Neighbour using poison

[FrancesNiadova]

I live in a tiny hamlet, 1/2 dozen dwellings. An untidy neighbour regularly gets rats in their barn. I had 2 lovely cats. A couple of years ago, the tortie became very sick & died; it was awful nursing her, squirting water into her mouth every hour day & night. The vet thought she'd been poisoned, that she'd eaten a mouse that had eaten the poison. He'd thought she might pull through as she was a young cat & I was flushing her out with water every hour. Anyway, she did die & it was awful, just awful. (I had been diagnosed with breast cancer the previous week & the effect on us all was awful: the worst week of my life).
All the neighbours knew what had happened & of course nobody would ever dream of putting poison down.
Sooo, roll on 20 months & 1 neighbour was complaining about the untidy neighbour's barn & said, "On Monday, I shall be putting poison down, I'm fed up of seeing rats running out of it." I begged him not to, but he just went on about how rats are vermin & it's only what pest control would do. I haven't seen any rats, anywhere, but I'm so worried. I can't keep our girl in, she's used to running in the fields and hunting mice. I can't bear to think of her suffering like our other girl did. What can I do? Are people allowed to put poison down when they know that there are animals around?

I don't think you can do anything apart from beg. I think you're going to have to keep her inside. Maybe, long term, you could get the cat netting stuff for your garden so she can't get out of your garden, but for now I would keep her in.

Thanks for your advice, I just hope that no woozy mice get in. I couldn't bear to see our girl suffer in that way again.

I'm not sure if this would help, or be allowed, but would it be possible to talk to your vet about antidotes (I think Vit. K injections are one thing that's used) and see if perhaps you could have a few on hand, so if the worst does happen you can get started treating her straight away?

It's a terrible thing, but I also think that given how much poison is around I'm always surprised that it doesn't happen more - so I think cats must sometimes be able to tell the mouse or rat is 'bad' - or perhaps the poisoned ones hide themselves away.

If there is a query over eating rat and mouse poison it is important to blood tests for clotting to help establish how long vitamin K needs to used for. Some of the third and fourth generation products require prolonged periods of treatment.

Lonecat - oh yes absolutely, I wasn't thinking of just treating with Vitamin K without seeing the vet, but if Frances had Vit K to hand then maybe it would help being able to get some into the cat straight away if she did turn up ill. I'm not a vet or anything, just wondered if that might be something practical she could do.

It ideally should be given by intravenous injection so sadly an act of veterinary surgery and can not be deputed to a lay person.

The vet did give my cat 2 injections & advised me to give her water with a syringe hourly, which I did, (I wasn't sleeping anyway due to my diagnosis!) I can't believe that a neighbour is now talking about poison though. I just know that I couldn't see my other girl fight & go through all of that, again.
I will call the RSPCA tomorrow & ask for advice.

Using poison is absolutely disgusting in this day and age. There are specially designed traps where a poisoned rodent can't escape.
Poison also damages wildlife. There are other animals and birds who eat mice. They die as a result, and their young die.

I agree Rudis, we have all sorts of wildlife up here; jays, woodpeckers & a pair of beautiful red kites - what would happen if they ate a poisoned mouse or rat?
I'm feeding my girl up & even adding dreamies to her food. I also have 4 hens who are just hilarious: they squat to be picked up, raise their wings for a tickle under their armpits & will sit in the conservatory if I'll let them! I dread to think of 1 of them eating a poisoned mouse or shrew.