Kittens are Gone!

lmahoney79

Hey, a cat we have been feeding had kittens over the weekend and they have been staying in a little hut we built out on our terrace, mother has been feeding them in there. Today, i looked in and the kittens are gone!! The mother came back down and was looking around and sniffing for them. Initially i thought she may have moved them but then why did she look like she was looking for them?? any suggestions??

Pin_Cushion

Put your hands in your pockets and whistle, happy in the knowledge that you don't have to go to the bother of offloading a litter of kittens.

easyeason3

Was she looking around for food you would have left out for her?

If it was a fox or a dog that got at them I'd nearly be expecting to see some blood at the very least.

lmahoney79

Pin Cushion..that's not very helpful.....

lmahoney79

easyeason3 wrote: »

Was she looking around for food you would have left out for her?

If it was a fox or a dog that got at them I'd nearly be expecting to see some blood at the very least.

No she was defo looking for them, she was looking inside the hut and sniffing around for them, sniffing their blanket. The hut is on our terrace behind the balcony, be very hard for a dog to get at it and there was no blood......thought they may have crawled out somewhere but no sign, just vanished!

easyeason3

lmahoney79 wrote: »

No she was defo looking for them, she was looking inside the hut and sniffing around for them, sniffing their blanket. The hut is on our terrace behind the balcony, be very hard for a dog to get at it and there was no blood......thought they may have crawled out somewhere but no sign, just vanished!

Was she pawing around looking kind of distressed?
If she was just having a sniff then I wouldn't be too concerned because she could have moved them herself.

If it's an isolated place then I don't know where they could have gone especially if they were only a few days old.

lmahoney79

yeah i didnt even think they woul dbe able to crawl far yet......i wouldnt go so far to say she was overly distressed but just seemed to be searching for them, she is just sitting here outside on the terrace like she is expecting to see them. she has already fed so she is not waiting for food....im confused! mother just keeps going to back to hut for a look around and a sniff every few minutes.

lmahoney79

Just thought that if she moved them, then why is she still sitting down here looking around the hut.........any thoughts anyone??

easyeason3

lmahoney79 wrote: »

yeah i didnt even think they woul dbe able to crawl far yet......i wouldnt go so far to say she was overly distressed but just seemed to be searching for them, she is just sitting here outside on the terrace like she is expecting to see them. she has already fed so she is not waiting for food....im confused!

Looking for more food maybe?
Feeding the kittens will take it out of her so she will need extra food & milk so maybe that was what she was doing.
Try & see where she goes if you can & I'm sure the kittens won't be too far away.
Failing that you're going to have to be patient & wait for a few heads to appear looking for food some morning

lmahoney79

defo not looking for food, there is bowl here for her that she keeps coming back to every few minutes......she just seems to be wondering around. I'll guess ill just have to wait and see, but was hoping to be able to handle them soon so i could get them used to humans so they could be re-homed.....if i cant find them, they wont have a chance!

Shazanne

Pin_Cushion wrote: »

Put your hands in your pockets and whistle, happy in the knowledge that you don't have to go to the bother of offloading a litter of kittens.

If that's your attitude you have no business on a pet lovers site! The OP is obviously concerned about what is happening and people like you should have enough cop on not to make the situation worse. Shame on you:mad:

morganafay

It could be that she moved them but she went back to see if she had left any, and she's just making sure there's none left, because they can't count. But it's kinda weird that she keeps checking. Do you think another animal could have gotten them? I'd bet she probably did move them, they often do after a few days.

You could wait and see if she goes away and follow her if you can. She might not lead you straight to them, but if you keep following her then she might to go to them. (Unless she's really nervous and doesn't want you near them).

My cat had kittens in my neighbour's greenhouse and I had to follow her through people's gardens and fields for two hours before she went to feed them.

Or just wait and see if she goes away for a while, and comes back later for food then maybe she's gone to feed them.

I hope you can find them or she brings them back, so they won't be feral Poor kitties.

lmahoney79

yeah i am going to try follow her if i can and see where she goes, there is another female cat here too that is the mothers sister, so she may have moved them when mother was away.....definitely no sign that something got at them as no blood or anything anywhere...

morganafay

That is possible that the sister took the kittens. Has the sister had kittens before or is she possibly pregnant? My friend's cats both had kittens and one stole some of the other kittens to raise with her own. And two of my sister cats, years ago, both had kittens and had them in the same house, and one mother tried to abandon one of the other kittens, but it had an eye infection so that was why. I don't know if a cat would try to abandon another cat's kittens or anything.

It's more likely that the mother took them herself, but it's possible the sister did I guess.

Good luck, I hope you find them and they are ok

easyeason3

lmahoney79 wrote: »

yeah i am going to try follow her if i can and see where she goes, there is another female cat here too that is the mothers sister, so she may have moved them when mother was away.....definitely no sign that something got at them as no blood or anything anywhere...

Not trying to be mean but the mothers sister could have moved them in order to get rid of them.

Something similar happened a neighbour of mine a few years ago. Basically the other female cat got jealous & abandoned the kittens somewhere, but you could see she was very jealous as soon as the kittens arrived!

lmahoney79

the sister has been spayed, we managed to get her done in time! the mother is still here at the minute hanging around, she doesnt seem too keen to move on

star-pants

Pincushion - take a day off and read the charter before you come back.
Imahoney / Shazanne - there's a report post button, please use it next time, if someone's being obviously unhelpful don't bother responding to them.

lmahoney79

Duly noted, thanks.

morganafay

The mother might hang around for a few hours, because she has to have a break from the kittens. I hope she knows where they are anyway. Let us know if you find them.

lmahoney79

the mum has been gone now a few hours so hope to god she is with the kittens wherever they are........there is an old building site near us where the cats go sometimes so we think she must have moved them up there. which unfortunately means we probably wont be able to socialize the kittens for re-homing.

ghost_ie

I don't want to look on the black side, but have there been any toms hanging around? Some toms have been known to take and kill kittens

convert

lmahoney79 wrote: »

which unfortunately means we probably wont be able to socialize the kittens for re-homing.

Maybe that's what she wanted and that's why she moved them?

Lando Griffin

She will turn up on your door step in a few weeks time with them, she just moved them cos she didnt feel they were safe, they will be grand. The sniffing is to see if their scent is still there so she can throw off a Tom cat that is probably feeling jealous.

morganafay

Lando Griffin wrote: »

She will turn up on your door step in a few weeks time with them, she just moved them cos she didnt feel they were safe, they will be grand. The sniffing is to see if their scent is still there so she can throw off a Tom cat that is probably feeling jealous.

Yeah, that's probably true. Keep feeding her and hopefully she'll bring the kittens back so you can feed them too, and they'll be a bit nervous but still young enough to be tamed.

lmahoney79

well this is the latest, we reckon we know what has happened. We think she moved them up to the building site where some of the other cats are because as we discovered late last night, a HUGE hedgehog was hanging around and eating their cat food!
So we have taken away all the food outside and cleaned out the cat's hut and put fresh blankets in in the hope that she will bring them back down soon!

Pin_Cushion

lmahoney79 wrote: »

well this is the latest, we reckon we know what has happened. We think she moved them up to the building site where some of the other cats are because as we discovered late last night, a HUGE hedgehog was hanging around and eating their cat food!
So we have taken away all the food outside and cleaned out the cat's hut and put fresh blankets in in the hope that she will bring them back down soon!

Best advice to you is to leave them alone. The mother obviously wanted to bring them somewhere else. Why do you feel the need to interfere?

It's obvious that cats don't like to have over-enthusiastic humans "petting" them, let alone hunting them out when they try to get away. My earlier comment was sincere, in spite of the silly mods.

Cats aren't stupid, they were looking after their kittens long before you came along, and will continue to after. Just because you've fed a stray cat once or twice doesn't make it your property. Leave her alone and let her look after her kittens.

The Sweeper

Pin Cushion, I could write paragraphs and paragraphs and paragraphs here, but I might become frustrated. Instead I'd ask you to properly educate yourself before contributing.

Please google the following terms:

Feral cat life span
Worm infestations in kittens
Conjunctivitis in cat colonies
Cat flu
Herpes in cats
Feline URTIs or upper respiratory tract infections
Feline AIDs
FeLV or Feline Leukaemia Virus
Trap, neuter, release
Ovarian cancer in cats
Pyometra and endometrial hyperplasia in cats
Hunting cats and the decline of song birds
Cats hit by cars
Statistics for cats put to sleep in the pound (this will be difficult, it's hard to find any because there are so many that nobody counts)
Cat baiting

And once you've read all about those, please google

Why neuter cats
Animal welfare and cats
Care of cats

And see if you can draw some conclusions between all of those results.

Finally please Google 'do you have a secret cat' for precise reasons why people SHOULD take ownership of stray cats.

morganafay

OP, please don't listen to pincushion, if you can find the kittens (even in a few months) then the best thing to do, for them, would be to try to tame them. They'd live a much better life as a pet then a half-starved feral cat.

I have a lovely cat who used to be feral when she was a kitten, she's the friendliest cat ever and is now 7 years old, if she was still feral she probably would have died years ago. I hope the mother brings the kittens back again in a few weeks, sometimes they do that

lmahoney79

I am not listening to Pin Cushion, he obviously doesnt have a clue what's best for them and dont understand why he is still writing in this thread to be honest........Firstly, we are not "hunting them down", we want to check they are still alive for one thing.....Secondly, we havent just fed the feral cat once or twice and now think we have ownership over it, we have been feeding her and her brother and sister for a year, have already neutered the other two, build them a cat house outside and generally kept them in bloody good health, so i will not just suddenly leave one all alone when she has given birth in the cat house we built her outside our house.
Thanks to everyone else though for your good advice :-)

morganafay

Actually the feral kitten I got was a similar story. My mother's friend's cat had kittens in their garden, but then took them away after a few days. But she brought them back once they started eating solid food so that they could get fed too. I got two of the kittens at 8 weeks and had no problem taming them and the owner tamed the others. So I hope your cat brings home the kittens too, good luck

goat2

morganafay wrote: »

It could be that she moved them but she went back to see if she had left any, and she's just making sure there's none left, because they can't count. But it's kinda weird that she keeps checking. Do you think another animal could have gotten them? I'd bet she probably did move them, they often do after a few days.

You could wait and see if she goes away and follow her if you can. She might not lead you straight to them, but if you keep following her then she might to go to them. (Unless she's really nervous and doesn't want you near them).

My cat had kittens in my neighbour's greenhouse and I had to follow her through people's gardens and fields for two hours before she went to feed them.

Or just wait and see if she goes away for a while, and comes back later for food then maybe she's gone to feed them.

I hope you can find them or she brings them back, so they won't be feral Poor kitties.

listen for their noise, watch where she goes after feeding, as my cat hid hers as she must not have liked me poking my nose in her business, i watched her and shure enough she she had hid them safely and i watched at a distance, then when they needed feeding solids i went and put food nearby and they are now in house and garden, cats are cute and great at seeing after babies,