I foster for a cat/kitten rescue. I saw the pictures of these six-week-old kittens and knew I had to save them from being put down. I picked them up yesterday and the man at the shelter told me they would need a lot of work. They were very scared and huddled together in the carrier. When I got them home I left them alone in the bathroom for a while. One of them would not come out of the carrier. Later I tried picking it up by the scruff and see if it would let me hold it. Well it didn't. It hissed and ran off into a corner. After that I went to work. Later I tried petting the same one (I put long sleeves on lol) and it let me while hissing. When I got closer to its face it spit and swatted at me. After that I left them alone. Today I have gone in to feed them but have not tried petting or holding them. I don't want to stress them out. It's so pitiful how they squeeze themselves into any corner to get away from me. I want to get them adopted by 10 weeks of age but I don't know if I can get them socialized in time.
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Rescued some mean little kittens from the shelter
- Thread starter sgrtx88
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Look also into our Feral subforum, there they are used to such fostering. Although here we are too. 
Do they seem to eat, drink, use the non clumping litter?
It is quite common they dont do none of this in beginning when they are scared, but always a good sign if the do.
Yes, you must take it easy with them. They must get some feel of safety, security.
Give them somewhere to hide a little, like a sideturned cardboard box. So they shall have it comfortable there, a little dark.
Come in regularly with food.
Talk a lot friendly, make soothing noises, but dont look too much at them, nor try to grab.
After a while you can sit down there, reading a book, or using your laptop / ipad. Pretending they arent there, but making some friendly noises. You preferably sit down, or even - lay down...Verry effective.
You dont touch them before them come themselves to you.
There are a couple of more tricks, when they had landed and begin to move forward to you.
Ah, and as they are several, someone of them will surely be more brave or more curious. Work with her, and make her your positive example.
Tx for helping them!
Good luck!
Do they seem to eat, drink, use the non clumping litter?
It is quite common they dont do none of this in beginning when they are scared, but always a good sign if the do.
Yes, you must take it easy with them. They must get some feel of safety, security.
Give them somewhere to hide a little, like a sideturned cardboard box. So they shall have it comfortable there, a little dark.
Come in regularly with food.
Talk a lot friendly, make soothing noises, but dont look too much at them, nor try to grab.
After a while you can sit down there, reading a book, or using your laptop / ipad. Pretending they arent there, but making some friendly noises. You preferably sit down, or even - lay down...Verry effective.
You dont touch them before them come themselves to you.
There are a couple of more tricks, when they had landed and begin to move forward to you.
Ah, and as they are several, someone of them will surely be more brave or more curious. Work with her, and make her your positive example.
Tx for helping them!
Good luck!
As Stephan said, sitting in there quietly or reading out loud will help them get used to the presence of humans. You can also put a radio with a talk station in there (no loud music!)
Also use food to your advantage. When you sit in there, move the food closer to you and see who is brave enough to approach. Gerber chicken baby food (only chicken and water, no onions) is a bribe most cats cannot resist.
Good luck and thank you for helping them!
Also use food to your advantage. When you sit in there, move the food closer to you and see who is brave enough to approach. Gerber chicken baby food (only chicken and water, no onions) is a bribe most cats cannot resist.
Good luck and thank you for helping them!
Ah, Stefan got there first. Waves, hi Stefan.
He said everything I was going to suggest.
Only thing, I'd call the kittens scaredy cats, not mean little kittens. Or were you teasing us. They're probably terrified. Peace, quiet, a box to hide in, nice food, and someone singing nursery songs to them will soothe their fears. They're young enough that once they start to turn around / tame down it will continue ever more quickly. How long had they been at the rescue / shelter?
Pictures?
He said everything I was going to suggest.
Only thing, I'd call the kittens scaredy cats, not mean little kittens. Or were you teasing us. They're probably terrified. Peace, quiet, a box to hide in, nice food, and someone singing nursery songs to them will soothe their fears. They're young enough that once they start to turn around / tame down it will continue ever more quickly. How long had they been at the rescue / shelter?
Pictures?
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Since it's only been one day, I would say give them a little more time to get acclimated. I agree with you that picking them up would stress them out even more.
They are still very young. They have time.
You can sit with them quietly as they eat their meals so they will associate your presence with something they like.
Also, leaving a piece of your clothing in the room with them will help them get used to your scent.
As they get more comfortable, their distinct personalities will emerge and more brave ones will come out to play with you (wand toys are great for this), helping shy ones in the process.
Once they are used to you, bring other people in (one at a time) to help getting them used to humans. More variety of people they see (male, female, young, old, children), the better, even if they are not willing to play with them. It might take a few weeks before they get that comfortable though, so do take it very slowly.
They are still very young. They have time.
You can sit with them quietly as they eat their meals so they will associate your presence with something they like.
Also, leaving a piece of your clothing in the room with them will help them get used to your scent.
As they get more comfortable, their distinct personalities will emerge and more brave ones will come out to play with you (wand toys are great for this), helping shy ones in the process.
Once they are used to you, bring other people in (one at a time) to help getting them used to humans. More variety of people they see (male, female, young, old, children), the better, even if they are not willing to play with them. It might take a few weeks before they get that comfortable though, so do take it very slowly.
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Socializing feral babies or traumatized baby kittens which is what they are (no such entity ss a mean Kitty ever!!) . so even setting a deadline of 10 wks is arming likely too much of these sweet babies. They can br adopted when ready and that has to depend on them and you. Be patient kind -which you must be or you would not take them on to begin with and as stated, read to them, leave acradoo in their room do they adjust to human voices or soft music. My guess is they are utterly so terrified they are doing what they may have learner from mama -not to trust and to fight back even as tiny and weak ad they are. The Berber chicken has worked for me as has playing with them even if I was playing fish by myself as I talked to them by mysrlfvfor periods of time. There will always be one who a bit or even a lot braver and /or more curious than his or her siblings and seek what you ate offering. Let him be the leader or tole model. Fl mot pet them or pick them up until they come to you and when they dupe interest in play, in you, in coming to you for food, reward them with the goodcstuff! Leave them some toys that they can bat around buy not swallow and make sure there are no hiding places but that there are areas they can feel safe!! They must get used to hour scent do even leaving an old sweaty t shirt near food helps. There is one exception re picking them up and of course that os if illness occurs. Bret of luck -look forward to hearing your good eork
Your mitzvah as we say in my religion.
Your mitzvah as we say in my religion.
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I recently rescued a feral kitten myself - my first cat in over 10 years! A girl was carrying her around at work and I complimented her on her 'baby', and then she asked if I wanted it! Obviously I couldn't say no, but what she forgot to mention was that she was completely feral. I'd say Catherine was a good 5 weeks when I got her. We isolated her in my boyfriends room the first month, stuffing every crevice we could find with blankets. I'd force myself to hold her with a towel even though she would do nothing but hiss and spit. I fed her wet kitten food on a baby spoon with a cup of water to make sure she'd get her fluids too - the goal was to make her rely on me entirely for everything she wanted to 'kill' the feral instincts. Maybe by the time she was 8 weeks she was a little cuddle bunny, although to this day she really hates the presence of toddlers. I stopped feeding her in my arms at 8 weeks as well, mostly because I always wanted her to associate human touch with good things.
Just be consistent with them.. it's probably going to be a little more difficult because you have an entire litter to deal with instead of just a lone kitten one by one, but don't fear from them too much. Often times their hissing isn't accompanied by any real threat - my kitten never tried to swipe at me anyway.
Just be consistent with them.. it's probably going to be a little more difficult because you have an entire litter to deal with instead of just a lone kitten one by one, but don't fear from them too much. Often times their hissing isn't accompanied by any real threat - my kitten never tried to swipe at me anyway.
Oh how I wish I would have seen your post 2 weeks ago when you first posted, 6 weeks old is a cinch to tame, 8 weeks is a full time job, this is the time frame that changes things.
First off, they need to be seperated. Sorry but it's true. Otherwise you will work with one, then put it back and move on to the next one, and by the time you put the next one back, the fear from the others has undone what you just did in taming.
Also at 6 weeks, if they were aggressively worked on, they can be tamed in days. TRUE!!
8 weeks is much harder because of their mental/emotional growth, and the fact that this fear is getting to be like a permanent imprint.
Each day from here on matters. Do NOT show fear to them, you really must have them seperate. I doubt that you have as many cages or empty bathrooms as you do kittens! You didn't say how many, but I'm hoping only 3 and not 6!! Cage, large carriers, whatever but seperation is key.
Take the food away, but leave fresh water of course.
Cover your hand with a towel and dive in, scruffing, not with a finger and thumb but all your fingers and the side of your thumb so you have a very secure hold, and wrap that kitten very snugly in the towel, like a burrito, make sure the towel wraps snugly around the entire body up high on his neck so the arms dont get loose, because they will squirm and get the arms free and it won't work, plus you will likely get scratched.
Then you can talk to them, touch the face, kiss, sing, just pack that kitten all around with you for a good hour.
By the time you release it back, it will not leap away but sort of walk away, huge difference already!
Move on to the next and do the same.
Your goal is to render them feeling helpless, and must submit.
Feeding time? Sit on the floor at their level, and offer food from your hand only. If he won't take it, he is not hungry enough yet, do NOT leave food.
Try again in a few hours, he will very likely be ready, and must come to your hand to eat, as soon as he eats, pet him with the other hand. If he backs away, pull the food away. Period. Repeat and he will soon enough feel that what you are doing doesn't hurt, and although frightened and shaking probably, he will allow it.
This should progress into coaxing him to have to climb onto your lap to get to your hand for food.
As I said before, time is critical now, and will be like a full time job.
Must seperate, must take food away and be their only source, must wrap and carry/hold for a good hour, twice a day.
Anytime you are in a kittens presence, always talk in a sweet, no-threatening voice, sing, talk, read, anything.
This is what it takes to tame an 8 week old kitten.
I have many, many years of experience in becoming a master tamer
Good luck and love that you are working with them!
First off, they need to be seperated. Sorry but it's true. Otherwise you will work with one, then put it back and move on to the next one, and by the time you put the next one back, the fear from the others has undone what you just did in taming.
Also at 6 weeks, if they were aggressively worked on, they can be tamed in days. TRUE!!
8 weeks is much harder because of their mental/emotional growth, and the fact that this fear is getting to be like a permanent imprint.
Each day from here on matters. Do NOT show fear to them, you really must have them seperate. I doubt that you have as many cages or empty bathrooms as you do kittens! You didn't say how many, but I'm hoping only 3 and not 6!! Cage, large carriers, whatever but seperation is key.
Take the food away, but leave fresh water of course.
Cover your hand with a towel and dive in, scruffing, not with a finger and thumb but all your fingers and the side of your thumb so you have a very secure hold, and wrap that kitten very snugly in the towel, like a burrito, make sure the towel wraps snugly around the entire body up high on his neck so the arms dont get loose, because they will squirm and get the arms free and it won't work, plus you will likely get scratched.
Then you can talk to them, touch the face, kiss, sing, just pack that kitten all around with you for a good hour.
By the time you release it back, it will not leap away but sort of walk away, huge difference already!
Move on to the next and do the same.
Your goal is to render them feeling helpless, and must submit.
Feeding time? Sit on the floor at their level, and offer food from your hand only. If he won't take it, he is not hungry enough yet, do NOT leave food.
Try again in a few hours, he will very likely be ready, and must come to your hand to eat, as soon as he eats, pet him with the other hand. If he backs away, pull the food away. Period. Repeat and he will soon enough feel that what you are doing doesn't hurt, and although frightened and shaking probably, he will allow it.
This should progress into coaxing him to have to climb onto your lap to get to your hand for food.
As I said before, time is critical now, and will be like a full time job.
Must seperate, must take food away and be their only source, must wrap and carry/hold for a good hour, twice a day.
Anytime you are in a kittens presence, always talk in a sweet, no-threatening voice, sing, talk, read, anything.
This is what it takes to tame an 8 week old kitten.
I have many, many years of experience in becoming a master tamer
Good luck and love that you are working with them!
I would agree with the comments above about letting them first adjust to the concrete environment, and let them recognize that you play a very large (and coincidentally dominant) role in it. If you give them their space, they will begin to recognize you as the mover and the shaker. I never force any cat or kitten out of it's carrier, ever. They have so much to take in and only so much nerve for the task, so leave them that exit as a touchstone for a while. Forcing them to be out of the carrier and to be held and challenging them with these strange interactions is just building up their resistance and I think could result in a horrible disposition in the end. Kittens have so little experience with humans, they can't be expected to read intentions, no matter how good. So just don't give them any reason to fight you or fear you, act natural with them in your home, let their own interest and and curiosity about you and your home progress naturally, and the bounds and security will build.
I suppose that's fine for someone who plans to keep them all, but to get them completely tamed and adopted out, not a chance.
I have learned everything I know through experience, and lots of it, many years of successful taming.
You will not hurt them, they won't have a heart attack, they are forced to have their eyes opened up to the fact that humans will not harm them, but are feel goods in their little lives.
I actually have taught a class on neo-natal care, and feral kitten taming.
You don't allow them to come around when they are ready! That can and will set their fears in for good, mentally, they can still be molded now, not on their terms, they don't know what's best for them, but you will be showing them while they are impressionable.
Allowing them space and time to become interested and curious, you will have a litter of feral kittens who will grow up becoming semi-ferals.
The only hope for any decent life will be keeping them, or finding a barn home type situation who want mousers.
You want highly adoptable, friendly cats, shy/semi ferals are nearly impossible to find homes for.
I have learned everything I know through experience, and lots of it, many years of successful taming.
You will not hurt them, they won't have a heart attack, they are forced to have their eyes opened up to the fact that humans will not harm them, but are feel goods in their little lives.
I actually have taught a class on neo-natal care, and feral kitten taming.
You don't allow them to come around when they are ready! That can and will set their fears in for good, mentally, they can still be molded now, not on their terms, they don't know what's best for them, but you will be showing them while they are impressionable.
Allowing them space and time to become interested and curious, you will have a litter of feral kittens who will grow up becoming semi-ferals.
The only hope for any decent life will be keeping them, or finding a barn home type situation who want mousers.
You want highly adoptable, friendly cats, shy/semi ferals are nearly impossible to find homes for.
The ThreadStarter Sgrtrx88 har her first post 2 weeks ago, and none post in this errand after that as I can see.
Lets hope she proceed to get advices somewhere else.
I have btw noticed some people seems to seek help parallelly, perhaps from from several people simultaneously. (here several different forums). This causes of course much extra work if there are willing helpers, but they themselves are contend, in the end they always get what they needed.
What CatWoman707 says is thrue, you dont let these 6 weeks just drive by and hope for the best. It may work out, but the risk is you produce small semiferales. Especially if you aint skilled fosterer for the little older kittens either.
Nay, you work actively with them when you do have this golden possibility, having them at this young & easy age.
What I envisioned was a step by step guidning. Ie the TS would continue a normal communication, like most askers do.
And the plan would be; first let them land a little, say 2 - 3 days, so they begin to eat etc willingly, and begin to play a little on their own, and after it, the battery of socializing....
The inexperienced fosterer also landing down a little, calming herself, having some time to read on, the thoughts to mature, etc....
Good luck everyone!
Lets hope she proceed to get advices somewhere else.
I have btw noticed some people seems to seek help parallelly, perhaps from from several people simultaneously. (here several different forums). This causes of course much extra work if there are willing helpers, but they themselves are contend, in the end they always get what they needed.
What CatWoman707 says is thrue, you dont let these 6 weeks just drive by and hope for the best. It may work out, but the risk is you produce small semiferales. Especially if you aint skilled fosterer for the little older kittens either.
Nay, you work actively with them when you do have this golden possibility, having them at this young & easy age.
What I envisioned was a step by step guidning. Ie the TS would continue a normal communication, like most askers do.
And the plan would be; first let them land a little, say 2 - 3 days, so they begin to eat etc willingly, and begin to play a little on their own, and after it, the battery of socializing....
The inexperienced fosterer also landing down a little, calming herself, having some time to read on, the thoughts to mature, etc....
Good luck everyone!
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I'm sorry, I've never heard of and can't agree that letting the kittens get used to the fact that they're in a new environment before trying to engage them in fairly close interactions will most definitely make them feral! That is just absurd to me. I will just assume that it was the lean content of the reply that caused a misunderstanding somewhere. Everyone I associate with does this.
The carrier that they come in with can be a great advantage to both the caretaker and the kittens, in that they can view their new surroundings, and its inhabitants, from a safe distance (and they do realize when they are in strange quarters that that is their safe place now, though it wasn't when they were first put into it!), only stressed to begin with by feeding/watering/cleaning. They can see the goings-on with the caretaker and other animals, which starts to alleviate their stress and provides them with some sense of their own place and how to behave. (I rely most heavily on my other cats as ambassadors!) They are exposed to all of the norms in a protected way. They can be ushered into habits of daily living, night-time activity/day-time activity, feeding times, and normal noises. Feeding times will provide the best opportunity for interaction and one can start with a pat on the back when feeding (my personal choice) to start the 'un-wilding' and get them out of the habit of growling. Then you can move onto actually picking the kittens up and putting them at their bowls yourself when it is feeding time, a few inches away- I call this 'stalling', to get them out of the habit of wolfing, and letting them know that the food will still be there even though they are being picked up. And then picking them up after they are done eating, holding them for as long as they will tolerate while they are sated and unalarmed. All of these opportunities made by the fact that they are in close quarters, not running wild in the place, and all within few days of their arrival. How this will surely make them feral is lost on me. I can't get my head around it. All it takes is a week of precious time.
But, I don't teach a class!
The carrier that they come in with can be a great advantage to both the caretaker and the kittens, in that they can view their new surroundings, and its inhabitants, from a safe distance (and they do realize when they are in strange quarters that that is their safe place now, though it wasn't when they were first put into it!), only stressed to begin with by feeding/watering/cleaning. They can see the goings-on with the caretaker and other animals, which starts to alleviate their stress and provides them with some sense of their own place and how to behave. (I rely most heavily on my other cats as ambassadors!) They are exposed to all of the norms in a protected way. They can be ushered into habits of daily living, night-time activity/day-time activity, feeding times, and normal noises. Feeding times will provide the best opportunity for interaction and one can start with a pat on the back when feeding (my personal choice) to start the 'un-wilding' and get them out of the habit of growling. Then you can move onto actually picking the kittens up and putting them at their bowls yourself when it is feeding time, a few inches away- I call this 'stalling', to get them out of the habit of wolfing, and letting them know that the food will still be there even though they are being picked up. And then picking them up after they are done eating, holding them for as long as they will tolerate while they are sated and unalarmed. All of these opportunities made by the fact that they are in close quarters, not running wild in the place, and all within few days of their arrival. How this will surely make them feral is lost on me. I can't get my head around it. All it takes is a week of precious time.
But, I don't teach a class!
