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Need help identifying a worm/bug...? Really confused!

post #1 of 4
9/29/11 at 5:30pm
Thread Starter 
Hello all,
Just got a new little guy yesterday. He's a stray and he seems to be in good health, considering. He's very skinny and I figured he probably had worms. We have a vet appointment coming up soon. Tonight as I was pouring food in his bowl, I saw this little...thing...right next to it on the floor. I looked at it in the light and it's definitely a bug or worm of some kind...but doesn't look like ANYTHING cat-related I an find online. It's a little over a half inch long, black on top, tannish brown on the underside. It appears to have segments - maybe or 5 - that almost make it look like a roly-poly type bug (but way less cute.) It has a distinct head, possibly with some pincher-type things on either side. Its body is "leaf-shaped", meaning it flares out and back in at the bottom.

The closest description I can find is fluke, but I don't understand how it's so big or where it came from. I think he'll be fine as I'm taking him to the vet soon, but I know some of these things are actually more dangerous to humans, and now I'm totally paranoid for both of us!

Thanks in advance for any tips...
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post #2 of 4
9/29/11 at 11:34pm
Are you sure the bug is coming from the cat and isn't just something that has come in from outside? It doesn't sound like anything I've seen or heard of. My only guess is that is can be a tapeworm since you describe it as being made up of segments. Tapeworm are made up of segments and although these segments are usually shedded individually looking like small individual worms it can sometime come out as a whole worm or several segments stuck together. A tapeworm does have a mouth piece that can hook on inside the cat but I don't think you would see it. Hookworm also have heads with pinching thingies but I believe that hookworm are a lot smaller and I've never heard of anyone seeing one. The only worms you will normally see are tapeworm segments that look like small white/brownish worms that look like grains of rice and sometimes move around and roundworm that are long and skinny like spaghetti and are usually seen, dead or alive, in vomit when a cat has a bad infestation.

I would bet that this bug is not an internal parasite from the cat. It's too big to be one.
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post #3 of 4
9/30/11 at 11:55am
Rest assured that this is not a intestinal parasite. You would not visibly see most parasites. Roundworm would be in the stool in the litterbox. Tapeworm looks like tan pieces of rice and is dried and hard. What you describe almost sounds like an earwig that came in from outside. I would just put it in a bag and bring it with you to the vet when you take the cat if you are worried. I am sure it is not a worm though.
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post #4 of 4
9/30/11 at 3:07pm
Thread Starter 
oooh, thanks! I was really worried, and grossed out Blech!
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