Newborn Kittens How To Take Care Of Them
As mentioned earlier newborn kittens will do nothing but sleep and eat during the first week of their lives.
Newborn kittens how to take care of them. Provide blankets a heat lamp or a heating pad to ensure the kittens stay warm. Use a large enough box to comfortably hold the mother cat and her kittens. To care for newborn kittens when the mother cat is still present feed the mother to keep her strength up but leave the kittens alone for the first week to ensure the mother doesn t reject them. Obviously the mother cat will take care of not only feeding the kittens but also keeping them clean.
To assist you in your kitten care you can picture the. Make sure you keep a fresh supply and not too much at one time. Newborn kittens are just super cute and loving. Raising a kitten is really a lot of fun but it s also a lot of work.
Chilling is one of the most critical dangers to newborn kittens. Caring for them is actually not too hard once you know how to take care of mother cat and newborn kittens. Like a human baby a newborn kitten will need to be fed frequently approximately every two to three hours. After feeding the kittens you ll need to wipe their genitals with a damp cotton swab to encourage them to urinate.
These antibodies last for six weeks or more. If the kitten in your care has been orphaned it is essential that you keep the young one warm. How do i keep a newborn kitten warm. It s also important to monitor the kittens while they are eating as they are unsteady and can fall head first into the food.
If the mother cat is not around you ll need to prepare and feed them yourself. This goes to show the extent mothers are willing to go to keep their little ones safe and sound. When the orphaned kittens reach about 3 weeks of age you can start providing watered down meat based kitten food for them to nibble on. Once they start eating food as it comes from the.
Stack clean towels to line it. One of the most heartwarming experiences is taking care of the newborn kittens. As long as you have patience and remember the basics about feeding handling socialization preventive care and toilet training you will be raising strong healthy kittens in no time. The first milk produced called colostrum is rich in antibodies and will help protect kittens against diseases.
You should also wash your hands before and after handling the kittens so you don t get them sick. As a rule of thumb for every ounce of kitten body weight he or she needs 8 ccs of formula. At 6 12 weeks old start giving them dry. At 3 4 weeks old provide formula and water softened kitten kibble 4 6 times daily.
So a kitten weighing 3 ounces will need about 24 ounces of milk replacement every 24 hours. This will continue until they gradually transition to solid foods when they are around four weeks old weaning. In fact she will eat any urine and feces her little ones produce. A heating pad or a hot water bottle wrapped in a towel works.
One of the most important bits of knowledge you ll need in learning how to take care of a kitten is feeding him or her. Mix the wet food with water until it achieves a soupy consistency and consider warming the mixture before serving. Newborn kittens should get all of their nutrition from their mother.