Did cat die from eating fertilizer?

Dr. Marie replied:

I'm sorry to hear about Mitchell.

It is extremely unlikely that this was due to poisoning though. Fertilizer is very caustic which means that it is very unlikely that an animal would eat enough to cause problems. And even then, if we did see issues they would likely be vomiting, diarrhea and perhaps kidney failure. Those symptoms would definitely be evident before causing death.

Any other poisons that I can think of would cause signs of illness that would have been very obvious.

When a cat dies all of a sudden the first thing I think of is a condition called hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM). This is a heart condition that some cats can have all of their lives and never show any symptoms. (Some cats have a heart murmur with it, but not all). Cats with HCM can just suddenly have their hearts stop. When this happens the cat can just die in mid stride like you have described.

I guess we'll never know for certain what happened without having a post mortem exam done (and even then we don't always find the answer.) But rest assured that it is extremely unlikely that Mitchell's death was your fault.

Dr. Marie.




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