Cats and Elastic Hair Ties

LizFS · ‎01-30-2015

Hi,

I was reading a thread from 2010 (yeah, I know) about cats stealing makeup brushes, and I came across a post from someone whose cats love to take off with her elastic hair ties. And while I realize this is not exactly a beauty related question, I had to chime in.

My cat also loves elastic hair ties. She goes just loony tunes about them. She can smell them a mile away (not sure how), and will shriek, just SHRIEK, if she thinks you have one and aren't sharing it. She loves to carry them around the house, chomping on them, often times seeming to treat them as though they were kittens she was grooming. And because she wanted them so much and had such a good time with them, we let her have them.

One day, Ms. Smudge started meowing very loudly, in a way that was very different from her normal "pay attention to me NOW" voice. It was a sad, mournful, deep kind of meow, and she sounded like she was in pain. So I took her to my vet.

During the exam, he felt a mass in her stomach. It was large, the size of a baseball. So they took an x-ray. They could clearly see the mass, and said it was a tumor that had to come out and be biopsied. She was meowing because it was causing pain when she ate. We scheduled the surgery and waited to find out if Smudge had cancer and what that was going to mean.

Thank heavens, Smudge came through the surgery with flying colors, and if you've read this far, you've probably guessed that she didn't have cancer, either. We brought our now perfectly healthy kitty home, along with a plastic bag containing the undigested pieces of approximately fifty elastic hair ties she had eaten over the years.

I had no idea, when she was playing with these things, that she was swallowing them. I had seen her chewing on them, but I never saw pieces laying around, I would find whole hair ties in groups behind the toilet or under the coffee table and figured she was storing them there - it just never occurred to me that she was swallowing them, because we kept finding the whole ties. But she was swallowing them. And they almost killed her.

Just a cautionary heads-up.

Pinkroses · ‎03-10-2010

I bet my Daisy would do that.! I give her scrunies. Glad your cat is ok!

MarenSeattle · ‎10-19-2013

I keep ribbons, rubber bands, string, anything that she can swallow away from my cat. I DO let her play with the BIG scrunchies, but I take it away and put it out of reach so she can only have it when I'm supervising. They're like little kids, I swear. And the thing with cats is they have no regurgitating action (or something) -- once something starts going down, they're committed to swallowing it. Every time I see her with something I'm on top of it.

SO happy your cat is okay and that you know her well enough to know the difference in her meows. She's lucky and so are you!! :-)

TY · ‎03-10-2010

Liz, my dog nearly choked on a scarf that was in her toy basket, so I'm not surprised that your cat would eat hairband elastics. My daughter is an animal health tech and they sometimes have patients who have swallowed all sorts of stuff (mostly dogs though) so I'm glad that your pet is better. It's a good idea to keep stuff that pets can get into away from them. I put all my hair stuff in a basket with a lid so my cat's can't get into them.

ANewHue · ‎11-21-2011

Your post caught my eye because I have three rescues, two kittens that also go ga-ga over them and elastic bands as well One of them loves to run around with them in his mouth when he finds one, it"s like he struck gold. I don't know where they kept getting the elastic bands from because I keep them in a bag in a drawer. My DD thought it was cute they were playing with them but I grabbed them away and explained the danger. Glad yours is fine.

Donnalona · ‎03-09-2010

Thanks for the heads up and I just want to add that on TV the other nite they had a cat which was an indoor outdoor cat swallow his little play mice and needed surgery. All because he was used to catching mice outside. So examine all toys for your pets and like children if they can swallow it throw it away.

GSPgirl · ‎01-03-2012

My moms kitty died after she ate a ribbon. I keep ribbons and used dental floss away from my cat.

MarenSeattle · ‎10-19-2013

On 1/30/2015 donnalona said: Thanks for the heads up and I just want to add that on TV the other nite they had a cat which was an indoor outdoor cat swallow his little play mice and needed surgery. All because he was used to catching mice outside. So examine all toys for your pets and like children if they can swallow it throw it away.

When I get mine a new toy, I pull off any feathers or "eyes", etc., that could come off and she could swallow. I really feel like I'm overly protective (when I was growing up we had cats who lived long lives who weren't as "sheltered") but I can't help it. I feel responsibil for her as much as I would feel for an infant/toddler.

Caitlinh429 · ‎06-25-2014

Yup, my cat is fascinated with all hair ties, elastic bands, ribbons, etc. My mother's cat also died when she was a kid from eating a rubber band, so I grew up with my mother constantly telling me to put away my hair ties and pick up rubber bands. Now I tell others Smile It's especially hard during xmas time though, I always find my cat finding ribbons.

shoekitty · ‎03-10-2010

They do not make most dog and cat toys safe! They really need to have standards. I guess they feel they are cats and dogs so why bother? ${#emotions_dlg.confused1}$ I am glad so many owners are more than savvy though when it comes to protecting pets.

I have issue with plastic grocery bags, which I am glad are being outlawed. My SIL lost her dog to one, and I had a cat who had a near tragedy had I not been there. There is a reason there is a warning on them

My daughter's cat Loves scrunchies. He goes wild for them. I think he carries the same one around though. I will remind her to be careful with them around though.