Here's the story. Munchkin turned up at our feeders about October 4th or 5th. She was teeny weeny. We thought she was part of a new batch of kittens from a pregnant mom we'd seen in August.
We took her to the Vet along with one of the other cats that needed to be spayed, but we were worried about Munchie's health (because she was so small), so she saw the Vet. There are four Doctors there - this was the owner, who we'd never seen before (we'd met him, but he'd never seen any of our cats before). They all know us there. He told Gary that this baby kitten was about 6 months old. That would mean she had to be the "lost" one from the first litter (the litter from which we adopted Lazlo and Sheldon). "What a survivor!," we thought. We left her there to be X-rayed because it seemed she had a problem with her bowels, but X-rays showed nothing wrong. They expressed her bladder, and she eventually had a bowel movement, and all seemed o.k. And they spayed her. So we brought her back, and released her.
Then it got cold, one of the cats mauled her, and we took her back to the Vets on either Halloween or the Friday morning after. We picked her up Sunday (she needed a few stitches, dewormed again, some antibiotics, etc.) One of the Doctors we work with regularly saw her. Gary asked how old she thought the kitten was, and she said it's so hard to tell, but maybe three months.
Gary didn't go nuts then, and we just kind of let it go. BAD US.
She's been here since Sunday. She is so small and SUCH A KITTEN, yesterday he called the Vet to talk to the owner to ask on what basis he made the age estimate. He got back to us this morning and said that the kitten had its adult teeth coming in, and Gary had said he'd been feeding her for "a little while." O.K. granted. Gary should have said a few days.
That kitten wasn't getting it's adult teeth in - if teeth were coming in, they were her baby teeth!!!!!!!!
But is that even possible? I looked it up last night, and it says the teeth start coming in at 8 to 10 days old. For how long do they grow? Because we started feeding her Oct 4 or 5 - so if baby teeth were still growing in, how old could she have been? Dummies that we are, it just occured to us that THE REASON SHE HAD A PROBLEM WITH HER BOWELS was that she was still weaning and shouldn't have been eating solid food yet!
At 1.9 lbs. with teeth growing in - could she have been 3 or 4 weeks old? I've found all kinds of places that tell me when their teeth start growing in, but nowhere does it say how long it takes them to come in.
All I know is, this is a mystery.
And Gary is FLAMING MAD that they would have been so irresponsible as to spay a kitten that young!!!!!!!!
Poor Munchkin!
(P.S. I think she's staying. Poor thing has had diarrhea as she adjusts to the new food and environment. She's a spaz in the litterbox, so we have to clean her each time she goes to the bathroom. Gary loves her to death, and they have some kind of bond going on. Last night he said - I'm not putting all this work into her just to give her away to someone else! LOL! Besides - Lazlo and Shelly have stopped just staring at her all the time. They've both established that they're bigger than her, and now they let her "attack" them without hurting her [not that we ever allowed her to get hurt once inside - just she can "attack" them now without anyone arching, hissing, growling or putting ears back]. We had a round-robin of tail-biting/playing this morning that was just hysterical!)
