We got a new kitten yesterday… he’s about 2 months old, and seems healthy.
His name is Loki. I’ll post pics as soon as my wife gets batteries for the camera.
The problem is, he’s been at our house now for about 24 hours, and as near as we can tell, he still hasn’t eaten or drunk anything. He finally used the box just about an hour ago, but he’s still not eating.
The lady we got him from told us that she had been feeding him kitten chow for a bit, so that’s good, but I’m starting to get a little worried about the food situation.
Any advice?
My wife is reluctant to get a canned cat food, since the woman told us he was eating solids. Would this make a big difference?
Yes, he needs to eat. 24 hours is reaching the time when you start to get worried. He’s probably just too nervous to eat, but if he doesn’t eat something, he’ll start to feel crummy, which will reduce his appetite, so then he won’t eat, so then he feels crummy, and so it spirals.
Right now, it doesn’t matter what he eats. The main thing is to get him eating. Tuna, wet food, whatever. Put him with his food and water and litter box in a quite room (spare bedrooms are perfect) and let him be for a few hours. If he hasn’t eaten anything in the next 6 hours or so, call your local vet for advice.
Canned food won’t really be a big issue if you put a little bit out, with dry food nearby. The canned food smells better than dry food, so that may stimulate his/her appetite more. Did you get the exact same brand of cat food as the previous owner was feeding him? Some cats are exceedingly finicky about what they eat and would literally rather starve to death than eat something they don’t like.
Is he drinking? You may need a syringe and some rehydration fluid. Kitty milk if you can get it (not cow’s milk as it could give him diaorrea and make things worse).
Any seafood with high protein is irresistible to most cats: tuna, salmon, crab, lobster, shrimps. If the worst comes to the worst, open a can of something like that and see if he’s interested.
Also, you need to give him somewhere he can feel safe: a whole house can be very intimidating when a cat has recently moved. Put him in a single dimly-lit room with the litter on one side of the room and food and water on the other, and the bed in a corner for “protection”. Let him explore the rest of the house in his own time.
When my kittens didn’t seem to get the hint about how to eat from a bowl, here’s what I did: put some milk in a shallow saucer, and float some dry kitty food in it. Encourage kitten to try it. If it doesn’t get the clue, (though it may sound harsh), gently push his little nose into it, just enough to get his whiskers a little wet. Kitty will lick the stuff off his whiskers, find it good, and take to the rest. Hasn’t failed yet.
Of course, you’ll have to be careful, because milk tends to give 'em loose stools. Just get him started, and then you can ease back.
Just wanted to point out that syringing fluids to a cat can be very dangerous. If you don’t know what you are doing, you can make them accidentally breath it in. And then you’ve causes an aspiration pneumonia and you have to take them for emergency veterinary care.
Giving kittens fluids with a kitten-sized bottle is much safer. But, you mentioned that he is already eating on his own. And, he’s about the right age for weaning, so a bottle might not be necessary.
In addition to the wet food by itself, you can try a little milk replacer, as Jimm suggests. KMR is a popular brand you should be able to find at a large pet store like Pet Co. There are also some ready-mix formulas available. Any small animal veterinary clinic would also have some on hand. Try mixing the milk half and half with the wet food. As he starts to eat, you can gradually lower the amount of milk over the next two weeks.
But, if he’s not eating anything in the next 6 hours, call the doctor!
Given the age of your kitten, I’d avoid cows milk at all costs. He’s little enough that diarrhea can quickly become life threatening once it starts up. You could try this same technique with the cat millk replacer, though.
If he was my kitty, I’d do the half and half cat milk food with wet food and just let him be by himself for a couple hours. If the food isn’t disturbed when you come back, then try putting his nose in it like Max torque suggests. If still nothing, a call to the vet.
Sorry I’m so lately thinking of this milk and food idea. Somehow I read his age as 2 years instead of 2 months.
We did this with our rescue kitty, who was about 4-6 weeks old at the time. He was small enough that we had to feed him from a spoon, but it should work well for you in a bowl.
I agree that getting him to eat something is a lot more important that getting him to eat any particular kind of food.
Yes, sorry, I should have said “use the syringe to drip liquids onto the cat’s tongue” - not down the back of the throat or anything like that. But if in doubt call a vet, of course.
Thank you all for the advice! One of the hazards of living in a small town, I’m not sure if there is a Vet open on Sunday. Heck, half this town is closed on Sundays.
I’m having the wife pick up some wet food on the way home.
According to my wife, the woman she got the kitten from said they had been feeding it Kitten Chow (which is what we bought) but that it also liked milk. If they had been feeding the kitten milk from the start, could that be causing any sort of issues?
Sometimes meat baby food is tempting to kittens - makes sure it doesn’t contain onion powder. (Take a magnifying glass to read the ingredients- I’m only partly kidding) The water from a can of tuna or salmon over dry food is also tempting to kittys.
As noted above, cows milk is usually not a good idea for kittens.
Hope he eats soon and stops worrying you. Good luck.
He ATE!!! In fact, he’s kind of made a pig of himself.
I did as pullet suggested, and put him in the bathroom with his food and such, and left him in there for about an hour or so. When I went to check on him, his food was definitely much lower! Hooray!
Since then he’s polished off that food, and a bit of can food that I stuck in there. Kitten formula, no spices.
Thank you all for your help!
(now, if we could just get him to sit still long enough to confirm his gender… he’s got rows o’ nipples, so now we’re not quite sure.)
You might need to let him have the bathroom as his “den” as you slowly (over the next few days to weeks) introduce him to the rest of the house.
Confirming gender is easier than you think. But nipples have nothing to do with it. Just like humans, both male and female cats have nipples.
Hold kitten with its butt facing you, tail up. The anus is probably the first thing you’ll notice. Below this is the area of interest. If you see a second opening, fairly close (a few milimeters) beneath the the anus, it’s a girl. If you see a span of tissue longer than a centimeter and then an opening further down, it’s a boy. The span of tissue may or may not have a gentile swelling to either side. This is the scrotum, though it should be sans-testicles at the moment. The opening is the prepuce, the kitty equivalent to a foreskin.
Happy kittying! Get it spayed/neutered and vaccinated as soon as it’s old enough!
On the gender thing, wait awhile and it’ll become apparent. A friend of mine named her cat “Mr. Ed” only to discover some time later that “Mr” was really a “Ms.”
