catnip

[Engine 88]

My cat, who is 7 months old,is possibly allergic to catnip.He was diagnosed with feline herpes about 4 months ago.He has since then been put on clavamox once and lysine 3 different times since then.We we first got him,he's a JBT, I had bought him some toys most had catnip inside and he loved to play with them.He also sneezed from a few times a day to possibly a dozen or more.This is why he was put on lysine to help stop the sneezing .It did not seem to help him.The last 3 weeks or so his sneezing was just about stopped .Last night I purchased some new play mice for him ,the others were destroyed and thrown out,I gave him one and he promptly broke it open and exposed the catnip and the stuffing. He then proceeded to sneeze quite a bit.I am going to take all the toys that have catnip and put them in the garage to see if it makes a difference.He has a vet appointment on Saturday. I will also speak to his vet about this situation. Do you think he could be allergic to catnip?Has anyone else experienced this?

[dandysmom]

http://www.idausa.org/cat_therapist/archive_december_06.htmlThat's a new one to me; never heard of a cat with a catnip allergy, but I suppose it's entirely possible. I'd be very interested to hear what the vet has to say......

Edited: I did a Google search on this, and could find only one mention; it's apparently rather rare and called psychogenic dermatitis. Here's a link:
Scroll down to self mutilation.
Carole Wilbourne is well known here in the States as an animal therapist.