A listener, Teague, emailed asking about taking your cat hiking and when Dewey and I talked about this episode, we thought we'd share our personal experiences. Being a Bigfoot enthusiast, Dewey is the perfect one to share some of our trail experiences with Pico.

Who's really calling the shots in your household? Cats have a reputation for being the masters of their domain, but why is that? In this episode, we talk about why our furry feline friends are such control freaks - and should you let them get away with that?

I'm currently fostering two cats - one medical and one behavior - and it inspired me to talk again about fostering. Is it for you? Do you have time? What might the challenges be? What's in it for you? I finished recording and realized I hadn't talked about fostering nursing moms! That's a huge demographic of cats in need of a foster home - and they're so easy! Mom does all the work. You get to play with the kittens and mom does all the feeding. I'm sorry I forgot to include that in the episode!

Stress plays an important role in the health of your cat - just as it does with humans. In this episode learn the types of stress your cat struggles with, the impact of stress, things that you might inadvertently be doing to cause stress, how to detect stress in your cat and what you can do to fix and prevent stress for your cat.

A listener, Denise Catoni, emailed me with a podcast topic, Chylothorax in Cats. I'd never heard of the medical condition before! She told me about losing her cat to this rare disease and I invited her to the show to talk about her journey.

Karen W. sent in another request for us to talk about some of the pros and cons of feeding cats a raw food diet. There are many more than we covered in this episode, but it is a good place to start if you're considering converting to a raw food diet.

Listeners always have the best questions! And when heard in their own voice, is even better! We added a feature to www.cattalkradio.com where you can record and submit questions. We don't get a lot of them, so I've collected them and answered the questions in this podcast. Please submit more, I think this is a really good format!

If you've listened to any of our enrichment episodes, you know how important it is to find ways to connect your cat with you and nature. Connecting with nature boosts their physical and mental well being. Our indoor spaces should allow our cats to mimic their natural behaviors. How do we ensure our cats are thriving indoors? Two very special ladies are with us on this podcast to share some great ideas!

You might remember the episode we did on cat litter that ended with me saying I hadn't found the perfect one yet. After that, I set out to test a bunch of different litters for their clumping ability, odor control, dust factor, renewable source, biodegradability, and cat preference. In that process, I found IT - truly the best litter I could hope for. Join me in this podcast as we talk about why Smart Cat grass rules.

Why do cats do things we don't like? What triggers those behaviors and how do we encourage different behaviors? What are some of the effective disciplinary actions you can use on a cat?