Thank you all for your thoughts.

I think I will tell the vet to wait on the FeLV vaccine, since its not 
necessary for them to have it right away.  My two older cats have been 
retested, and still are showing negative on FeLV.  

I'm still unsure on the whole overvaccination issue, but i'm not yet 
comfortable with not giving any vaccinations at all.  There are so many 
differing opinions on whether to give vaccinations.  I'm thinking I will give 
them their first sets of shots, and that will be the end of the shots.

The enclosure that we built is 6 feet high, but still needs to be reinforced 
before I let the kittens go in unsupervised.  We will be putting a wire 
upsidedown U shape at the top, so that they will be unable to climb out.  Since 
we fenced in a wild forrested area off our backyard, we also have to deal with 
some trees that are close to the fence...either cut them down or put plastic on 
their trunks to make them unclimable.

Oh, and these are my kittens if anyone wishes to see them :)  
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v43/Fyrwulf/?action=view&current=SamiTiko2.jpg
 , Tiko is on the left and Sami is on the right.

Cassandra
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: wendy 
  To: felvtalk@felineleukemia.org 
  Sent: Tuesday, July 31, 2007 4:17 PM
  Subject: Re: Vaccinating kittens of unknown status against FeLV?


  Hi Cassandra,

  Congratulations on your two new additions to your family!  They are so lucky 
to have you!  As far as vaccines go, what are your reasons for vaccinating the 
kittens?  Even if they do go outside, I don't know that much contact can be had 
through a chain link fence, although I could be very wrong.  How tall is this 
fence?  Is it possible they could jump it or outside cats could?  Do you have 
that enclosure thing that goes around the top that keeps them from jumping the 
fence or climbing over?  I would wait until they are older to do vaccinations, 
when you can test them for FeLV.  I am of the mind that if they are indoors 
only, I don't vaccinate at all.  

  I would really like to see research done on this issue.  Some people have 
cats who were vaccinated but positive and often they live for several years 
versus those that die in the their kittenhood who were not vaccinated.  It's 
just a hypothesis right now, but what if the vaccine actually does help?  When 
I have time, I'm going to write the professor at A&M and ask him about this and 
also about what percentage of anemia cases are attributable to hemobartonella.

  In the meantime, I would stick with not vaccinating a positive (or unknown 
positive) until we know better.
  :)
  Wendy
   
  "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change 
the world - indeed it is the only thing that ever has!"     ~~~ Margaret Meade 
~~~





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