A very young (we think), heavily pregnant cat showed up at a friend’s house a few weeks ago and my friend has been feeding her daily, outside. She decided not to have her aborted and spayed since she was so very pregnant, but to wait until after she’d had the litter.
Well, yesterday, she clearly gave birth although we don’t know where. She’s lost her pear shape and has noticeably swollen nipples and when she showed up to eat, she had gunk (afterbirth and fluids I guess) crusted on the underside of her tail. Today, we were over at this friend’s house doing an Easter brunch, and the little cat was outside the whole time, and acting quite needy and affectionate, about four hours.
If she’s had a recent litter, wouldn’t she be with them most of the time right now, and just leaving them to eat, drink and potty? My guess is she either had them and freaked out and left them, being young, or had stillborns, or something.
If mama cat is very young herself, and was a stray, she most likely only had one or two kittens anyway, and they very well may have been stillborn. However, equally likely is that mama cat wasn’t raised right herself, and has no maternal instinct.
If it were me, I’d be scouring the local area for the babies, if only to confirm that they were in fact deceased.
As a possible motivator, if it/they are alive currently, if mama or a person doesn’t pay attention to them soonest, they will die anyway.
Sadly, even with attention, it/they might die anyway.
I wonder if her “needy and affectionate” was trying to get someone to follow her and find the kittens? Stranger things have happened. I’ve got a cat who will lead me to the sink to turn it on for him, and he usually starts by being affectionate, before meowing while he looks over his shoulder as he walks away, and coming back to head butt me if I don’t follow him and do his bidding.
I think if she did that again, I’d try to follow her and see what’s up. But it may be too late, if she left them for 4 hours on their first day of life.
Yes, we did go looking for babies, and tried to get the little mama cat to lead us to them, to no avail. There are dense woods behind my neighbor’s house, and we tromped all over looking for likely spots and listening for meowing, but nothing.
Damn. Either way, she is getting spayed, tested for FIV/FLV and vaccinated before she has the chance to come into heat again. If any Michigan/adjacent state Dopers are looking for a cat, we have a small, feisty (she tried to attack my dog), affectionate, pure black cat up for adoption…
Whynot, we did follow her into the woods and tried to be non-threatening and all that but she just kept circling back to us for attention. Poor wee thing. And poor kittens.
If the cat is small, it might be an adolescent giving it’s first birth. In my experience, usually this means stillborn kittens, and she most likely ate them already. You might want to walk around the yard and see if you can hear kittens crying. If the mother tries to lead you in a particular direction, go in the opposite direction. If she gets excited, that’s the right direction. Usually they birth kittens within a few dozen yards of where they get food. Odds are, the nest is under the house.
Superhal, indeed we think she is very young and this was her first pregnancy. My friend is going to go out and look again tomorrow morning but based on responses here and what I’m reading online, it seems these were not viable kittens, or little mama freaked out and abandoned them so it’s probably too late.
Oh when following the cat, the more relaxed it gets, the farther away you are from the kittens. The more nervous and noisy she gets, the closer you are getting.
Oh, that makes sense. I’ll pass that on to my friend.
Although I suppose no kittens is for the best, way too many stray and feral cats around here as it is.
