Sounds like things are going well. It is so nice when you see the results of your hard work and momma's coat becomes softer. I bet she feels better too.
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Caught a Feral Mom and her Five babies...
- Thread starter pandabbit
- Start Date
I would give her more often, or at least, have some dry food in between to munch on..
I understand your schema works fine, as both mom and kittens are thriving. And not so few people give their cats perhaps twice a day. So it is surely OK.
But cats are normally "often" eaters. ´ten mices and about 30 hunting tries a day´
And moms with 5 kittens we dont want to inhibit their consumption.
Good luck!
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- #23
Yeah, the feedings I was talking about are wet food. Wet food is every 6 hours what she'll eat in 30 min. Usually about an hour after that I'll give her some dry. I'm nervous about giving her dry, I heard eating a lot of it too fast then adding water can give them one hell of a tummy ache. I was also really worried for a while there'd be an issue (as mentioned earlier) with refeeding syndrome. I wanted moma cat to pace herself and get used to a schedule so she doesn't make herself sick.
Everyone is doing well still. Kittens are up and about, still shaky on their legs. They've begun to play a little and attempt to jump on mom. Mom cat gets very vocal when she hears me bringing food, it excites her a lot. She seeks a lot of petting and purrs a ton too. Overall she doesn't seem stressed out or frightened, she's got a quiet part of the house to herself as well.
Everyone is doing well still. Kittens are up and about, still shaky on their legs. They've begun to play a little and attempt to jump on mom. Mom cat gets very vocal when she hears me bringing food, it excites her a lot. She seeks a lot of petting and purrs a ton too. Overall she doesn't seem stressed out or frightened, she's got a quiet part of the house to herself as well.
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- #24
Question about weaning: When and how should I encourage them to begin eating food?
Kittens have teeth now, I can get the orange one and one of the black kittens to lick wet food juice off my finger (before they start to chew on my finger). However, when I try to give them pieces of the wet food they're not interested. Also, when I give mamma cat dry, some of the kittens will pick up pieces in their mouth but often spit them out. Is this the beginning of interest in food and a sign I should start encouraging it? Kittens are beginning to be shakily playful...they'll attempt to pounce one another or mom. Poor mom is getting her legs chewed on (I've given her a ledge to hide on away from the kittens, not sure if she's using it though there is litter and fur remains on it so I know she had to have been up there a little bit).
Kittens have teeth now, I can get the orange one and one of the black kittens to lick wet food juice off my finger (before they start to chew on my finger). However, when I try to give them pieces of the wet food they're not interested. Also, when I give mamma cat dry, some of the kittens will pick up pieces in their mouth but often spit them out. Is this the beginning of interest in food and a sign I should start encouraging it? Kittens are beginning to be shakily playful...they'll attempt to pounce one another or mom. Poor mom is getting her legs chewed on (I've given her a ledge to hide on away from the kittens, not sure if she's using it though there is litter and fur remains on it so I know she had to have been up there a little bit).
If you feed mum in shallow dishes they will wean themselves. They explore everything by sucking, licking & chewing and one thing leads to another.
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- #26
Noticed. One of the little black kittens was chewing on everything when I brought food down, so I pushed a little near him while he was chewing on the dish and soon he was eating the food on his own while purring (kittens sound funny when they purr).
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Thanks for being so kind to these little waifs..Your pretty special
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- #28
Some of the kittens are getting the idea of solid food, but mom is pushing them away and eating greedily herself. I'm going to increase what I feed them and split it into two dishes so while mom focuses on one dish the kittens can focus on another. Orange has really picked up eating and he gets messy, its hilariously cute watching him clean (or attempt to clean) himself off.
You are going to have to start feeding more - maybe more often, maybe more at the time as well. Several dishes is a good idea. Mum will be producing a lot of milk right now and needs a lot of food.
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- #30
I know, the issue I'm having is mom cat. Even if her one dish is full she's starting to go to the kitten dish and eat their stuff and moves back and forth pushing the kittens away. She is getting enough food, there's leftovers. Feeding is between 4-6 hours apart with constant dry food snacking in between.
Try feeding more often and using another dish or two.
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- #32
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- #33
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I spent five months in the hospital being tube fed due to an inability to eat/keep food down. I have to say that never once did the Dr's explain this as well as you did!! If an animal is anything like humans in this regards then it is VERY easy to get sick from eating to much, to soon following starvation!! I can remember when they first had me begin to try and eat that I felt like I could eat a house, I WAS STARVING, problem is that I tried to eat to much and it would not stay down. I had to start with Jello, broth and other liquid and then slowly move to more complex foods. One year later I am now able to eat almost anything, within reason, LOL!! I do remember that it took about 2 months of not getting proper nutrition and about two weeks of not being able to eat anything before the blood work showed up as severely malnourished. It was a much longer time to get the levels normal (sodium and potassium were what they seemed to be most concerned with and supplemented through the IV).
