I’ve got a prenatal appointment with the OBGYN next week and I am sure she’ll make a comment about the lack of weight gain this month but N and I aren’t worried. According to all our reading Tater is just starting another growth spurt so I’ll probably pack on several more pounds shortly.

It seems my weight gain is not really a gradual thing, I pack on a good amount one month which puts me over what is deemed normal then the next month I stall out and don’t gain much… It is hit or miss really. Good news is I am still eating like a mad woman and I’ve put on 20 pounds since becoming pregnant, I think gaining another 20-30 pounds in 3 months is not going to be a problem.

This morning I was happy to see it was again a warmer day and we were able to open up all the windows and enjoy the fresh breeze. We are fresh air and sunlight people. We love our windows to be open so winter is sometimes a downer for us, especially when we don’t get enough pretty snow.

The morning email checking was nice with the cool breeze blowing through the house. Andrew one of our cats climbed in to my lap and took a nap as soon as I got up. These days all the pets have been less interested in hanging out with me, probably because they sense Tater is coming. So it was nice that Andrew came to see me today.

N snapped a photo of the love fest on my lap so everyone could see how the belly is looking…

It is kind of funny how Tater responds to the cats purring. She can totally hear them and she will kick when ever they are purring near my belly.

I told N she is either going to be super soothed by the purring when she’s born or she’ll go crazy wanting to play with them when they purr. What do you think?

The post Purring Cats on Pregnant Bellies… 24 week pregnancy thoughts appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

Fleas are nasty, nasty creatures. If you can’t tell the kind of make me crazy. It is all because of this one encounter N and I shared way back in the day. Right after we began dating N moved in to my tiny 1 bedroom apartment with me. It was in Tempe, Arizona in the dead of summer and our fridge died so I went to the complex management about it.

They wouldn’t be able to get us a new fridge for several days and all our food was spoiling so we were pretty put out. The complex management offered to let use a working fridge in a vacant apartment in the meantime. They could have just moved the working fridge to our place but whatever. So they gave us the keys to the vacant place, we packed up our spoiling groceries and headed over to store them in the vacant place.

As soon as we entered the vacant apartment we immediately were disgusted by how dirty and messy it was left, then we felt things jumping on our legs. We soon realized the place was totally infested with fleas and they were feasting on our fresh meat as we walked across the apartment. It was the most unbelievable thing. We were literally jumping all around and trying to run across the carpet to avoid the fleas.

After entering the flea infested apartment we would shake off and even left our shoes outside our apartment to avoid tracking fleas in to our own place. We had 3 cats at that time so fleas were the last thing we wanted. Unfortunately they were unavoidable.

Inevitably a few made it in to our place and began taking up residence on our clean kitties. We got rid of the fleas after several months and it was not a fun process. We were just thankful that our flea situation never even came close to the nastiness of the vacant, flea apartment. To this day fleas and roaches just make my blood boil (I’ll save the roach story for another day though).

Amazingly bathing the cats was mostly an easy task. Jack, our huge yellow kitty, was the handful of the bunch. He acted like we were trying to skin him or something, it was quite dramatic and man is he strong! The rest of the kitties were cooperative and now everyone smells and looks so nice. Also, they have all stopped itching so I feel good about the flea eradication.

—————–

Want a comb that will electrocute fleas? I found this fun and evil little flea zapper online that ammused me.

The post Fleas make me a crazy lady! appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

However, I have received much information from readers about the potentially harmful side effects of Colloidal Silver and I did want to disclose this information to all my readers.

I do not want to give anyone bad advice or only provide one side of the story so I feel it is appropriate to update this post to include some of the potentially harmful side effects of Colloidal Silver. (I added all this stuff to the original post also)

As with anything you should consult your doctor before hand and you should get all the facts! To help you with this I want to share some of the useful information about how Colloidal Silver, when used in excess, could harm you.

I did some reading online today and found a site that explains “The best known consequence of over consumption of silver is argyria. Most authorities state that argyria is disfiguring because of the discoloration of the skin but has no other harmful consequences. With argyria, silver is taken internally in excess and the excess is deposited in the skin, organs and other tissues. This causes the skin to turn a gray or bluish gray color. Upon exposure to strong sunlight, skin of the affected individuals can turn a dark brown or black color. This coloration is permanent. In addition to argyria, the intake of very large doses (far in excess of the amount that causes discoloration of the skin) of silver can cause neurological damage, organ damage and arteriosclerosis.”

Fore more reading on the risks of Colloidal Silver check out:

• From the National Center for Alternative and Complimentary Medicine- Colloidal Silver
• Colloidal Silver Toxicity – How much is harmful?
• Another person turns blue from colloidal silver
• Colloidal Silver- Safe or Scam?

If you have something to share on this topic please don’t hesitate to post a comment below. Knowledge is power, I want to be informed and to provide helpful information to my readers so they can make the best decision for themselves.

Oh, I have a video of my sick kitty that I am posting to help other pet owners recognise an upper respiratory infection in their own pet. Some animal owners actually don’t know what an upper respiratory infection looks like! Basically lots of sneezing, maybe some snot bubbles coming out of the nose, wheezing, watery eyes you know all the symptoms of human respiratory issues would indicate a possible respiratory infection in your furry friend.

[youtube r5rXgAkLfbw Sick Jack]

The post Upper respiratory infections in pets- Day 1 update appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

Out here in the rural subdivision we live in people have the tendency to allow their animals and small children to wander about the neighborhood without supervision. I guess they must feel it is safer because we aren’t in heart of a crime ridden city but still that is no reason to let everyone run amok. That is a rant for another day though.

Anyway, we kept the friendly dog out of our house and went about our business moving in. We didn’t bother to try and take her back to her home because we had the feeling she was allowed to run the neighborhood as were most dogs in the area.

A week after we were moved in we discovered that Dixie had a strange eye discharge, her eyes we watering like crazy and the discharge was greenish. We figured she had picked up and eye infection from playing with Lady on move in day (or that one of the cats had scratched her eye). We wiped her eyes out for a week with warm washcloth and eventually the eye discharge cleared up.

Well last week Andrew (one of our cats) began sneezing like crazy and his eyes were watering, he was sluggish for a few days and then back to normal but now Jack and Mr. Guy (also cats) are sneezing and displaying the same symptoms. Except they are much worse that Andrew was. Jack can barely breathe and he seldom eats or drinks anything now.

It appears our household has contracted an upper respiratory infection. In felines this infection is highly contagious and is often treated with costly antibiotics at the veterinarian. We don’t have the money to be taking all our animals to the vet for antibiotics and would prefer not to unless they absolutely need it. Besides we prefer to do things a bit more naturally.

A few years back a coworker gave me a bottle of Colloidal Silver and explained how it is great remedy for many ailments. It’s apparently a naturally occurring mineral that when taken clears up many infections, much like an antibiotic. We have a bottle of it from that worker (she got it at a natural food store) that I have used occasionally with great results! Today I was thinking it may also benefit my sick kitties.

I set out to learn about it’s impact on animals. Obviously I am not trying to give my pets something that could harm them so I did some research on Colloidal Silver and animals.

Lots of people have used it on their animals for various aliments. It is given topically, rectally and orally depending on the problem. It is even administered to treat minor sicknesses in dogs and cats. I found a fellow blogger who has shared his success with Colloidal Silver and his pets.

It appears Colloidal Silver is successful in animals so I gave my furry friends some today to help them get over the respiratory infection. If you are looking for information on how Colloidal Silver is used for pets and/ or it’s safety check out this Google search for Colloidal Silver for pets.

———

Update 1 day later-

Jack’s symptoms have greatly improved and he is acting more himself, I only added a few drops to water and fed it to him via dropper. However, I have received much information from readers about the potentially harmful side effects of Colloidal Silver.

I do not want to give anyone bad advice or only provide one side of the story so I feel it is appropriate to update this post to include some of the potentially harmful side effects of Colloidal Silver.

As with anything you should consult your doctor before taking it and you should get all the facts! To help you with this I want to share some of the useful information about how Colloidal Silver could harm you.

I did some reading and found that a site that outlines that “The best known consequence of over consumption of silver is argyria. Most authorities state that argyria is disfiguring because of the discoloration of the skin but has no other harmful consequences. With argyria, silver is taken internally in excess and the excess is deposited in the skin, organs and other tissues. This causes the skin to turn a gray or bluish gray color. Upon exposure to strong sunlight, skin of the affected individuals can turn a dark brown or black color. This coloration is permanent. In addition to argyria, the intake of very large doses (far in excess of the amount that causes discoloration of the skin) of silver can cause neurological damage, organ damage and arteriosclerosis.”

Fore more reading on the risks of Colloidal Silver check out:

• From the National Center for Alternative and Complimentary Medicine- Colloidal Silver
• Colloidal Silver Toxicity – How much is harmful?
• Another person turns blue from colloidal silver
• Colloidal Silver- Safe or Scam?

If you have something to share on this topic please don’t hesitate to post a comment below. Knowledge is power, I want to be informed and to provide helpful information to my readers so they can make the best decision for themselves!

The post Upper respiratory infections in pets. appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.

We did removed the grown babies from the cage mom and dad are in. We did this because all the reading material said that when mom and dad began laying again the older/ grown babies would be in danger and that they might be considered “in the way”…

So despite the very traumatic situation we separated them. Babies are in one cage and mom, dad and the 5 new eggs are in another cage.

Oh, and my 3 grown babies are doing well and all have new homes & owners that will take them pretty soon here. We still have the gray/ white finch that is a bit different from all the rest. I guess we hatched a unique one!

So once the grown babies start to get their defining feathers we will send them off to their new homes and then we will focus on the new hatchlings that are on the way, we will need to find homes for these too.. It would be nice if we could sell the to a pet store!

The post Oh, boy… We have 5 NEW finch eggs! appeared first on Updates from Ryder Family Farm.