Boston Ferns and your Cat

The Cat Fanciers association lists the Boston fern (Nephrolepis exaltata--a.k.a. Sword Fern) as a non-toxic plant for cats.

Today, our little guy taught us differently by munching on my boston fern last night while we slept, and getting sick afterwards.

Non-toxic does not necessarily mean "edible". We all know what happens when cats eat things they aren't meant to swallow.
 

Yuck.

We took him to a veterinary ER, to make sure he would be OK.  Apparently Boston Fern can cause gastrointestinal upset, lethargy, vomiting, loss of appetite, and diarrhea. We've seen all but the last one in our cat.

Yummy.

Cat's not happy about it either, but he seems to be recovering, getting his appetite back late this afternoon. (Right after we got home from the vet hospital, of course.)

From now on, only "edible" plants in the house.

Good thing I live in a semi-tropical climate, because my ferns are about to be banished to the warm shadiness of my back porch, where they will probably be just as happy anyway.

For a longer list of plants poisonous to your cat, see this list from the Cat Fanciers Association.

Just a spoonful of sugar...

Or is that a spoonful of raindrops?

That's about all I got from Edouard in my rain gauge today.  Almost exactly one inch in 24 hours. 

I feel like Ben Stein in the Clear Eyes commercial.

Wow.

Looks like I'll still be doing plenty of watering this week.

On the bright side, no flooding!

So far, so good over here.

Things are still pretty quiet southwest of Houston. Plenty of rain, very little wind.

Nancy has been seeing 

more action from Edouard today.  She has posted twice so far. Here, and here. See all of Nancy's Tropical Storm posts.

Not nearly as bad as Tropical Storm Allison, which stuck around dumping rain long enough to turn this:

Photo Source

Into this:

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Photo Source: Rice.edu

Photo Source: http://www.srh.noaa.gov

That's right.  Full up to the top. This was before I came out here.  Just gives you an idea of the possibilities, though.

Edouard, however appears to be moving at a decent enough pace to avoid repeating this.

Smells like rain...

Lots of it. And Wind. Nasty wind. 

Never been through a tropical storm, so this will probablly be an education.

I'll be bringing many of my lighter weight plants and my outdoor furniture into my garage tonight so they don't get too blown around.

The containers that are too big for me to move will just have to wait it out, I suppose.

Oh yes, and the wind chimes? They're coming in too. 

Hopefully the new little trees I planted last winter will be okay.

Hopefully the big trees won't drop anything on my house.

Tomorrow, definitely staying inside.

On the upside, at least we need the rain.

Post-storm thoughts to be posted later.