OH, help please cat/ kitten emergency amazing update!

[chicknmania]

OK. She had two kittens as of this afternoon. WE put them in a box, close to where she had them, and it was in an out of the way location. But she moved them. Now, I think I know the area where they are, but I don't want to mess with them for fear she will move them again. They were in the barn last I thought, but now my DS says she may've moved them outside, he's just not sure. She is inside the barn now with the barn closed up.

I talked to our neighbor who said this cat had her kittens in their garage last year. She said BK moved her kittens twice when the neighbors started fussing over them too much. Last time she moved them, same thing, they knew the general area where they were, but couldn't find them. And it was outside. Those kittens went wild and/ or dissapeared. This is what we are trying to avoid b/c of the impact of too many feral cats on the wildlife population.

What the heck can we do to make her trust us around these kittens???? She is very trusting and affectionate with us normally. If we try to confine her, she just freaks.

Ideas????????? I believe she has had at least one more kitten since the other two, since this afternoon she was considerably more deflated.

 

[Anianna]

Some cats that have been feral and grow very friendly are still very anxious around people and will be very anxious about their kittens, moving them frequently. I would suggest taking her in tomorrow for a spay. While she is at the vet, the kittens will likely cry for momma and it will be easier to find them. Gather them up and lock them in the barn (or wherever you think is best). When girly comes home, lock her in the barn with them so she is limited on where she can move them. She probably won't be happy about it, but that is really the only way to keep the kittens from disappearing into the wild.

We had one cat that got so anxious about her kittens, she somehow stuffed them in a wall in the house, we think from the roof. We had to cut the wall open to get them. In my experience, kittens of such anxious mommas tend to disappear and we believe it was due to the fact the mother would hide them where she couldn't reach or in an otherwise dangerous location where they succumb to the environment.

 

[Judy]

Quote:
Definitely agree -- whether you can coordinate with the vet or just have to put her in a closet for a few hours then do the spay a few days later, whatever. There is a real danger of the kittens dying somewhere like the walls or floor insulation, not a pleasant situation, believe me. Mama won't be happy but she will survive.

 

[chicknmania]

OK, we'll try that. I was going to take her to the animal shelter's clinic, which is on Monday mornings, b/c it is a lot cheaper, for her spay. So I have missed it this week, but I will try to just stick her in a dog crate or something for a couple of hours in the afternoon when the flock is out of the barn and I can HEAR something in there....

Will she still have milk production after the spay?

I think you are right about her hiding them and then they succumb to the environment. Now that I think about it, I think she may have had kittens at least one other time since last year; she looked pregnant for a while and then didn't look that way and we just thought she might've been wormy b/c we never saw evidence of any kittens...so we dewormed her and forgot about it.

 

[Judy]

Or maybe the first litter miscarried.

I'd sure ask the vet or assistant about the milk thing -- I think so, but they can also start eating kitten food pretty young if I remember correctly -- it's been a while.

 

[chicknmania]

Yes, I will. I would've locked her up this morning, but it is so cold...my DS told me he locked her in the barn last night, but she was outside this morning when I went out there....So to me it seems she may've moved them outside and busted her way out of the barn someplace so she could get back there to them. And there is so much bird and chicken and just general noise outside, I don't know if I could ever hear them mewing. I thought maybe we will try this afternoon to lock her up when it is warmer, and go listen then,or maybe I can set the game camera up tonight to get a bead on where she goes. If it would just warm up maybe they would be more active and make more noise, but it is supposed to be cold and rain all the way through next weekend.

I wondered about the miscarry thing too. But she is still very round and her back end is dry and clean now so I think she's done. And she's acting normal, not clingy anymore, just not eating much. So maybe she's just that round all the time from having so many litters, or maybe there's something else wrong.

 

[chicknmania]

I just thought other cat owners might like to have this information for reference. I took BK to the vet today, originally just to have him palpate her. He said he thought he felt a kitten, but wasn't sure. Decided to give her a shot, then two shots, of oxytocin. Nothing happened after waiting forever. Then he decided to do an xray which (cool!) showed a kitten head down and headed for the door, but he couldn't tell if it was alive, and, said that sometimes cats can carry a mummified dead kitten around for a long time with no ill effects. He thought this one looks good but no guarantees of anything. Because of the possibility that her other kits might still be alive, he sent me home with another oxytocin shot to give her later, and we decided to let her run, rather than keeping her confined, in the hopes she'd go back to her other kittens. In the meantime a search for the kittens produced no results. Well, she didn't return to the kittens , with us around anyway. We looked and looked before we brought her back in the barn, saw and heard nothing. If she does not have this kitten tonight, she will be back to the vet tomorrow for a csection and spay. He was very reasonable with the bill, for which I was grateful, basically just cost. We were very disappointed with the results overall though, but I thought it was interesting a cat can carry a kitten that long without any ill effects, and also that they can go that long in extending out the birthing process, he said it was STILL possible that she would've had this kitten normally without any help at all.

 

[chicknmania]

Those kittens are STILL ALIVE! We never found them again, and every day BK has been in the barn all day, dissapearing outside at night. Two nights ago she attacked a skunk, and she has been attacking any animal, regardless of size, that comes near he established territory, including waving her paws at the chooks and peacocks. Today she meowed at me, and when I looked at her, she led me across our field, stopping once in a while to look back and meow at me. When she got to the other side of the field, she lay down in the dirt next to a very large section of high grass and brush, surrounding a big tree, in a corner of our field. It seemed to me she was saying "they're here". I noticed her teats were VERY full. Welll, I looked around a bit, but couldn't find the kittens, and wasn't real interested in getting covered with ticks looking for a needle in a haystack. So I hung out with her a for a while and listened. NO kitten noises. No sign of them. But it was obvious they were there. She did not follow me when I finally left, though I would have liked to sit with her for a while, to see if the kittens came, or if she finally led me to them. Tonight at dinnertime, her teats were empty. How the heck is she keeping those kittens in one place? They would now be about three weeks old. Could the male cat be assisting her in parenting them????? The amazing thing is that she led me to them, or to the area where they are. I am sure about this. So now we are wondering why, is she worried and actually realizes we can protect them, but just not sure she's ready to trust us? Or maybe she hoped that my being there would help to keep her kittens safe, if I would just stay?