Kitten Care Bringing Up Baby

Providing good kitten care during the first few weeks of life ensures that your new bundle of fur will grow up to be a confident, healthy cat.

It can all be very exciting having your first kitten, but it does come with a responsibility to play an active role in their upbringing.

However it is a fine line between spoiling them and giving them the confidence to interact in the human world. Too much spoiling and cosseting and the kitten may grow up not possessing the skills to look after themselves properly.

What to expect In Normal Kitten development

If all goes well with the birth and the mother cat, or Queen as she is known, is happy and confident with her kittens, then there is a normal pattern of development that will occur during the few months of life.

Knowing what this normal pattern is will help you to notice if anything is wrong or if you will have to intervene and provide some extra kitten care of your own.

There are three main things that are important in the early life of a kitten. They are:

Protection from Disease - Unlike human babies, kittens are not born with some of their mother's antibodies to protect them from illness. Instead these antibodies are obtained from a substance called colostrum, which is contained in the first milk produced by the Queen.

To obtain the most protection it is important that the kittens nurse within the first two hours of birth, as the levels of colostrum in the milk slowly decreases and is practically zero after 12 hours. Kittens who do not receive enough of this first milk are very susceptible to bacterial and viral disease and will require a lot of extra care.

Birth weight - the weight of newborn kittens depends on several factors, the health and age of the queen, the size of the litter and the length of gestation. As a guide a kitten born to a healthy mother after a 65 day gestation with only 3 or 4 other siblings will weigh around 3 to 5 ounces.

Weight Gain - Similarly the rate at which kittens gain weight is also dependant on several factors, the health of the kitten, the milk production of the queen and the size of the litter. As a guide in normal situations kittens can gain 2 to 4 ounces a week and after 7 days can have doubled its birth weight.

Between 5 and 10 days after birth, depending on the length of gestation the kittens eyes will open and after 6 weeks the queen will begin to wean the kittens off her milk onto solid food.

Early Lessons

Most cats are excellent mothers and will teach her new brood all the catty things they need to know but as an owner we must stand by to give her a helping hand or to reinforce certain lessons.

This type of kitten care can often be overlooked as we think that the mother cat will teach them everything they need to know, but without our intervention, sometimes things can go a little awry.

The mother cat will teach her kittens about hunting, play, toilet training and which food to eat, your role in helping with these lessons are:

• When the kittens are ready to move on to solid food (around four weeks), provide cat food especially formulated for kittens and also offer them lots of different flavours. This way they will be less fussy eaters when they grow up.
• Kittens will start to use a litter tray around five weeks old. Provide soft litter, which will be easy to dig and will not hurt paws and put them off. Also make sure that the litter tray is easily accessible for a kitten to get into. If they have only positive experiences of using the litter tray during this time it will avoid any toileting issues later on.
• Play pouncing and hunting games with your kitten but never let them play with your hands. This could develop into a learned behaviour and although it doesn’t hurt now when they are kittens, it certainly will when they are fully grown. It will be very difficult to reverse this behaviour later on in life and by not encouraging this type of play now will avoid problems in the future.

Annie's New Kitten Gift Box

Kitten care not punishment.

It is very tempting for kitten and cat owners to punish their pets when they do something wrong, just like we would out children. However cats do not have the same understanding of punishment.

They do not automatically associate a punishment with a certain misdemeanour; instead they will associate it with the person. So instead of providing a positive outcome i.e. stop chewing the chair for example, you are creating a negative one between your cat and yourself.

This can lead to aggression towards you and even avoidance, which in some extreme cases could result in the cat going off to find new owners.

So from an early age it is important to practice these rules and teach your furry youngster the right and wrong way to behave.

Reward good behaviour always with a positive experience, something that your particular cat really enjoys, it could be:

• A treat
• A game
• A cuddle etc

Reward bad behaviour with a negative experience by taking something away that your cat enjoys. The most powerful of which is the removal of attention. So:

• Stop playing the game immediately
• Walk away from the kitten, preferably out of the room.
• Remain silent
• Have no eye contact with the kitten

The cat will perceive this as a bad experience and will not want to repeat it.

What if something goes wrong?

Unfortunately things go wrong and you may find your self having to provide some extra kitten care for your new furry family or even in extreme cases have to completely hand rear the kittens your self.

There are many occasions where you may come across an orphan kitten that will require urgent care and attention. Knowing when it is right for you to get involved and how best to provide those early days of care can be a difficult one.

If you do find yourself in the situation where you are having to hand rear orphan kittens, it is very important that you know how to provide the best kitten care to prevent illness or even death during the early weeks.

The requirements of a feline brood is very different to those of human babies and your main goal for looking after orphan kittens is to keep them alive until they are old enough to be weaned. After which they should be strong enough to survive with less help. Kitten health can be a worry but with a little vigalance can be looked after easily.

Kitten care during the first seven weeks.

These first few weeks are vital to the physical and mental health of the kittens and you will have to make sure that you provide such care as:

• Providing the most suitable sleeping arrangements
• Keeping them warm
• Keeping them clean
• Feeding the correct amount and type of food
• Providing socialisation skills and experiences
• Weaning
• Looking after their general health

All of these subjects are discussed further in more detail in additional pages

Final words on kitten care

It is easy for us to look after a kitten nutritionally and medically these days, as everything is so accessible. Special kitten food can be bought from every supermarket and our local vets can carry out vaccinations and neutering relatively cheaply and easily.

But too often the important kitten care of socialisation and early training experiences are overlooked and this when done correctly from the beginning will prevent many future behavioural problems and will ensure that you have a happy contented confident cat who will bring many benefits to the family for many years.

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