Do Male Cats Kill Kittens?

Norachan

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I'm so sorry for your loss @morgs  

I'm also really surprised. I've been taking care of a feral colony for a while now and I've never heard of males showing this much aggression towards females. Sometimes tom cats will chase the spayed females if there are intact females and kittens around. They see them as a threat. It's not usually as violent as the fights between two tom cats can be though.

Could you tell us some more about your cat? Was she spayed? Are you sure it was the tom and not another animal that killed her?
 

StefanZ

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A male stray cat killed my female cat today. Obviously I am so sad and upset about this. But I am also really shocked! This happened at my house (the females terroritory. The make. At appeared a few weeks ago and has fought with my cat a few time...my cat would jump up onto the house to avoid him if I would take her into the house. This evening these cat was meowing at my front door until I chased him. Please could you help me to understand griis behaviour? Thanks
I wonder why would he meow at her place, if he had just killed her??

And thus, I too wonder if it was someone else whom killed her.  A straying dog?  Because he did made some sort of courting, violently perhaps, but its seldom or never deadly.

IF you found him bloody, it could be he tried to defend her, but too late...   THIS was apparently the case with one of the starting post in this longh tread.  The tom trying to save the kitten, but getting all the blame...

The alterantive is of course the obvious - he tried to mate, she wasnt willing, they fought, and he happened to overdo...

Still, why meow afterwards?  Probably because he didnt understood he killed her.  Which again proves, whatever happened, it was not his aim.
 

ravencrone

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I feel so horrible after reading some posts here. I have a Mum cat - feral - and she had 5 babies. One died, possibly 2 did, of a respiratory condition. I have been feeding her and her kittens for about a month as well as the year old kittens from previous litter. Money has gotten very tight so I had to warn off the older cats so I could feed only Mum and babies. They are about 2 months old. Today the two gorgeous smaller kittens have not shown up at all and only one remains. I now worry it's my fault because i had to stop feeding the baby's older brothers and sisters - and believe me it was not a decision I wanted to make cos I love them all but there are others on the street feeding them so I felt they would eat and their Mother did teach them to eat. I don't think the Mum knows her kittens could be possibly dead because I know she would mourn if she did. She mourned the passing of her other two. I have a feeling it's the biggest of her two sons because he onlt thinks with his stomach and pushes everyone out so he can eat. I caused this by not feeding him didn't I? It's alright tell me, I'm already in bits over this possibility. I feel like a beast.
 

Norachan

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R ravencrone male cats don't kill kittens in order to eat them. They may kill very young kittens in order to make the mother go into heat again, but it's very rare that they will do so.

I think it's more likely that the kittens died of some disease or were taken by another predator.

I'm sorry you are going through this. Feral cats have terribly short lives and it can be heart breaking to watch what they go through.

Can you get some help with taking care of the cats? The female cats all need to be spayed, they will all have kittens again very soon. The males should be neutered too.

Could you try calling the Humane Society or Alley Cat Allies? Are there any TNR groups in your area? It sounds like these cats really need your help.
 

Lizzie47

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This just happened to me today. My family and I are in the process of taming a playful female stray. She brought over her one kitten we estimated being about 3 weeks old. It was so cute and the mommy cat was okay with us holding her kitten. We would of brought them in, but the mommy cat isn't at that point yet. Sometimes you can pick her up. Anyways, this morning we awoke to a bloody mess in the box and on our carport. The kitten was missing and the mommy cat was freaking out. We found tufts of fur that were not colors of the kitten or mom cat. We assume that a orange Tom cat (the same color as some of the tufts of fur) that has been roaming around the area lately, probably ate the kitten. :(
The mother cat may have killed her kitten because you held it .you aren’t really suppose to touch them
 

Lizzie47

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Do Male cats kill kittens?

We had three little kittens in our backyard .We were feeding them and their mother for a week. They were so tiny and beautiful and playful. Actually, other strays were even afraid to come near he mother. But y'day night, we saw a huge cat, it was twice the size of the mother and unlike any stray we had seen. The mother cat was out on a hunt and the three kittens were frighttened and hiding. (They wre too little even to mew). We chased the big one away. But it looked exactly like one of the litter. ( a striped grey that we called Tiger). So we thought may be it was the father of the litter, and so it would not harm them. But this morning, the mother came back and sat staring stiffly at something behind a bush. When my brother went and saw, it was little Tiger, (Oh God!) bitten in half with its lower part missing. We searched for the others, but could not find them. But then later we saw the other two in our neighbor's house. But Tiger was our special pet, the most beautiful of the litter, a shy kitty, that would peek around a bush or a wall and make sure none of us were near before it came to lap up the milk we gave them. Just yesterday, all of them, including Tiger started coming near us and played with us when we shook little twigs at them. It was so delightful to watch.
We have a dog, but she is a nice little thing, besides which she is too old and almost totally blind. And she always stays indoors, especially at night. And chances of another dog coming in are not high because we lock the gates at night(not a huge gate but still, I have not seen any dogs come in when the gates were closed). But this big cat slid in easily.
Hi ,what you have endured with the cats and kittens ,I have just gone through roughly the same, except I don’t know if the kittens are dead because the mother is back here without them, there has been a big cat that’s been hanging around for the last 5 weeks and pooping in the shed where I put they food and also pooped on the wall, her kittens were 5 weeks old , the mother is ferel and had her kittens in our shed , then she moved them to the graveyard just over my garden wall she kept moving them further away for the first 3 weeks then she started coming back closer to the house, only 3 gardens always she was, and I could hear them meowing then 5 days ago the mother came back without them and started sleeping back in the shed where she delivered her kittens !!!. I still haven’t seen the kittens or heard them I’m so heart broken.i wish I knew what may have happened to them
 

msaimee

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It is just not true that a mother cat will kill her kittens if they are handled by humans. She may move them to a new place which she feels is safer for them, but she will not kill them. Also, tom cats don't kill their own offspring. They recognize by their scent that it is their offspring, and they don't kill them. Now it's possible that when a male kitten has become sexually mature, he may challenge his father over territory or a mate, and may get injured at that point. It's also possible that a tom may attack or drive away another tom's kittens, but I've never actually seen it happen.

There are some real misconceptions in this thread about toms and mother cats, and I'm surprised people still respond to this thread years later. It must appear a lot in Google searches.
 

Lizzie47

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It is just not true that a mother cat will kill her kittens if they are handled by humans. She may move them to a new place which she feels is safer for them, but she will not kill them. Also, tom cats don't kill their own offspring. They recognize by their scent that it is their offspring, and they don't kill them. Now it's possible that when a male kitten has become sexually mature, he may challenge his father over territory or a mate, and may get injured at that point. It's also possible that a tom may attack or drive away another tom's kittens, but I've never actually seen it happen.

There are some real misconceptions in this thread about toms and mother cats, and I'm surprised people still respond to this thread years later. It must appear a lot in Google searches.
Sometimes she will kill the kittens because they have been handled by another person or animal. Her own scent has been obscured and she either no longer recognises them as her own or she feels threatened and unable to escape. They either become prey - in size, sound, smell and movement - or she attempts to 'protect' them by the last resort method of killing them. A female that has prevously been in an abusive situation may be anxious with kittens and may kill them as a result; stress seems to over-ride normal maternal instincts."



It's better to read full article, as she mentions house cats as well & notes that in that situation the human may be viewed as another 'queen'. Link to full article.
 

msaimee

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I don't see any article links in your post, are you referring to something you linked a while back? From everything that I have read, mother cats may reject or kill a kitten that is ill, deformed, or that she is not able to nurse, but she will not reject her kittens because of human touch. If This Were true, it would be very difficult for people to socialize feral kittens prior to trapping them. Human scent is all over the food and water bowls, and the kittens are often handled. Plus, the mothers themselves are familiar with our scents.
 

Norachan

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The mother cat may have killed her kitten because you held it .you aren’t really suppose to touch them
That's a myth actually. Like msaimee msaimee said, people who care for feral cats touch the kittens in an attempt to socialise them. Lots of our members have feral mothers that they have trapped with their kittens. The mothers still care for them, even though they are being handled daily.

;)
 

CheetahLover5859

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The mother cat may have killed her kitten because you held it .you aren’t really suppose to touch them
I don't believe it was the mother, especially if you saw ginger fur there that didn't 'belong'.
If I may describe the behaviour of Lions who live in packs called 'Prides'. A pack of brothers guard the 'pride', the lionesses & cubs. The male lions get old, other younger male lions who roam freely, having been turfed out of their own packs/prides by 'Dads/Uncles' are looking for females.
They come across a Pride headed by older males & either kill them or 'exile' them, to 'take over' the 'pride' the lionesses - if the cubs are young & suckling, they kill them, which stops their mother's milk supply, which brings the lioness into season - so that the new males can mate & father cubs. Older cubs are left unharmed & are guarded by the new male lions with the same zeal as if they were their own natural offspring. It is the same with Tom cats, their priority is 'mating', though without the extended responsibility of Lion males. Keep ALL un-neutered male cats away from any kittens!!
 

Norachan

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I don't believe it was the mother, especially if you saw ginger fur there that didn't 'belong'.
If I may describe the behaviour of Lions who live in packs called 'Prides'. A pack of brothers guard the 'pride', the lionesses & cubs. The male lions get old, other younger male lions who roam freely, having been turfed out of their own packs/prides by 'Dads/Uncles' are looking for females.
They come across a Pride headed by older males & either kill them or 'exile' them, to 'take over' the 'pride' the lionesses - if the cubs are young & suckling, they kill them, which stops their mother's milk supply, which brings the lioness into season - so that the new males can mate & father cubs. Older cubs are left unharmed & are guarded by the new male lions with the same zeal as if they were their own natural offspring. It is the same with Tom cats, their priority is 'mating', though without the extended responsibility of Lion males. Keep ALL un-neutered male cats away from any kittens!!
Yes, but big cats have a far longer gestation period than domestic cats and the time between giving birth and coming into heat again is also much longer.

Domestic cats can have a heat cycle within days of giving birth. Those of us who care for feral colonies have seen mother cats heavily pregnant before the previous litter has finished nursing. (Which is why it's so important to get all the cats spayed and neutered as soon as possible.)

There is no need for male cats to kill kittens so that the female will allow them to mate.

It might be the case with lions, but it doesn't happen in domestic cat colonies. Male cats killing kittens is extremely rare. In my experience even un-neutered tom cats are very tolerant with kittens, regardless of whether they fathered them or not.

Keep ALL un-neutered male cats away from any kittens!!

Get ALL un-neutered male cats neutered!!
 

CheetahLover5859

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Yes, but big cats have a far longer gestation period than domestic cats and the time between giving birth and coming into heat again is also much longer.

Domestic cats can have a heat cycle within days of giving birth. Those of us who care for feral colonies have seen mother cats heavily pregnant before the previous litter has finished nursing. (Which is why it's so important to get all the cats spayed and neutered as soon as possible.)

There is no need for male cats to kill kittens so that the female will allow them to mate.

It might be the case with lions, but it doesn't happen in domestic cat colonies. Male cats killing kittens is extremely rare. In my experience even un-neutered tom cats are very tolerant with kittens, regardless of whether they fathered them or not.
I couldn't agree more that male cats should all be neutered, I was thinking more about random Toms wandering into people's gardens - the Toms not belonging to any mother cats/kittens owners.
There are many accounts on this thread of Toms killing kittens. While I don't have personal experience of it myself, the then 'older' generation of pre-war (sometimes both wars) when I was a child did & repeatedly warned us about it. Their time had been an era when working class people kept cats, not as pets, but outside as mousers whether in tenement buildings or on farms. The cats were never neutered/spayed & they lived a semi-feral existence, the farm ones were definitely not tame & I still have the scars inflicted when I tried to hold them.
I know the Toms don't have a NEED to kill the kittens, pet cats don't NEED to catch birds either, but follow their instincts. I assume that a Tom facing a vicious rejection time after time would find it much easier to dispose of the competition when Mum finally shifts herself to find some food.
I've some experience of fertile cats. My semi-feral, pregnant on arrival was booked in to be spayed 3 days after her kittens turned 8 wks. She did not appear to be in heat & managed to open the handle of an unlocked window the day before by pushing it up with her snout; she couldn't have the op because she could have eaten, when I took her a week later, I was phoned by the vet who found she was pregnant once she was anaesthatised. She must have got pregnant again about 2-3 weeks previously, at the point where the kits were starting their first solids. I had Mum, an old cat & 7 kittens running around in warm weather with the windows shut. This time there were no sorties outside & Mum was spayed at the 8 wk mark. They are 11 yrs old now & not 'lap'-cats at all, they will nestle but don't like being picked up. I kept Mum & the first litter (3), a relative with a farm had the second (4), females neutered at 7 months, the Toms the month after.
I sometimes find it a losing battle trying to convince people to neuter their male cats, especially young men. "Oh, I couldn't do that to him" is a popular response (male dog-owners too) & the apathetic "Oh, with a Tom, there's no need to have anything DONE!". I've taken in lots of Toms over the years who have been in sorry states with their injuries & scars, they don't go home & maybe home isn't the best, they can feed themselves on pigeon, starlings & mice adequately where I live. I also had to notify a rescue centre of a colony in a seaside town where I was on holiday. All of which could have been avoided if said Toms had been neutered in the first place.
 
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