going to take in mom/kitten fosters - advice?

Hi all,

So kitten season is already in full bloom, unfortunately! I am going to be fostering a mama with kittens through our local Humane Society. They have several moms to choose from, and we're going to go pick out which mom/litter we want to take home over the weekend. I'm just not prepared to care for tiny kittens at this stage of my life, hence making sure we have a mom.

I know they will sit down and talk about what to expect, but this will be our first time doing this, so I'm wondering if anyone here has any advice or words of wisdom for me. Are there any special supplies we should get? Any way to arrange the room to keep it the most comfy for mom and babies? Anything we might want to look for when picking out mom/kittens to help us have an easier time with this? I need to start easy. 

The only particular thought I had is that we might want to get a lower-sided litter box - our foster room one is a pretty standard litter box with sides that are maybe 4 inches high. Any other thoughts are most appreciated!

What a wonderful thing you are going to do!  JUST what is needed!

In this world where so many people fond of kittens, make sure their family cat gets pregnant, or go "oops", so they do have kittens.   I have even met at least one case when they killed off the kittens when they were halfgrown....        Just to let their "angelic" dau play with the sweet kittens.  

OK, how big are the kittens supposed to be?     It is quite a difference between "infants", being in the nest, and kids, running and playing over the whole room!

You talk about a weekend.  Is this fostering just a couple of days, or the weekend is for "look and see" and if it seems OK, you shall foster them several weeks?

If you want to start easy, take a family girl who got thrown out when she got pregnant. Or got astray. Ie a nice, socialized momma without real problems. Just some defensive watchfullness. (they usually have as it is every moms foremost duty to protect her kittens)

Helping shy semi-ferales is very rewarding,  and really easier than most think, but it is perhaps not the easy beginning you do look for.

A real aggressive ferale are never in the common shelters.

And the specialist shelters who do help also the more ferale, of course know not to let them to a

newbe.

Good luck!

What to get is something they should discuss with you as well, along with their vet policy and so on.  Am not clear if you are taking a cat that has already had her kittens or a pregnant one, this list is for pregnant queens but most things are applicable to one that's already had kittens.

My view on what you need: 

• cardboard boxes make disposable nests. 
• Newspaper makes a slightly absorbant disposable lining. 
• Puppy pads are useful for birthing on as they are absorbant, cheap and disposable. 
• Fleece is easy to wash & dry and makes a nice warm bed that little claws cannot get caught in. 
• Yes, a lower litter tray though you will be surprised how early the kittens want to use the tray their mum uses.
•  Mountains of food and cat litter. 
• A set of kitchen scales that weigh in grams - weighing each kitten about the same time each day and recording the results is the easiest way to spot a problem happening.  Each kitten should gain about 10g per day or more, most days. 
• Wormer - the kittens should be wormed when they are about 2 weeks old, but ask the rescue what they want done on this front.  Mum should be wormed as well, and she can be wormed whilst pregnant.  Ask the rescue if they have wormed and deflead her. 
• A way of keeping kittens warm - a heat pad or hot water bottle.  Remember too warm is as bad as too cold, but if she wanders around and drops kittens all over the place they need to be put togeather somewhere warm - 80F - until she has finished.
• Details of the rescue's vet and out of hours vet.  Make sure you know how to get there as well.
• An old teeshirts for wiping new-born kittens is mum doesn't clean them up.

Some useful pages - remember that most of the time the problems outlined do not happen:

http://www.fabcats.org/breeders/infosheets/breeding_from_your_cat/felineparturition.html

http://www.fabcats.org/owners/kittens/handrearing.html

http://www.fabcats.org/breeders/infosheets/kitten_health/fading_kittens.html

And IMHO the trick to looking after kittens is to look after the queen, and she will deal with the kittens.

Thanks for all the pointers! You have no idea how helpful this is!

I didn't write clearly - we're picking a litter over the weekend, then we'll bring them home to foster until all of them get adopted. I've fostered through this org before, so I'm pretty familiar with how they work, but I've only done adult cats. Our current foster is going home on Friday, then we're picking up this litter on Sunday. :-) If mom hangs out here for a long time after all her babies get adopted, they have a room with several cats at the shelter and they would take her back - usually the moms who used to have litters do fine in there, and they benefit from the extra foot traffic. They like to get as many litters out to foster as they can - away from the germs and stress.

The shelter does try to spay all the pregnant cats that they can, but I think they already have several litters with kittens of various ages available (sigh, it's only February). A mom just gave birth in there yesterday, so I could take some teeny tiny infants! I joked yesterday that we should get a litter where all of them look different so we can be sure to tell them apart.

This shelter has a fabulous TNR program, so they may or may not work with feral moms and adopting out the kittens. But I will stick with a friendly stray or owner surrender for the time being so I can dip my toe into the pool instead of diving! Will post some pics once we bring them home.

Kitchen scale just arrived in the mail today.   They included guidelines on weight for postal service letters and calorie contents of various foods. Somehow, I don't think that this was quite the purpose they had in mind... !

I'd be very worried if they said how many calories were in a kitten!