Washburn, our ginger cat, appeared in the living room yesterday evening just before kitty supper time; he hobbled in holding up his front paw.
We hurriedly checked him over, and couldn't find anything. It didn't seem to be broken, we couldn't find a wound... we assumed that he had probably landed awkwardly. We agreed that it wasn't an emergency, so we would take him to the Vet in the morning.
Meanwhile we blocked up the cat flap, and put out a litter tray. Our cat flap has a lock so we can prevent cats from going out. We've had something on previous cat flaps, which just don't work on a determined individual. Years ago, Wash was trying to get out of a "locked" cat flap, and he managed to get a paw stuck in the corner. Not pleasant.
Even if that hadn't happened, I want the cats to be able to trust that the flap will open when they want it to. And so we've always blocked access to the flap completely. Usually the bin which contains the chicken feed (which is a semicircle shape) gets dragged in front. We happened to have some discarded bits of worktop by the cat flap, so we used those.
Wash slept in the study behind a computer. He came in to see us this morning, and spent an hour having a cuddle.
He still can't put any weight on his front paw, but he is managing to get around on 3 paws very well.
Wash hates using the litter tray. He keeps begging to go out, scratching and scratching at the kitchen door. Normally we get up and let him out, but we've been ignoring his pleas.
Poor lad.
I phoned the Vet at 8.30, as soon as it was open. Got an appointment for this morning.
