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- Apr 29, 2019
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Hi! So a little background: I work at a local animal shelter and we help with strays that come in via our local animal control. I am currently fostering a mama with EIGHT kittens and was wondering if anyone had some insight or ideas to address a few of my concerns.
Details:
Mom and 8 kits were found stray and held at local animal control for 10 days before coming to us. At AC, mom was fed standard adult cat food.
Upon our intake, mom was dewormed and tested for FeLV/FIV (negative) and kits were dewormed. Aside from being very underweight, mom appears healthy. We estimate kits are around 4-5 weeks based on when they opened their eyes and their teeth development. They are very small for this age but that seems reasonable considering the size of the litter and the very tiny mom.
My concerns:
Mama cat has been switched to free feeding dry and wet kitten food to try and help her get some much needed calories since she's nursing off such a severe deficit. She is not gaining any weight. To further complicate things, she now has diarrhea. I know that overfeeding cats can cause diarrhea, as well as the switch in food, so how can I ensure she's getting enough nutrients without her overeating and ending up with diarrhea? Is there a good calculator for how much food she should be intaking with this large of a litter?
All of her kittens are eating wet kitten food now too and a few are even starting to eat hard food. Which leads me to my second concern: one kitten is substantially smaller than the rest. Since most of the kittens are starting to wean from mama and are maintaining good growth, would it work to separate mom and runt kitten during the day and then reunite all at night or vice versa? Would that help alleviate some of her nursing strain while still providing the extra nourishment the runt still needs? She's taken to taking one kitten out of her "nest" at a time and feeding it solo and I think its because she is just too tapped out to feed them all at once at this point.
Third issue: one of her nipples is starting to look a little raw and red. I'm keeping a close eye out for mastitis. Any advice? Eight kittens and her whole body is just working super overtime.
It's a complicated situation since she came to us so underweight and that's compounded by a massive litter size. She is a super sweet mama and is doing her best so I just want to make sure I'm doing everything to give her and kits the best chance.
Details:
Mom and 8 kits were found stray and held at local animal control for 10 days before coming to us. At AC, mom was fed standard adult cat food.
Upon our intake, mom was dewormed and tested for FeLV/FIV (negative) and kits were dewormed. Aside from being very underweight, mom appears healthy. We estimate kits are around 4-5 weeks based on when they opened their eyes and their teeth development. They are very small for this age but that seems reasonable considering the size of the litter and the very tiny mom.
My concerns:
Mama cat has been switched to free feeding dry and wet kitten food to try and help her get some much needed calories since she's nursing off such a severe deficit. She is not gaining any weight. To further complicate things, she now has diarrhea. I know that overfeeding cats can cause diarrhea, as well as the switch in food, so how can I ensure she's getting enough nutrients without her overeating and ending up with diarrhea? Is there a good calculator for how much food she should be intaking with this large of a litter?
All of her kittens are eating wet kitten food now too and a few are even starting to eat hard food. Which leads me to my second concern: one kitten is substantially smaller than the rest. Since most of the kittens are starting to wean from mama and are maintaining good growth, would it work to separate mom and runt kitten during the day and then reunite all at night or vice versa? Would that help alleviate some of her nursing strain while still providing the extra nourishment the runt still needs? She's taken to taking one kitten out of her "nest" at a time and feeding it solo and I think its because she is just too tapped out to feed them all at once at this point.
Third issue: one of her nipples is starting to look a little raw and red. I'm keeping a close eye out for mastitis. Any advice? Eight kittens and her whole body is just working super overtime.
It's a complicated situation since she came to us so underweight and that's compounded by a massive litter size. She is a super sweet mama and is doing her best so I just want to make sure I'm doing everything to give her and kits the best chance.
