I was really starting to wonder!
I’ve seen several nursing moms show up during feeding time. Normally, when their kittens get old enough to wean, the mamas bring them to the house and feeding stations and basically leave them here. That hasn’t been happening. One of the moms, Ink, clearly has a pretty large litter, judging from how her underside look, and how many teats seemed to be full and swaying. I could never get a good look to judge how many, though, but figured more than four. Lately, though, her belly is starting to return to normal appearance, which means she’s not really nursing much, if at all, anymore, and there’s no sign of kittens.
Well, that changes this morning.
When I came out to feed the cats this morning, I found four new babies in the sun room!
That black and white one in the back is particularly hissy-spitty. BUT they did not run away. They had been playing when I opened the door, which means they’d already been there for some hours, at least. Long enough to start to feel comfortable.
Lady Hypotenose is her mom, and she seems to have contentedly moved her babies into the sun room.
Everything else was as usual while I did my rounds, and when I left to meet up with my brother and his family to take my mom out for lunch.
That changed when I got home.
There were no kittens in sight when I parked the truck in the garage, but when I got out of the truck, I was hearing distressed meowing! My first thought was that I somehow hurt a kitten, but it wasn’t a pain meow. It was more of a panic meowing.
I went around the truck and saw a kitten run out from under and around my brother’s riding mower that’s parked to one side. The kitten saw me and ran behind some stuff to hide.
Which is where I saw a second head pop up, see me, and disappear again.
These kittens are much younger than the garage kittens.
It was late enough in the afternoon that I decided to quickly get changed, then feed the outside cats. Lately, I’ve been doing just kibble, but this time I made sure to do the upgrade from kitten soup. Before, I would use a couple of cans of wet cat food, mixed with hot water until smooth and thin, and then I mixed in dry kibble to soak up the water and wet cat food gravy. The cats love it to the point that I have had to kick the adult cats out of the sun room so the kittens could get some.
I also grabbed an extra container to use as a bowl in the garage.
Well, that worked out different than expected.
After I’d put the garage food out, I saw the little kitten I’d seen first, running around behind the garage and meowing. Pinky – the garage kitten mom – seemed unsure about these new additions and a little stressed out.
Still, once the food was set out, I saw her eating together with one of her own kittens, plus the new one.
The new one was eating very enthusiastically.
Looks like we have a boy!
Just after I got that first picture, though, Pinky promptly started batting at his head. He was so hungry, he mostly ignored it and went back to eating, but Pinky was NOT happy with him there.
He was so busy eating, I was able to come over, pick him up and carry him to the isolation shelter. He hissed at me, but that was about it. Once I put him down, he almost immediately dove in for the food.
I finished up with the cat feeding and put things away. By the time I was done, the new kitten was out of the isolation shelter and running around in the grass, meowing in distress. He seemed to be trying to follow other cats. For a moment, I thought maybe Ink was the mom after all, but she took off, ignoring the kitten as he tried to follow her.
When the kitten started wandering to the outer yard, I had to do something. It’s dangerous for a kitten out there! Thankfully, I was able to catch him. This time, I took him into the sun room and into the cat cage, then gave it his own food and water bowl. He tried to get through the cat cage walls for a while before the food became too irresistible for him. The cat cage has a kitten sized opening under the “door”, so it would eventually find its way out, but for the moment, he settled. Some of the kittens that showed up this morning were nearby, and that seemed to relax him a bit. Which is when I was able to get that last photo in the above slide show.
After a while, though, Lady Hypotenose showed up to nurse her own kittens. While she was moving around to get their attention, I took a chance and got the new kitten out of the cat cage and put him with Lady Hypotenose and her babies. I don’t think she nursed him, but he was definitely calmer around the other kittens, and already seems to have picked a friend!
In the second picture, you can see Lady Hypotenose taking a break from the kittens!
Two of her others like to hand out around that cat bed. The last one, the black and white, is definitely the spiciest of them all. I kept hearing him growing, hissing and spitting, at any of the bigger kittens that come near.
Later on, I’ll go out and see if I can spot that other kitten I saw in the garage. I’d really like to get it into the sun room, too. Whichever cat is the mama, at least in the sun room, they will have access to food and water, even if the mama has simply left them here.
Our total kitten population is now at 14 or 15, and the new ones in the sun room now have a MUCH better chance at being socialized and hopefully adopted out!
Which is a good time to point out that we do have a donation button at the top. All donations go towards the feeding and care of the cats.
The Re-Farmer
The Re-Farmer 