Little Runt Feral

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Hello!!  I’m a HUGE cat lover and I care for a large colony at my work - I've gotten all TNR'd minus two sneaky males I'm still working on.   A pregnant female showed up last May had a small litter that same month (Mom has since disappeared)  and out of the two siblings one has stayed really small.  Short legs & small.   I feed this tiny cat canned food daily and he is always around to eat but still looks like a little young cat  - not nearly as big as his sibling.  He has short little legs and a tiny head, tiny mouth .. has anybody else encountered a little cat like this?  He seems totally healthy otherwise - appetite, energy, eyes look good, runs around etc and he's the cutest thing ever but I've never seen a cat almost a year old look so itty bitty.    I attached a couple pics of him – one is him with water jugs behind for somewhat of a scale & next to a reg size cat - … and he’s still pretty furred out right now from winter, I can only imagine he'll look even smaller the closer we get into Summer (I'm in AZ)     I don’t think there’s anything wrong with him, I’m just curious because I’ve seen small cats before but I’ve never seen a cat stay this small at his his age.    

he may be part munchkin..

  Yes, I have a small little kitty that we call Polly. She has grown quite a bit during this past year and is about the size of a 4-5 months old kitten. She will be two years old soon so I think that she is finished growing. She stayed very young looking and her littermates would hunt her as a mouse. I, too, am curious as to why they stay so small. Thank you for rescuing those kitties  - you are a real blessing for this world and especially for feral cats

He looks healthy, and I've seen smaller one year-old cats. The kitten I recently took in looked 4-5 months old, but the vet thinks she could be 6-10 months old--she is small. My neighbor's rescued cat is 3 years old and is also very small.  I wouldn't be concerned about his size if he is acting healthy. He is a real cutie.

Oh Thank You!  I wish I knew more about the little guy ... I don't remember the Mom much and she's now gone. I love this little cat ... him and the rest of the clan are the main reason I come to work every day.   I hope to one day be able to pet this little dude.

From personal experience (haven't researched to back it up) I can say that some cats tend to stay small for longer periods and some eventually end up smaller than most people think is "normal". This is not a bad thing, there is a lot of height variation among humans as well so it is only natural it can be found in cats too, albeit to a lesser degree.

On the bright side, he gets a +5 cuteness bonus  

I've got a tiny female here that had two litters before I spayed her (a stray from the neighbors). She is half the size of a normal cat, but I know she was abandoned at two weeks old when her mother was killed and the only survivor out of the litter, so she had a rough start in life. She is two now and feisty as ever, she knocks some manners into the big toms around here. So even though they may be small in size, they're huge in spirit!