advice on a cat

Hello all. I live on a farm and I have 2 cats. The female I've had for 2 years. She has since had 3 litters (@#$%). I also have one of the toms from her second litter. The tom is the one I am worried about. He is about a year or so. He usually likes to stay out doors for long periods of time. He is a survivor and will eat mice and whatever he can get his paws on. He is usually active and very aware., but lately he has been very lethargic and sleeps about 22 hours a day. His fur is starting to shed and since I live in Alberta, this is not the normal time for a cat to start shedding. He has holed up somewhere in the house where I cant find him and i won't see him for a couple of days at a time now. He won't eat much and I've noticed there is diarhea in the kitty box lately. The mother has been spending a lot of time around him as if to be worried in a cat mother sort of way (best way to describe it) I know animals sense thing better than we do, so I am a little worried. I'm not a cat person. I got a cot for the usual reasons to get a cat on a farm, but I have sort of taken a liking to them and would hate to see anything bad happen. My concern is maybe he picked up a bug while out  doing what he does and if so could it be caught by the mother. I also have a dog and would hate to see everyone get sick. I have tons of pigeons out there hence tons of pigeon poo. If anyone has any thoughts I would appreciate it.

Thanks

Rick

Thank you for taking care of the cats.

Were I you I'd try to trap the male cat and take him to the vet--your large animal vet if that's the only one around.  He may have worms, may have a URI.  If you set out poison for mice, he could have eaten an infected mice.

While he at the vets, needs to be neutered if not already.

Worms and URI are contagious, certain intraspecies.  Pigeon do-do is a no-no, too.

If you have a good relationship with your vet, he might prescribe antibiotics (kind you can put in food) and dewormer without seeing the cat.

And yes, other cats can sense sickness.  Some become hostile; others, very protective.

Thanks Ritz. He's not feral just prefers outdoors, but he hasn't gone outside in quite a while. The mom is very protective of him lately. I'll see if I can get him to a vet here quickly.                                                                                                                                    

Good to hear; let us know what the vet says.

Is the mom spayed?

If super protective, you might want to take both to the vets; the mom probably has worms too.

Are either spay/neutered?

It's really time for the female to stop having litters. It's bad for her health and there's a really bad problem with homeless animals already. I strongly reccomend taking both cats to the vet and having the spay/neuter surgeries done, but getting the male checked out first since he seems to be sick.