Weaning kittens when working full time?

A work friend recently rescued a cat, who turned out to be pregnant and recently had five kittens. All are doing well, the kittens are all spoken for, and mama is feeding all the babies beautifully at the moment. But, both my friend and her husband work full time and are away from home, at the same time, for 8-9 hours and are worried about weaning process. Seems like in the perfect world you'd offer kittens food every 3 hours or so...but, what do people do if you're simply not home enough and can't find help to feed the kittens so frequently? If you could point me in the right direction for guidance, it'd be much appreciated. Mine were four years old when I adopted them, so I have no experience in this area.

Thanks!

I work full-time and my kittens are getting weaned. I don't offer them food every 3 hours. I leave dry food out all the time, which they are eating now. I give them some canned food in the evening after work. I think right now some of them are still nursing a little bit. Everything is going OK. It's not diffucult. It just happens naturally.

And while we are on the subject, my kittens are also weaning. I have 4 and 3 are doing great! The 4th (also the biggest of the bunch) won't touch the food! I put the wet food out and here comes momma, and 3 of the babies. The 4th would rather nurse on momma when she is eating. He won't take the food off my finger either. Should I just wait? Will he eat when he gets hungary enough? gaha! so frusturating!

Well, Cuddles took a little while to warm up to the food. Yours will probably decide to try it eventually. I've never heard of an animal dying because he refused to be weaned. I think it will be OK.

There really is nothing that you need to do. The mother cat should have kitten food available to her at all times. Just start putting more down now and she will show the kittens how to eat it when the time is right.

Because I allowed mom to nurse as long as she wanted (kits were nursing up to 3 months old), I didn't have any problems. I would get up about 1/2 hour earlier and offer the kits canned food before I left work. Then when I got home they would get their canned food again (without mom in the room) and a little more before bed.

So they were eating about 3 times a day. Mom had dry kitten food available, and I'm sure the kits nibbled on that.

Thank you so much - I'm sure this will reassure my friend. It's really a sweet story. Her own cat had crossed the RB, and shortly after she was just walking home and saw a scrawny kitten drinking from snow melt on the sidewalk. She stopped, and the kitten started purring and bunting. My friend decided there was room at the inn and took the kitten home. Vet visit revealed that 'kitten' was about 9 months old and pregnant. With my friend's and her husband's care, mama-to-be filled out quite nicely and the five kittens were born with no trouble and all is still going well. But, like all of us, my friend wants everything to go as perfectly as possible, so thanks for your help!

what a sweet story! I hope it has a happy ending with all cats fixed up and ready to find new homes!

All the kittens are spoken for (my friend's sisters) and she and her husband are keeping mama and two kittens. And, yes, spaying/neutering has already planned. I tend to think the RB kitty planned all this, myself.