Cat With No Eyes Catches a Fly

My cat, Nickel, catches a fly she had been chasing all morning.

We found her in our driveway one morning and took her in thinking that she just hadn't opened her eyes yet (she was still very young) and we'd put her up for adoption because my wife is allergic to cats. After taking her to the vet, we found out that she had feline herpes in utero and didn't develop eyes. The recommendation from the vet was to put her down because quality of life couldn't be very good for a cat with no eyes.

We couldn't just put her down, so now my wife is buying allergy medicine in bulk and we've found out that this amazing cat has a great quality of life.

Wikipedia article on Feline Herpes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feline_viral_rhinotracheitis
It doesn't mention anything about birth defects and being born with no eyes though.

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• eyeless
• cat
• no
• eyes
• hunting
• fly
• catch

[lycante]

Congratulations for having such a special animal.

And on what the vet said, some vets should just understand that animals and humans alike have a truly AWESOME ability to adapt.

And with catlike hearing, I wouldn't be surprised if Nickel had some sort of echolocation going on. She found the fly after it was done buzzing, she knew exactly where your finger was when you were pointing at some point... truly remarkable.

Thanks for sharing this and congrats again.

[mjressler]

@lycante Her hearing is pretty astounding. I haven't recorded her making any noises to echo-locate though. When she gets startled she'll run into things, but quickly recovers. The only time she was really struggling was after she was spayed and we put the cone on her. She was such a sad sight running into things with that cone on that we just decided to take it off and chance it. Turns out she did OK :)

[ItsMrQ]

So no eyes at all, just empty sockets? Or is there like dried out eyeballs in there? Im so amazed at the ability of some animals.

[mjressler]

@ItsMrQ She has no eyes at all. Apparently when a cat has herpes in-utero, that messes with the development of the eyes and as a result, no eyeballs are formed. So she's been blind for life.

[alucardxserasfangirl]

what happened to her? she's cute

[mjressler]

@alucardxserasfangirl She was born without eyes. We found her in our driveway and the vet said she had Feline Herpes in utero and never developed eyes.

[KissHope]

Bless you both for giving life to this beautiful animal. Shame on the vet who said what he did, life is life with eyes or w/o.

[theofficialstagerage]

Awwwww..its so cute , i wish she had eyes :(

[TheSkylerTv]

@theofficialstagerage we could find a way to make your wish come true :)

[TheSkylerTv]

i could find a way to get glass eyes for this cat, or have real people donate their eyes for the cats.

[Molhedim]

@mjressler i love your voice so much ! is verry relaxing.

[pefu1906]

poor kitty :(

[CriticalBlackman]

That is the most badass cat ever.

[scrippsie1]

she's really pretty and super cute! my parents just adopted a blind kitten who had herpes and had to have her eyes removed. she is the most affectionate, loving, and playful little thing. sometimes you swear she can somehow see. i'm so glad you rescued this sweet kitty - cute video :)

[lycante]

@mjressler When hearing isn't great you would need to make sounds and listen to echoes, but I guess with cat hearing you'd hear other sounds bouncing off of things and there's air movement and what not...

And I wouldn't worry about it, my cats always ran into things when they had the cone on and their eyes are fine. :)