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Using 'The Pill' with your Breeding Queens

This does not pretend to be an authoritative article. The author is not a Veterinarian and is only aiming to pass on some anecdotal feedback, which may serve as a cautionary tale to alert breeders to some of the pitfalls of using “the pill” to suspend the normal cycling of our breeding Queens.

We all talk to a great many breeders as we network around the Cat Fancy. Many people use the pill successfully and have no difficulty subsequently, once they stop administering it, in getting their Queens into kitten and then producing completely viable litters.

There are others who declare that they would not at any price administer the pill, whether to maiden Queens or to older breeding females. Everyone is entitled to their views, based probably on personal experience and that of their friends.

The author can only pass on to you their own observations and some horror stories related to them by close friends, whose version of events they would believe. In the authors experience the breeders who seem to suffer no ill effects in giving the pill administer it in minute quantities. People reported that they give one quarter of a tablet before the Queen actually comes into season and then continue to give the same dose every two weeks until the decision is made to breed from her again. Others have reported giving one half of a tablet every three weeks – again before the Queen goes into full-blown “call”. Others have said that they start with one quarter of a tablet and watch for signs of the Queen showing early cycling behaviour before they give a further quarter tablet and that the gaps in between doses get longer and longer. All these approaches seem to produce good results.

Anecdotally, where things seem to go wrong is when whole tablets are administered on consecutive days, often when the cycle has already started; i.e. when the calling behaviour is well established and the Queen already vocal. One particular horror story reported was when a Veterinary Nurse gave a breeder a packet of 20mg tablets instead of 5mg and the breeder gave all her Queens the 20mg dose in whole tablets on several consecutive days. None of her Queens have subsequently produced complete litters of viable kittens, a problem which her Veterinarian now believes is likely to be attributable to the high doses of 20mg tablets.

Please therefore be careful about your own use of this treatment. Consult with your own Vet and do speak to other breeders who have used the pill over a number of years with no ill effects. The authors own Vet advises that it is always better to breed from cats as soon as they are fully grown and mature enough to cope with a litter. He says that cats can be bred from frequently, unless they do not physically or mentally deal well with having and rearing healthy kittens. Therefore, to hold them back is “unnatural” and potentially harmful. It may be better to allow them to have several litters quite close together – say one litter every 9 months – and then spey them once they have had several litters. This is often difficult for breeders to cope with, especially if you have Queens that spray in the house when they come into season. However, we need to balance our own life style and convenience with what is best for our cats.

Oriental Cat Breeder advises that this article is for information only and that prescription medicine should only be administered under the advice and instruction of your vet.

Many thanks to OCA for their kind permission to publish this article.

Listings appearing on Oriental Cat Breeder do not constitute as recommendations.

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