Dr. Reed Stevens talks about these pet myths
1. Cats always land on their feet – Cats have an amazing sense of balance. Their ability to right themselves by swinging their body around and land on their feet on the ground. From shorter distances it is actually harder for them to have time to turn themselves around. If you have cat tree you might want to have a soft pad around the bottom in case your cat is a little klutzy and there are definitely klutzy cats out there.
2. Wet nose vs. dry nose – It means nothing.
3. Dogs and cat’s mouths are cleaner than ours. It is true their immune system is better than our and they are better to cope, it seems, with pain than we do but he says when he looks into a dog or cats mouth and your smelling bad breath on you cat and dog there is some real disease in there. He says they have seen some terrible disease in terms of gingivitis and tarter and that can cause havoc with heart values, liver, kidney even the lungs. If your pet has bad breath it is a good time to visit the vet.
4. Dogs are color blind. – They are not. See blue, yellow, greens, but not as vivid as we do. Their vision is a little better than ours and a cat’s vision is far better than ours. During the day a dog’s vision is a little blurrier than ours.
5. Fleas and ticks are just a spring summer disease. – Not at all. Dr. Stevens definitely recommends your dog and cat has protection all year round.
6. Female cats and dogs should have one litter before they are spayed. – Not true at all. Spaying them before their first or second heat dramatically decreases the chances of mammary cancer later in life and removes the chances of them getting an infection in their uterus like people get infection in their appendix. In dogs it’s called pyometra and this can be very life-threatening and not to mention expensive especially if it is 3am and your dog needs urgent surgical care, so spay your dog.
