My Orphan Kitten Won’t Eat Wet Food?

[JessandOlivia]

Hello everyone,

So I’m a newly gifted orphan kitten mother of our beautiful Olivia. My dad rescued her and 2 siblings from his office ceiling and bought one of them home for my little sister and I. I’ve been bottle feeding her for the past week and as we don’t know her age it’s difficult to gage where she should be naturally.
My dad told me today that the other two kittens are currently eating wet food whereas Olivia is still bottle fed and I’m not sure where I’ve gone wrong?
Any answers would be fabulous I’m just at my wits end trying to figure this out!
Thank you in advance

Jess and Olivia

 

[JessandOlivia]

Sorry I should’ve mentioned that she’s estimated 2-3 weeks when we got her and now would be around 3-4 weeks!

 

[RajaNMizu]

Welcome and congratulations! Would there be any way you could put a photo of Olivia to help determine her age? Perhaps she should still be on the bottle. Are her eyes open? Does she have teeth yet?

 

[RajaNMizu]

Here is some additional information on kittens and weaning them to kitten food. Has your baby been to the vet yet? Weaning — Kitten Lady

 

[jcat]

Some kittens will eat solid food at 4-5 weeks, while others, including litter mates, start later. You can offer a slurry (kitten milk and canned kitten food on a saucer), but continue to bottle feed her until she's reliably eating just kitten food. Usually there's a period of a few weeks when the kittens consume both.

 

[JessandOlivia]

Welcome and congratulations! Would there be any way you could put a photo of Olivia to help determine her age? Perhaps she should still be on the bottle. Are her eyes open? Does she have teeth yet?

Yes eyes have been open since we’ve had her. She seems to have her full set of baby teeth too!

 

[JessandOlivia]

Here is some additional information on kittens and weaning them to kitten food. Has your baby been to the vet yet? Weaning — Kitten Lady

No vet yet, she is being rehomed and my family are very much DOG people so aren’t too sympathetic with the whole process.

 

[Lots of spots]

OMG she is so cute!!

 

[war&wisdom]

No vet yet, she is being rehomed and my family are very much DOG people so aren’t too sympathetic with the whole process.

Ugh, I know this is somewhat off topic, but I will honestly never understand people who are so staunchly "dog people" that they just don't care if a cat is sick or in pain. (The same goes for "cat people" who don't care about dogs, but I've encountered very few of those.) They're living beings who feel pain and emotions! /rant

 

[JessandOlivia]

Ugh, I know this is somewhat off topic, but I will honestly never understand people who are so staunchly "dog people" that they just don't care if a cat is sick or in pain. (The same goes for "cat people" who don't care about dogs, but I've encountered very few of those.) They're living beings who feel pain and emotions! /rant

Tell me about it! Why bring her home if you’re not going to care for her wellbeing. I’m 20 years old with a full time job and I feel like a bad mother I’m going away for 3 days and I’m just trying to get her as independent as possible because I know they won’t give her the proper amount of care she needs.

 

[Kflowers]

Try the slurry with lots of the Kmr in it. Put it in a flat plate and let her walk into the food. She'll try to 'nurse' the food because that's how she knows to eat. She'll get it all over herself and need a kitchen sink rinse off - you hold her under the faucet and use warm water. Wipe her face with a wash clothe.

It may take several meals for her to get the hang of it, so keep on with the bottle feeding until she's eating whole meals. Slowly increase the wet food to kmr ratio.

Our bottle babies used the bottle until they were 6 weeks old then they were done with it. One actually scooted under an older cat to stick his head in her bowl. She was not amused. He got his own bowl.

I like a nice mix of dogs and cats. Cats to wake the dogs up when something needs tending to and the dogs to chase the prowlers away.