Hello everyone,
Just two months ago I took in a lovely female cat. It turns out she was already pregnant.
Anyway, a few weeks later on 30th October 2021, she gave birth to five beautiful kittens. (It was her first litter; she's very young, only 18 months old).
The pregnancy went quite well and I did my best to keep her calm and reassured. The little ones felt cold, so I put them in a room heated to 21 degrees with their mum. The kittens were mewing and moving around. But then, in the early hours of the morning, I found one of them on its own in the corner of the basket, cold and lifeless. The others seemed fine; the mum was licking them and they were feeding without any issues. She was licking their bottoms and tummies to help with their digestion. I left for work at 7 am and when I got back around 2 pm, two more had died!
I didn't understand what was happening, so I called the vet. They gave me some advice and suggested I bottle-feed them with kitten formula, as she might not have had enough milk. I started doing that straight away. The babies were suckling well, no problems at all, and the mum was still looking after them.
In the time it took me to fix some lunch, I came back to a total shock: two of the three remaining kittens were dead...
Why?!!! I tried calling the vet back, but unfortunately it was a Sunday. I tried others and eventually got through to an out-of-hours vet who told me there was nothing they could do! They said kittens are very fragile and the mortality rate is very high in the first week... they told me to keep up with the hand-feeding, which I did, every two hours.
On Monday morning, the kittens seemed okay. I bottle-fed them and then left them with their mum. I was checking on them every so often and they were sleeping. Then I heard a kitten mewing and whimpering; I rushed over just as it took its last breath, with the mum cuddling and licking it... I just don't understand! There was only the tiny runt left, who was already cold and struggling to breathe. I used a hot water bottle and a towel to try and warm him up, but a few minutes later he stopped breathing... How can an entire litter perish in less than 48 hours!
I've now booked an appointment to have the mum spayed... but I'm still in shock over what happened. It’s devastating how quickly such joy can turn into a nightmare... I just needed to talk about it. My question is: has anyone else been through this? Why did they die? Any theories? Thank you for reading and for any help you can give.
