Pet Food Recall

I must be living in a vacuum because I just found out this morning about the pet food recall and the rising number of the deaths caused by kidney failure from the tainted food. Here's a link to the latest news on it:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-03-20-pet-food_N.htm?POE=NEWISVA

The list of recalled cat foods are here:

http://www.menufoods.com/recall/product_cat.html

The list of recalled dog foods are here:

http://www.menufoods.com/recall/product_dog.html

We were safe with our cat foods which are all made by Royal Canin but I had two cans of Nutra Ultra dog food for filling and freezing in kongs which was on the list. One was from the bad date and unopened. That went straight into the garbage. The opened one was 2/3 empty and was from before the recall date. That also went straight into the garbage. We're not taking any chances with a dog who is already missing one kidney.

Cat Toys

We got a new favorite cat toy a month ago from the retail shelves at the Woodbury humane society shelter where I work. It's a simple toy made of stiff wire and little bits of tightly twisted paperboard, but it makes even our little fat cat dance around on her hind legs. Our other long-standing favorite toy is a beautiful length of fleece on a sturdy clear wand that reminds me of the long trailing ribbon wand things they use in rhythmic gymnastics. It can move like a snake and makes the cats do gymnastics. All the other wand type toys have died fairly quick deaths when the strings have broken or feathers or whatever was on the end were pulled out while we were playing. The fleece toy has lasted more than a year with frequent use - a record for our household. (A lot of our toys get put away when we're done playing since they fall victim to a combination team of chewing cats and dog if we're not looking.) I was surprised to see that both toys are made by the same company Cat Dancer. Here's a link to their products page. Our favorites are the Cat Dancer and the Cat Charmer.