Pregnant barn cat *update* We have kittens!

[watchdogps]

Quote:

We are going to have her spayed after the birth as soon as we can afford it. But doing it now would be an abortion, wouldn't it? I'm not going to do that. I believe she is young, that is why I'm concerned about her birth. I'm going to try to supervise it and make sure things go okay as far as I can, but I won't get her spayed while she is pregnant.

Technically yes. But animals arent people, and we dont need to apply our own morals to them. There are wayyy too many cats out there as it is, and if you let her have more, your kittens will take homes that others who are already born will not get, so someone has to die either way. If you plan on keeping all the kittens, fine. If not, think about the impact this one litter will have.

 

[LyonFuzz]

Even if you are keeping all the kittens, it doesn't sound like you can afford to give them the care and spay/neutering they will need. You said you have to wait until you can afford to spay the mom. So you're going to bring 4-8 more kittens into the world and let them go unaltered to produce more?

 

[MustLoveHens]

First off I'm going to say kudos for giving a stray cat a home. HOWEVER....
Next, I'm going to say that I completely 100% agree with Watchdogps and Lyonfuzz.
The reality is this: you have a semi feral to feral cat that is pregnant. There is no guarantee that she will stay in the garage with the kittens. She very well may move them and then you are looking at the very real possibility that she and all her kittens will not be able to be handled let alone altered. Leading to more unwanted cats that you cannot afford.
You also stated that you will spay her "after the birth as soon as we can afford it." This indicates that you cannot afford the vet bill if she were to have problems during birth requiring a vet. Nor can you afford to properly care for her or the kittens. Vet check ups, worming, vaccinations, kitten food (which she should already be on) to name a few. And as Lyon pointed out, it also indicates that you cannot afford to alter the kittens once they are born.
Having worked at and help start a rescue, I cannot tell you how many times I have heard similar statements and the animal never is altered and keep on having litter after litter because the money was just never there to have it done.......But maybe I'm just really jaded.....

Think about this: According to UC Davis, In seven years, an unspayed female and an unneutered male cat can produce up to 781,250 kittens. According to dogandcats101.com, an unspayed cat, her mate, and all of their offspring, producing 2 litters a year, with 2.8 kittens surviving per litter, can add up to 11,606,077 in 9 years. That is not a typo! 11 million plus cats in 9 short years.

MY 2 CENTS: If you don't want to have her litter aborted because of your beliefs then I have to respect your stance even if I don't at all agree with it. However, since this is the road you wish to go down, my advice is to take that young cat and release her to a shelter before she gives birth . They have the means and funds to care for her correctly and will have her and her litter altered. If there is a medical emergency, they have the staff to take care of it.
If you must have a barn cat there are many available that need homes and are already altered. Some are even free or are offered for adoption at reduced fees. Check with petfinders and your local shelter.

 

[maizy'smom]

First off I'm going to say kudos for giving a stray cat a home. HOWEVER....
Next, I'm going to say that I completely 100% agree with Watchdogps and Lyonfuzz.
The reality is this: you have a semi feral to feral cat that is pregnant. There is no guarantee that she will stay in the garage with the kittens. She very well may move them and then you are looking at the very real possibility that she and all her kittens will not be able to be handled let alone altered. Leading to more unwanted cats that you cannot afford.
You also stated that you will spay her "after the birth as soon as we can afford it." This indicates that you cannot afford the vet bill if she were to have problems during birth requiring a vet. Nor can you afford to properly care for her or the kittens. Vet check ups, worming, vaccinations, kitten food (which she should already be on) to name a few. And as Lyon pointed out, it also indicates that you cannot afford to alter the kittens once they are born.
Having worked at and help start a rescue, I cannot tell you how many times I have heard similar statements and the animal never is altered and keep on having litter after litter because the money was just never there to have it done.......But maybe I'm just really jaded.....

Think about this: According to UC Davis, In seven years, an unspayed female and an unneutered male cat can produce up to 781,250 kittens. According to dogandcats101.com, an unspayed cat, her mate, and all of their offspring, producing 2 litters a year, with 2.8 kittens surviving per litter, can add up to 11,606,077 in 9 years. That is not a typo! 11 million plus cats in 9 short years.

MY 2 CENTS: If you don't want to have her litter aborted because of your beliefs then I have to respect your stance even if I don't at all agree with it. However, since this is the road you wish to go down, my advice is to take that young cat and release her to a shelter before she gives birth . They have the means and funds to care for her correctly and will have her and her litter altered. If there is a medical emergency, they have the staff to take care of it.
If you must have a barn cat there are many available that need homes and are already altered. Some are even free or are offered for adoption at reduced fees. Check with petfinders and your local shelter.

There are just so many middle grounds to this debate. In my experience, which, granted, was in the City of Philadelphia, if you take a pregnant cat in to most shelters, they will not only not care for the cat through delivery and then care for the kittens, but will in fact, put the mother down before the kittens are even born. That is exactly what I was told when in the same (urban) situation.
An alternate option might be to care for the cat till she delivers, and once the kittens are born and able to be on their own, (6-8 weeks), take them all to the shelter, to have mom spayed and the kittens adopted. It doesn't have to be so drastically black-and-white. I'm rather fond of gray, myself....

mm

 

[babyblue2]

My husbands friend let my cat out while my spouse and I were on our honeymoon. The cat had a scheduled appointment to get fixed the week we came back. We did not find her for many weeks and at that point she was very pregnant. We kept her in the house, tamed her. Food is a good bribe. She went from feral kitten, to indoor lap kitten, to feral to indoor kitten again. She demanded to give birth on my lap. If I tried to get up and walk away she screamed and cried. We got her and every baby fixed asap and found homes for all of them threw a rescue. We got lucky. Every kitten has beautiful long fur. They got snatched up quickly.


For your cat I would catch and contain her by any means possible. Even if you have to lock her in a bathroom or in a large dog crate. Offer her food and be quite and gentle with her. Socialize with her as much as you cant. Do not let her back out again. She will come around. Once she has her kittens and they are up and moving do the same thing with them. Start looking now for a rescue or shelter that will take and re-home the kittens.

 

[LaynaDon95]

On November 9th, 1984, my soul-mate, Mona was born. On April 15th, 1985, I mid-wifed Mona's delivery of three kittens. I too, was new to kittens at that time...I had only been step-mom to Tasha, my husband's cat for about a year. I contacted Tasha's vet to ask some of these same questions, like do new-born kittens need a first check up, and his answer was, "What? Forget about the kittens, bring me the mother! I've been telling people to spay their cats at 6 months of age, and she just delivered a litter at 5months old! And it is a 6 week gestational period, so she conceived at 3 1/2 months!" That said, she did strain a bit with the last one, who was rather large-headed for her little body, but all survived the event without any medical intervention. In fact, Mona lived to be five weeks short of twenty years old. Part of our very strongemotional tie, I think, came from bonding over her delivery. All I really did was keep her comfortable and coo and caress her, and offer encouragement through her contractions, but she remembered it all her life. mm

Oh my goodness! I cannot believe she conceived that early! I'm glad everyone was okay.

 

[LaynaDon95]

Technically yes. But animals arent people, and we dont need to apply our own morals to them. There are wayyy too many cats out there as it is, and if you let her have more, your kittens will take homes that others who are already born will not get, so someone has to die either way. If you plan on keeping all the kittens, fine. If not, think about the impact this one litter will have.

I politely disagree. Abortion is abortion whether it's a human, cat, or platypus. I will not be getting her spayed while she is pregnant. It's not my fault there are so many kittens in this world and I won't do something I consider immoral to prevent more of them. I will get her spayed after the birth to prevent it from happening again. We all thought she was much younger than she was and that we had more time. I know very well the impact these kittens will have on other already living kittens. That's why I planned to have her spayed in the first place. I'm not being irresponsible and careless. I do care. I refuse to spend money we don't have on a cat when the people in my family can't afford all the care they need. I'm not looking for advice on killing unborn kittens, I want to know how to take care of Jack while she's pregnant and her kittens when they get here.

 

[LaynaDon95]

Even if you are keeping all the kittens, it doesn't sound like you can afford to give them the care and spay/neutering they will need. You said you have to wait until you can afford to spay the mom. So you're going to bring 4-8 more kittens into the world and let them go unaltered to produce more?

I'm not trying to start a flame war, but the decision has been made. If you don't have advice on how to take care of the mother and kittens then your comments are not needed here. I'm doing the best I can. The fact is she is pregnant and I refuse to abort the kittens.

 

[erinchelsea]

IME cats are very well equipped to handle delivery and caring for kittens on their own. Most do not like humans around while they are giving birth. I think it's a good idea to keep an eye on her but try not to interfere too much. I'd provide a box with some towels where you have her food, but mama cats will have their kittens where they feel is a safe place, not necessarily where you want her to. So be prepared that she may take off before she goes into labor. Hopefully everything will go smoothly but just do what you can.

Don't stress too much about it. We had just tons and tons of barn cats when I was growing up, I only remember one mommy out of all of them that would not take care of a litter of kittens.

Also, after the kittens are weaned, check to see if there is a program in your area that assists with the costs of spaying feral cats. I've heard a program advertised here on the radio, I think they were only charging $20 for a spay which is awesome. Good luck!

 

[LaynaDon95]

IME cats are very well equipped to handle delivery and caring for kittens on their own. Most do not like humans around while they are giving birth. I think it's a good idea to keep an eye on her but try not to interfere too much. I'd provide a box with some towels where you have her food, but mama cats will have their kittens where they feel is a safe place, not necessarily where you want her to. So be prepared that she may take off before she goes into labor. Hopefully everything will go smoothly but just do what you can.

Don't stress too much about it. We had just tons and tons of barn cats when I was growing up, I only remember one mommy out of all of them that would not take care of a litter of kittens.

Also, after the kittens are weaned, check to see if there is a program in your area that assists with the costs of spaying feral cats. I've heard a program advertised here on the radio, I think they were only charging $20 for a spay which is awesome. Good luck!

Thank you. We have a small room in the garage where she likes to stay so I might put her in there closer to time and keep her and the kitten in there for awhile. I don't want the kittens to run off. We have too many strays in the neighborhood as it is.