10 kittes (there will be more) and have some questions

[Aurel]

Hello
I am sorry if this is too much questions or not the proper place for this topic. I am not too ised to forums.
I live in a mega rural place in Slovakia country with already low standards for pet care. Me and my parents luve with my grandparents who are extremely old fashioned abt animals that arent "of use". That they are worthless and dirty and me and my brother dont need themans they definitely SHOULDNT be inside.
We recently had three cats attracted to our house because of food and we more or less adopted them. We have no idea where they came from but mom thinks its a guy three house later who has a veritable hive of cats. Anyways they are ours now.
Two of them came already pregnant and so far along that our vet did not recommend spaying yet so we let them gave birth. One is pregnant rn and will give birth because, she was so far along it would be risky and mom did not want to risk her dying (its a very rural vet with not much resources)
So yea the situation is...not ideal. Luckily we spayed the two moms as quickly as we could. But now we have ten kittens (5 seven weeks and 5 six weeks) and we refuse to take my grandparents approach to Dealing with them. And I have some questions because we uh. Have some issues? Me and mom never had cats or took care of them.
1.) Is it normal they are playing in litter box and is there anyway to prevent that?
2.) We are currently feeding them aroumd three times a day but their moms have to be away for that bwcause they would eat their stuff. Right now we are locking them in building outside but they are starting to catch on and refuse to get in even with promises of more food. The bigger issue is we want the kittens to have constant source of food in their little place but the moms constanty eat all of it. Not sure even if it is solution but.
3.) They seem to be terrified of us? Like just week or so ago they were playful and fine with everything but now they hate being grabbed (and I have to since they can get into the place we lock their moms in for feeding time and it would be dumb to try and feed without kittens). One of them hissed at me when I came to feed them this morning. For a long time. And some were hiding from me. I am not sure why this current antisocial behaviour but it is worrying especially since we want then adopted. Again this could be normal but I am not sure we dont have experience at al.

Thank you for reading and apologies for long post. I always need and try to give all facts.

 

[Margret]

StefanZ , I think this is your area of expertise.

 

[di and bob]

The kittens are getting older and are losing their trust, that very young animals have. They should still be nursing at that age, so don't need a lot of food, I just put out bigger pans of food, and mothers and kittens all ate. The mothers need a lot of nourishment when they are nursing. when the kittens are older, about 3-4 months old, try to get all the females spayed or find them homes. the expense will seem like a lot, but when they have kittens, the food bill will get overwhelming. They can get pregnant at 5 months. They are playing in the litterbox because they really don't know what it is for, if it is clumping litter they may eat some of it and get a blockage. change to nonclumping litter until they are a little older and can go outside. And do try to handle them, it will go easier if you lure them in with treats or toys, such as a cat wand. Bless you for helping them!

 

[StefanZ]

A Aurel

1. Yes, its fairly common they use litter box as their place... I suspect they dont use it much yet, moms perhaps still are eating their
wastes??
Anyway, do have the litter boxes at hand, with non clumping litter (IF they happen to eat some, less bad with non clumping)

2. Food. I presume they still nurse some from mommas? So mommas needs lotsa of food, much more than the average cat. Food of
good nutrients, containing much calcium. Dont use raw pork (pig meat). Chicken meat, cow meat, is good. Eggs are excellent.
If you dont have problems with salomonella in eggs, raw egg yolk is good. IF you have problems with salomonella, be sure they are cooked at least 10 minutes.... Even if cats manage salomonella better than humans, but we dont want to take stupid risks.

Can you get goats milk? Its always useful as supplement, both for kittens and adult cats. Otherwise RAW cow milk may be OK.
Or kefir or unsweetened youghurt.
Good kittens see mommas eat, so they learn from momma to eat...

3. They are 5 / 6 weeks? Good. So they are still inside of the 8 weeks zone, when kittens are pretty easy to foster into sociale, nice
home cats.
Still, you must work actively with fostering!!! If you cant have them inside home with you, you must be there with them at least a couple of
hours every day. You can give them food, so they connect you / humans with food and other pleasuries.
and treats, play with them, cuddle with them... Begin cuddling with the most willing to cuddle, so the others sees its nice to cuddle with you.
Cuddle with their mommas so the kittens see it...
If mommas are shy and wont let you cuddle with them, but there is a home cat, or a friendly dog, cuddle with it, and let they see you are friendly with animals...
Talk much to them. Sing if you can... Make lotsa of friendly noises... (same with mommas if they arent handtame).

A couple of tricks: dont look directly into the eyes, look at their shoulder. (home cats manages nice to be looked into eyes, but not semiferales).
blink slowly with eyes at them. Yawning is a friendly greeting. Likewising to strech on yourself... (so the "sleepy, tired cat" is often really
greeting you!)

A trick is to wrap such a semiferale kitten in a thick towel alike a burrito, so its helpless but not hurt, and carry it at your chest a good while.
while you sing to it and talk with it... A couple of such sessions - and its done.
The same idea as with "breaking in" a horse, but much much gentler and more sympathic.

 

[Anchoress]

ie OP resonating with so much your say. I live on a small offshore Irish island and several of the islands eg Tory, and Inis Bigil where I live, had huge issues with an exploding cat population. And dealt withit, in my opinion, badly. Ireland was until recently very very poor so animals had to earn their keep amd had no vet care and were thus ot neutered and bred prolifically and inter breeding was common. They sorted it probably cruelly as happened on Tory so now I have almost all the very few cats left. My two new cats are semi feral farm cats... My work with them now is to fix that and get them fixed ie neutered... lol...Four days om and they are just coming out of hiding but no way can I touch them.... Or come near them. I think you may resonate with this.! I delight in just watching them and this is the first time they have come this close to me. It will be a long journey if I respect their needs but I long to touch them. They will have been born on a farm to a farm cat.. Oh they are watching me so close now! They know the food comes from me and food is the key

 

[Aurel]

Thank you for all the replies, we have had a little bit of progress today, as they played with us....if we dont make sudden movements they do not get scared and eventually let themselves be picked a bit and even play. Their moms played before birth but now they dont play... Apparently they are very young themselves and vet said they are not even a year old. But today one of the moms wanted to play with us. They also get super close if its feeding time. Their yells summon others. One of them, a little toms we are probably keeping keeps climbing us to get to the feed preparation station. Both me and mom have completely messed up legs due to that.
I hope if they dont get adopted and I finish school and get job I will be able to get together money so they will get spayed and vet cared. Tommorow we are going for checkup and deworming with all of them.
We can get goats milk, but I did not know much about eggs. I am not sure if they nurse much, almost no if we are around, I think. Sometimes I still see a kitty latch on but it does not last much. They are sisters and both care for both sets of kittens so that was good... I feel bad for the pregnant one, she will be on her own.