Going to the vets

[Kurt Mylar]

We whent to the vets to get the rest of Loki's kitten shots. He absolutly can not stand the vet and hisses at her and fights her all the way. So he has doubled in weight in a month he is 6.9 pounds and all the vet could talk about was how big his feet are. Tiger grew about a pound a month and he is 19 pounds now. I am wondering if Loki might get a little bigger than Tiger. Tiger's tail is about 12" long at almost two years and Loki's tail is about 13" long at 4 months.

 

[Kristine]

Most cats do not like the vet, Loki is not alone. I have no idea on how big he'll be based on his current weight. I am guessing a pretty big kitty. I have an 11 week old F 7 SBT boy who is about 8 lbs and he seems giant to me. He is almost the size of his mother! But I still cannot predict what will happen as he grows.

 

[Lori Greer]

Especially when their experience is for shots or worse... the dreaded rectal temp!

 

[Patti]

I'm sorry to hear that Loki doesn't get along well with your vet - do you think it's a personality thing, or does he just not like the vet's office. If it is the latter then you might be able to desensitize him by taking him to visits there where staff take a few minutes lavishing attention on him and nothing 'bad' happens to him.

I'm not sure how to respond to your size question. Using tail length to gauge size is probably not going to give you a very accurate picture. The best way to judge size is to measure Loki from the shoulder bone to the paw. Also, I usually consider a lb per month of age to be an average growth rate so anything more than that may indicate a larger cat once it reaches adulthood.

 

[Kurt Mylar]

He seems to be fine until the poking and proding starts and hates the shots one ok but two or more forget it.

 

[Brigitte Cowell]

Tail length most definitely is NOT a good gauge, if one has a Serval length tail compared to an Oriental Shorthair's relative tail length.... for a Savannah they could inherit either!

Funny story though, I remember Sandy and Mike Hale showing Babe many years ago, the judge commented on his long possum-like tail and I flippantly said "oh, he'll grow into that"... and he did! By a year old that tail was within our Standard and no longer a long tail...sometimes they do indeed grow into that tail. Some keep a very long Oriental whippy tail though...

 

[Ashley]

Kovu HATES the vet. I'm thinking about taking him in because he is getting SO chubby, even with exercise & cutting back on food, but I'm worried about how stressed he is going to get. Especially with the rectal temp.. that gets him riled up EVERY time.

Kovu's tail is pretty long (13 inches also) & he is 7 months old. Any time I take him out people are always commenting on his tail. lol

 

[DChap]

So far Tojo doesn't have a problem with the vet. His tail is long too and he is so obsessed with it he almost fell off his 76" cat tree the other day while chasing it