April 2, 2024 • 21 mins
Not sure what to do when you stumble on a litter of kittens?
Every spring, well-meaning people rush to “rescue” kittens they stumble across who may not need saving.
In this episode, Amy breaks down what you need to know before stepping in—so you don’t accidentally do more harm than good.
BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU’LL DISCOVER:
- How to assess if the kittens are healthy or in danger
- Simple ways to tell if the mother cat is still caring for them
- What signs indicate it’s time to intervene—and when to leave them alone
If you’ve ever found a litter and didn’t know what to do, this episode gives you the confidence to act responsibly and compassionately.
OTHER LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:
Kitten Age Chart – KittenLady.org
P.S. You may hear us refer to the show as Starlight Pet Talk during this episode. That was our previous name before we embraced the fur, mess, and mayhem. Same show, same mission—just a name that fits better now.
Love the show? Share it with a pet parent living with chaos and leave a 5-star review so others can find the pet parent advice they need.
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Pet parenting is tough, but The Pet Parent Hotline helps solve real pet problems with practical pet care advice. Each week, we provide pet parent advice for overwhelmed pet parents trying to save money on pet food at the pet store, on vet bills, make puppy training easier, fix cat behavior problems like litterbox issues and scratching, and keep multi-pet households running smoothly. We also share expert tips for pet budgeting, managing dog behavior, stress-free vet visits, and keeping your home clean with pets. Follow for the pet parent support you need, so you can stop chasing your tail and start enjoying life with pets.
Contact: Amy@petparenthotline.com
©Ⓟ 2025 by Amy Castro
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Amy Castro (00:00):
Well, I don't know what it's like where you are,
but it's definitely spring inTexas, and you know what that
means Getting outside andenjoying the weather before it
gets too darn hot, springcleaning and other activities.
But what would you do if youfound a litter of kittens while
you were out doing all thisstuff?
Would you pick them up andbring them inside and rescue
them, or would you leave themalone and let nature take its
course?
(00:20):
Well, on this episode, we'regoing to share with you exactly
what you should do so that youcan do the right thing, not only
for the kittens but foryourself.
Stay tuned.
You're listening to StarlightPet Talk, a podcast for pet
(00:42):
parents who want the best petcare advice from cat experts,
dog trainers, veterinarians andother top pet professionals who
will help you live your verybest life with your pets.
We also share inspiring rescueand adoption stories from people
who've taken their love of petsto the next level by getting
involved in animal welfare.
My name is Amy Castro and I'mthe founder and president of
Starlight Outreach and Rescueand a columnist for Pet Age
magazine.
I've rescued thousands ofanimals and helped people just
like you find the right pet fortheir family.
My mission is to help petparents learn all the ways that
(01:06):
they can care for, live with andeven have fun with their pets,
so they can live their very bestlives and their pets can, too.
Welcome to Starlight Pet Talk.
I'm your host, amy Castro, andI am going solo today again, and
what I want to share is someinformation from a presentation
that I do pretty frequently onwhat to do if you find baby
(01:27):
kittens while you're out andabout.
It may be your instinct tosnatch them up and bring them
indoors, but could you be doingmore harm than good?
That's what we're going to talkabout today.
So, for those of you who don'tknow this and hopefully
everybody knows this by now I amnot only the host of this
podcast, but the president ofStarlight Outreach and Rescue,
and Starlight Outreach andRescue was founded in 2017 in
(01:50):
honor of a young lady named EmmaStarlight Hyde, who was a
14-year-old volunteer with me ata local animal control facility
, and unfortunately, in Octoberof 2017, emma passed away very
tragically and suddenly, andthat's when I decided to start
Starlight Outreach and Rescue inher honor.
(02:10):
Although it was never ourintention to be a cat rescue, we
do rescue a lot of cats atStarlight Outreach and Rescue,
and the reason for thisoftentimes is because people
don't know what to do when theycome across a cat or kittens, or
both, when they're out andabout in the community or even
in their own yards.
So you've come across some babykittens.
(02:30):
Now what?
Well, if you can get the answerto these three key questions,
that's going to help you decidehow to proceed.
Question number one isassessing whether the kittens
appear to be healthy, and I knowyou're not a veterinarian, but
there are some things that youcan look for to determine
whether these are fat, healthy,well-cared-for kittens by their
mama or whether they might needimmediate human intervention.
(02:53):
Question number two is themother even around?
A big mistake here is thatpeople oftentimes assume mom is
not around, but how do you knowfor sure?
We'll talk about that.
And then question number threeis determining how old the
kittens are, because if youdecide that you need to take
these kittens in, their age isgoing to determine how much work
(03:13):
and how much effort it's goingto be to keep them alive and
healthy before they're ready tofind them permanent homes.
So let's dive into thesequestions.
So, do the kittens appearhealthy?
A couple of things that you'regoing to want to look for Eye
discharge, nose discharge,crustiness around the eyes and
nose that might be indicative ofsome type of upper respiratory
(03:36):
infection.
When kittens have a heavy upperrespiratory infection, that
means they're not breathing wellthrough their noses, which
means, just like when you have ahuman baby if you've got a
human baby with a stuffy nose,it's not going to take a bottle
very well or it's not going tobe easy to breastfeed a baby
like that because they can'tbreathe while they're eating.
And very often kittens whodevelop upper respiratory
(03:57):
infections won't nurse and thenthey're at risk of dying in that
case.
So what you're looking for isyou're looking for signs of,
like I said, discharge of theeyes, discharge from the nose,
crustiness.
It's also a good idea to assessand you can find tons of
pictures on the internet ofhealthy and unhealthy kittens
but assess their body weight.
(04:18):
Do they look underweight?
Can you see the spine or feelthe spine easily?
Kittens are not going to belike.
You might have heard about birds, about not touching baby birds,
but even that is a myth, thatif you touch babies that their
mom won't come back.
That's not going to be the casewith kittens.
You shouldn't overly handlethem, but you could certainly
(04:38):
touch them to see.
Do you feel obvious ribs,obvious backbone?
That would indicate that thesekittens are underweight.
So those would be some initialthings to look for.
Also checking their rear ends,you know.
Do their rear ends look clean,which means the mother's
probably been caring for themand maybe they don't have
diarrhea?
Or do they have crusty, red,raw looking bums?
(04:59):
That might be an indication ofsome type of a parasite,
infestation or other cause ofdiarrhea that could easily cause
these kittens to becomedehydrated and die.
When you're seeing healthykittens, they're going to be fat
.
Their heads are going to be fatand round and filled out.
Ideally they wouldn't becrawling with fleas, although
(05:21):
sometimes they might have somefleas.
So the bottom line would be ifthey look pretty fat, pretty
healthy, pretty clean, then Iwould not immediately jump into
trying to pull these kittens andtake them away at this time.
So question number two is themom still around?
First thing I would say isdon't assume that the kittens
(05:43):
are abandoned just because youdon't see the mom.
Mom could be out there huntingfor food.
Mom might have been scared awaywhen you approached.
Mom could be watching you rightnow and not wanting to draw
attention to her baby.
So she's hiding in the bushessomewhere.
So don't make that assumptionand immediately snatch up
kittens.
What you really have to do isyou have to be patient.
A couple of things you can doWatch from a distance to see if
(06:06):
mom comes back.
Sit in a lawn chair 100 feetaway.
Watch with some binoculars 100yards away.
Watch from inside your house tosee if the mom goes back into
your garage.
Whatever you need to do I alsohave found pretty good luck,
depending upon where the kittensare nested is to sprinkle a
little ring of flour or at leastat access points in or around
(06:31):
the nest or the.
If it's in your garage, maybeat the entrance to the garage,
to see if there's going to befootprints in that later on.
That would indicate that themom has come back.
The other thing you need to do,you know, as far as this, you
know, being patient is kind of afine balance.
You don't want to wait too longbecause you certainly don't
want the kittens to starve orbecome dehydrated, but again,
(06:52):
don't want to intervene too soon.
So part of this process andwe're going to get to this in
question number three isassessing how old the kittens
are.
If the kittens are under threeweeks old, those babies will
need to be fed approximatelyevery two to four hours.
So if you know that thosekittens' eyes are still closed,
for example, that means they arelikely under 14 days and should
(07:16):
not be left for more than fourhours or so without being fed.
So if you watch for four and ahalf hours and mom hasn't come
back, it's time to start gettingconcerned.
If the kittens are older maybethey're up and about walking,
their eyes are opened then theymight be able to go a little bit
longer.
So, again, that's going to goto assessing the kitten's age,
(07:37):
which we're going to get to in alittle bit.
But there are a lot of greatcharts online that you can look
at and we will share some aswell.
That would help you assess thekitten's age to know when do I
need to step in, if at all?
Another thing you can try doingis setting up a game camera or
some type of othermotion-sensitive camera to see
if you catch mom coming back.
The other thing I would say is,whether mom comes back or not,
(08:01):
realize that there are no heroesthat are going to step in and
save you to take these kittensoff your hands if you decide to
intervene.
So I would say highly, I highlyrecommend that you rescue
kittens at your own risk andrealize that it's quite possible
.
You will end up being fullyresponsible for them in many
(08:23):
ways once you decide to takethem in, so you might just be on
your own.
You want to ask yourself acouple of questions.
You know, are you willing andable to bottle feed kittens
assuming they are bottle agekittens for up to as many as 30
days, depending upon the age ofthe kittens?
When you find them, it could bearound the clock.
(08:44):
It could be every two to fourhours around the clock.
You know, if they're a littlebit older, it might be a last
feeding at midnight and amorning feeding at 5 am.
What are you going to do whenyou go to work?
Are you taking them with you?
Are you getting somebody tocome in and feed them for you?
It's a bit of a challenge.
Have you actually contactedevery single rescue to see if
(09:05):
they can help?
Because the mistake that peoplemake is they think they're
going to pick up these kittensand immediately pass them off to
a shelter or a rescue, and veryoften that does not happen.
Many, many rescues and sheltersare filled to capacity or
overfull and they might justtell you, no, they can't take
them Shelters, especially ifthey are city or county shelters
(09:25):
.
They might take them andimmediately euthanize them if
they need to be bottle fed,because they don't generally
have bottle feeders available todo that job, and it would be
cruel and inhumane to leavekittens to starve 15 hours
overnight, 18 hours overnight,whatever it is, while they're
closed.
Are you going to be able toprovide the food, the water and
(09:47):
indoor shelter until they're oldenough to be adopted?
You're looking at about eightweeks at minimum.
So where are you going to putthese kittens if you decide to
bring them in and you know thecost of kitten food, the cost of
formula formula good formula isnot cheap where are you going
to physically put them?
You know, can you put them inyour bathroom or is that
impossible?
Do you have a spare bedroom ordo you not?
Now you get into the the othertricky stuff, probably the
(10:07):
trickiest part, if you happen tosurvive the eight weeks and
those kittens can be adopted, orif you get some kittens that
are six weeks, vaccinated, fecalsamples to see if they've got
(10:30):
worms, getting wormingmedication, etc.
So that's going to be afinancial challenge for some
people.
And then finding adopters ifyou decide to take them in on
your own, the odds are youprobably don't want or need six
cats, eight cats, four cats,however, probably not eight.
But you know you probably don'twant or need that many cats.
So how are you going to getthem adopted?
(10:51):
And I say this all from thesincerity of my heart, having
been through this myself.
I picked up a kitten.
I didn't even need to pick upthe kitten.
The kitten had already beenrescued by some ladies at a
church.
But I had to be a busybody andget all involved in it because I
thought, oh, I know that myveterinarian has adoptable
kittens in her lobby andcertainly I can just bring this
(11:12):
kitty cat up here.
And so Pickles the cat who Inow still have, by the way, 14
years later, you know I took herfrom these church ladies and
said, oh, I can take care ofthis for you.
And I drove straight to my vetand they were like yeah, no,
(11:35):
sorry, and the rescue was full.
And so Pickles the cat is nowmy cat.
So you will get stuck if youdon't, if you don't think that
process through.
So let's talk about a couple ofdifferent scenarios.
If you come across thesekittens, you know if the mom is
still around.
So you've done the flower test,or you've used your game camera
and you're like, yep, she'sstill coming back to feed them.
Ideally, you want to leavethese babies with their mom as
long as you possibly can.
So you've got a couple ofoptions.
(11:57):
One would be to trap or capturethe mom and the babies, and
ideally you would.
If you think you're going totake them to a shelter or rescue
, you would contact theirshelter or rescue first to see
if they'll take them.
Or you have a plan for keepingthem safely indoors until the
babies can be weaned and adopted.
(12:17):
What you might have a challengewith there is sometimes these
moms that are having kittens outin the community are friendly
former house pets or have beenraised being handled by humans.
Sometimes they're not.
Sometimes they were raised outin the wild and they're kind of
like wild cats.
So if the mom is feral or youcan't catch her in any way,
(12:39):
ideally what we try to tellpeople is leave the babies at
least until weaning age, so atleast until they're a good four
weeks old assuming they're safewhere they are, assuming they're
healthy and let mom care forthem before you intervene,
because otherwise you'redepriving them not only of the
physical most appropriatenourishment from their mother,
(12:59):
but also the socializationskills that she's going to teach
them about how to be a cat andhow to get along with other cats
along the way.
The problem is you don't want towait too long if the mom is
feral and again, if you plan onat least capturing these kittens
to see if maybe you can getthem adopted.
The longer you wait, the moreferal they might become,
(13:22):
learning from their mom'sbehavior, and the harder it will
be to tame them down the road.
So we have found at StarlightOutreach and Rescue that kittens
that are 12 weeks or olderbecome very, very hard to turn
into house pets.
It's not impossible.
Some of them you can do itreally easily and some just it
doesn't happen.
And so you know you probablyare looking at that.
(13:45):
More than four weeks, but lessthan seven weeks somewhere in
there.
You know if you can safelyleave them with mom for about
six or seven weeks, that's great.
If you need to pull them alittle bit earlier and finish
the weaning process, it'sprobably better than allowing
them to stay out feral, unspayedand unneutered.
(14:06):
You also are going to have todetermine and you might not have
any choice on this, because youmight come across kittens that
are older or younger, but partof the process is figuring out,
you know, is this mom andkittens a family that I can get
adopted, or would it be betterfor me to intervene in the form
of getting them to aveterinarian to get them spayed
and neutered and putting themback where I found them?
(14:28):
So that's a question you'regoing to need to ask yourself,
based on your situation, basedon the behavior of the animals,
how old the kittens are when youfind them, etc.
If you find that the mom is notaround, then you probably need
to trap or capture those kittensand take care of them.
If you can't intervene in someform or fashion, the kittens are
(14:49):
not going to survive,especially if they are super
young kittens and not able toeat solid food and nobody's
feeding them.
So, moving on to our finalquestion, and this is a tricky
one for a lot of people and it'sinteresting because people will
call and they'll say oh, Ifound these tiny, tiny baby is
they've never seen a tiny, tinykitten.
You know that newborn kittensare probably the size of three
(15:26):
quarters of a hot dog, maybe alittle bit wider, but you get my
drift on that.
So they're pretty darn small.
And so if they're up and theireyes are open and they're
walking around and playing,those are probably some older
kittens.
But either way, there's easyways to make some determinations
.
A great great website to checkout is kittenladyorg and
(15:51):
actually if you go towwwkittenladyorg forward slash
age A-G-E, the kitten ladyHannah Shaw has some fantastic
charts that give you an idea ofhow old these kittens might be.
So definitely check that out.
But generally newborn kittenskittens are going to, you know,
(16:13):
like new newborn less than aweek old.
They might still have umbilicalcord attached, their eyes are
going to be closed, their earsare going to be scrunched down
and kind of folded over, and oneof the most important things
about them is they cannotregulate their body temperature
at this age.
So if it is cool out, if mama'seven if it's not that cool out
(16:33):
if mama's not around thesekittens definitely need to be
taken in quickly and put on aheating source because they
can't maintain their bodytemperature At about a week or
so generally, your kitten's eyesare going to start opening as
early as eight days, but couldbe as late as two weeks.
So that you know if the eyes areopening or starting to look
(16:55):
like they're wanting to open,you can actually see the slit in
the eyelid.
That can give you a little bitof an indication that those
kittens may be somewhere between8 and 12, 8 and 14 days.
The ears are probably stillgoing to be folded, but the
umbilical cord should be gone atthis point.
At about two weeks or so theireyes should be pretty much open.
(17:17):
They're going to look like theyhave blue eyes and they may or
may not be walking around.
If they do, they're going to besuper duper wobbly on their
feet.
From there on up it's a matterof looking at things like teeth
and ears.
So a kitten that's about threeweeks or so old is going to
start having its teeth are goingto start to emerge, the ears
(17:38):
are going to look more pointyand erect like a regular cat and
they can start figuring out thelitter box as early as that age
, assuming you give them an ageand size appropriate litter box.
And from there on out it's apretty subtle growth process.
It's about when teeth areemerging.
How well are they walking?
(18:00):
When can they start eating,which is you're probably looking
at about five weeks to startgetting them onto canned food.
So you're bottle feeding upuntil then.
Another guideline that weoftentimes will use is the
weight of the kitten, is thatonce they get after about four
weeks or so, they generally gainand again, this is just a wide
(18:21):
ballpark, but they generallygain about a pound a month.
So sometimes you can put thekitten on a postage scale or a
food scale and get an idea fromthat.
But you know, at six weeksthey're, you know they're going
to have a lot more teeth.
They're going to be eatingpretty well on their own At
seven weeks.
Their eye color, their true eyecolor is going to start showing
(18:42):
up by the time they get to beeight to 12 weeks, which is
generally about the time thatthey get adopted.
They are usually doing a prettygood job of eating dry food if
you feed dry food and you know,once they get to that point,
that's usually our decidingfactor as to when we start
thinking about adopting kittensout if they are reliably eating
(19:02):
dry food on their own, drinkingplenty of water, although we
really don't like dry food.
We know that a lot of peoplelike to feed that because it's
convenient, and so we generallywon't let kittens go to adopters
until we know they're able todo that, because we don't want
them to become malnourished ordehydrated or anything like that
.
So, again, make sure you checkout the wwwkittenladyorg forward
(19:26):
slash age.
Those are some great charts onthat website, but there are also
other sites as well that youcan find those charts.
So I hope that gives you atleast a little bit of an idea of
what you can do if you comeacross some kittens.
Taking them in, as I'vementioned, is a huge
(19:47):
responsibility.
Don't take it lightly.
Make sure you do it witheducation.
You've gotten a little bit inthis podcast episode and I hope
it was helpful.
And if you want to get involvedin helping baby kittens when
they end up in rescues,definitely check out your local
rescues, your local shelters.
Find out if they have an infantkitten bottle feeding program
(20:08):
or if they have a need forbottle feeders.
I will say, although it is alot of work and you lose some
sleep over it, it's incrediblyrewarding to see these tiny,
tiny babies grow and developunder your care.
So if you're in the Houstonarea and you want to reach out
to us atstarlightoutreachandrescueorg,
(20:29):
and we'd love to have you onboard as a volunteer.
Thanks for listening toStarlight Pet Talk.
Be sure to visit our website atwwwstarlightpettalkcom for more
resources, and be sure tofollow this podcast on your
favorite podcast app, so you'llnever miss a show.
If you enjoyed and found valuein today's episode, we'd
appreciate a rating on Apple.
(20:50):
Or if you'd simply tell afriend about the show, that
would be great too.
Don't forget to tune in nextweek and every week for a brand
new episode of Starlight PetTalk.
And if you don't do anythingelse this week, give your pets a
big hug from us.
Well, I don't know what it's like where you are,
but it's definitely spring inTexas, and you know what that
means Getting outside andenjoying the weather before it
gets too darn hot, springcleaning and other activities.
But what would you do if youfound a litter of kittens while
you were out doing all thisstuff?
Would you pick them up andbring them inside and rescue
them, or would you leave themalone and let nature take its
course?
(00:20):
Well, on this episode, we'regoing to share with you exactly
what you should do so that youcan do the right thing, not only
for the kittens but foryourself.
Stay tuned.
You're listening to StarlightPet Talk, a podcast for pet
(00:42):
parents who want the best petcare advice from cat experts,
dog trainers, veterinarians andother top pet professionals who
will help you live your verybest life with your pets.
We also share inspiring rescueand adoption stories from people
who've taken their love of petsto the next level by getting
involved in animal welfare.
My name is Amy Castro and I'mthe founder and president of
Starlight Outreach and Rescueand a columnist for Pet Age
magazine.
I've rescued thousands ofanimals and helped people just
like you find the right pet fortheir family.
My mission is to help petparents learn all the ways that
(01:06):
they can care for, live with andeven have fun with their pets,
so they can live their very bestlives and their pets can, too.
Welcome to Starlight Pet Talk.
I'm your host, amy Castro, andI am going solo today again, and
what I want to share is someinformation from a presentation
that I do pretty frequently onwhat to do if you find baby
(01:27):
kittens while you're out andabout.
It may be your instinct tosnatch them up and bring them
indoors, but could you be doingmore harm than good?
That's what we're going to talkabout today.
So, for those of you who don'tknow this and hopefully
everybody knows this by now I amnot only the host of this
podcast, but the president ofStarlight Outreach and Rescue,
and Starlight Outreach andRescue was founded in 2017 in
(01:50):
honor of a young lady named EmmaStarlight Hyde, who was a
14-year-old volunteer with me ata local animal control facility
, and unfortunately, in Octoberof 2017, emma passed away very
tragically and suddenly, andthat's when I decided to start
Starlight Outreach and Rescue inher honor.
(02:10):
Although it was never ourintention to be a cat rescue, we
do rescue a lot of cats atStarlight Outreach and Rescue,
and the reason for thisoftentimes is because people
don't know what to do when theycome across a cat or kittens, or
both, when they're out andabout in the community or even
in their own yards.
So you've come across some babykittens.
(02:30):
Now what?
Well, if you can get the answerto these three key questions,
that's going to help you decidehow to proceed.
Question number one isassessing whether the kittens
appear to be healthy, and I knowyou're not a veterinarian, but
there are some things that youcan look for to determine
whether these are fat, healthy,well-cared-for kittens by their
mama or whether they might needimmediate human intervention.
(02:53):
Question number two is themother even around?
A big mistake here is thatpeople oftentimes assume mom is
not around, but how do you knowfor sure?
We'll talk about that.
And then question number threeis determining how old the
kittens are, because if youdecide that you need to take
these kittens in, their age isgoing to determine how much work
(03:13):
and how much effort it's goingto be to keep them alive and
healthy before they're ready tofind them permanent homes.
So let's dive into thesequestions.
So, do the kittens appearhealthy?
A couple of things that you'regoing to want to look for Eye
discharge, nose discharge,crustiness around the eyes and
nose that might be indicative ofsome type of upper respiratory
(03:36):
infection.
When kittens have a heavy upperrespiratory infection, that
means they're not breathing wellthrough their noses, which
means, just like when you have ahuman baby if you've got a
human baby with a stuffy nose,it's not going to take a bottle
very well or it's not going tobe easy to breastfeed a baby
like that because they can'tbreathe while they're eating.
And very often kittens whodevelop upper respiratory
(03:57):
infections won't nurse and thenthey're at risk of dying in that
case.
So what you're looking for isyou're looking for signs of,
like I said, discharge of theeyes, discharge from the nose,
crustiness.
It's also a good idea to assessand you can find tons of
pictures on the internet ofhealthy and unhealthy kittens
but assess their body weight.
(04:18):
Do they look underweight?
Can you see the spine or feelthe spine easily?
Kittens are not going to belike.
You might have heard about birds, about not touching baby birds,
but even that is a myth, thatif you touch babies that their
mom won't come back.
That's not going to be the casewith kittens.
You shouldn't overly handlethem, but you could certainly
(04:38):
touch them to see.
Do you feel obvious ribs,obvious backbone?
That would indicate that thesekittens are underweight.
So those would be some initialthings to look for.
Also checking their rear ends,you know.
Do their rear ends look clean,which means the mother's
probably been caring for themand maybe they don't have
diarrhea?
Or do they have crusty, red,raw looking bums?
(04:59):
That might be an indication ofsome type of a parasite,
infestation or other cause ofdiarrhea that could easily cause
these kittens to becomedehydrated and die.
When you're seeing healthykittens, they're going to be fat
.
Their heads are going to be fatand round and filled out.
Ideally they wouldn't becrawling with fleas, although
(05:21):
sometimes they might have somefleas.
So the bottom line would be ifthey look pretty fat, pretty
healthy, pretty clean, then Iwould not immediately jump into
trying to pull these kittens andtake them away at this time.
So question number two is themom still around?
First thing I would say isdon't assume that the kittens
(05:43):
are abandoned just because youdon't see the mom.
Mom could be out there huntingfor food.
Mom might have been scared awaywhen you approached.
Mom could be watching you rightnow and not wanting to draw
attention to her baby.
So she's hiding in the bushessomewhere.
So don't make that assumptionand immediately snatch up
kittens.
What you really have to do isyou have to be patient.
A couple of things you can doWatch from a distance to see if
(06:06):
mom comes back.
Sit in a lawn chair 100 feetaway.
Watch with some binoculars 100yards away.
Watch from inside your house tosee if the mom goes back into
your garage.
Whatever you need to do I alsohave found pretty good luck,
depending upon where the kittensare nested is to sprinkle a
little ring of flour or at leastat access points in or around
(06:31):
the nest or the.
If it's in your garage, maybeat the entrance to the garage,
to see if there's going to befootprints in that later on.
That would indicate that themom has come back.
The other thing you need to do,you know, as far as this, you
know, being patient is kind of afine balance.
You don't want to wait too longbecause you certainly don't
want the kittens to starve orbecome dehydrated, but again,
(06:52):
don't want to intervene too soon.
So part of this process andwe're going to get to this in
question number three isassessing how old the kittens
are.
If the kittens are under threeweeks old, those babies will
need to be fed approximatelyevery two to four hours.
So if you know that thosekittens' eyes are still closed,
for example, that means they arelikely under 14 days and should
(07:16):
not be left for more than fourhours or so without being fed.
So if you watch for four and ahalf hours and mom hasn't come
back, it's time to start gettingconcerned.
If the kittens are older maybethey're up and about walking,
their eyes are opened then theymight be able to go a little bit
longer.
So, again, that's going to goto assessing the kitten's age,
(07:37):
which we're going to get to in alittle bit.
But there are a lot of greatcharts online that you can look
at and we will share some aswell.
That would help you assess thekitten's age to know when do I
need to step in, if at all?
Another thing you can try doingis setting up a game camera or
some type of othermotion-sensitive camera to see
if you catch mom coming back.
The other thing I would say is,whether mom comes back or not,
(08:01):
realize that there are no heroesthat are going to step in and
save you to take these kittensoff your hands if you decide to
intervene.
So I would say highly, I highlyrecommend that you rescue
kittens at your own risk andrealize that it's quite possible
.
You will end up being fullyresponsible for them in many
(08:23):
ways once you decide to takethem in, so you might just be on
your own.
You want to ask yourself acouple of questions.
You know, are you willing andable to bottle feed kittens
assuming they are bottle agekittens for up to as many as 30
days, depending upon the age ofthe kittens?
When you find them, it could bearound the clock.
(08:44):
It could be every two to fourhours around the clock.
You know, if they're a littlebit older, it might be a last
feeding at midnight and amorning feeding at 5 am.
What are you going to do whenyou go to work?
Are you taking them with you?
Are you getting somebody tocome in and feed them for you?
It's a bit of a challenge.
Have you actually contactedevery single rescue to see if
(09:05):
they can help?
Because the mistake that peoplemake is they think they're
going to pick up these kittensand immediately pass them off to
a shelter or a rescue, and veryoften that does not happen.
Many, many rescues and sheltersare filled to capacity or
overfull and they might justtell you, no, they can't take
them Shelters, especially ifthey are city or county shelters
(09:25):
.
They might take them andimmediately euthanize them if
they need to be bottle fed,because they don't generally
have bottle feeders available todo that job, and it would be
cruel and inhumane to leavekittens to starve 15 hours
overnight, 18 hours overnight,whatever it is, while they're
closed.
Are you going to be able toprovide the food, the water and
(09:47):
indoor shelter until they're oldenough to be adopted?
You're looking at about eightweeks at minimum.
So where are you going to putthese kittens if you decide to
bring them in and you know thecost of kitten food, the cost of
formula formula good formula isnot cheap where are you going
to physically put them?
You know, can you put them inyour bathroom or is that
impossible?
Do you have a spare bedroom ordo you not?
Now you get into the the othertricky stuff, probably the
(10:07):
trickiest part, if you happen tosurvive the eight weeks and
those kittens can be adopted, orif you get some kittens that
are six weeks, vaccinated, fecalsamples to see if they've got
(10:30):
worms, getting wormingmedication, etc.
So that's going to be afinancial challenge for some
people.
And then finding adopters ifyou decide to take them in on
your own, the odds are youprobably don't want or need six
cats, eight cats, four cats,however, probably not eight.
But you know you probably don'twant or need that many cats.
So how are you going to getthem adopted?
(10:51):
And I say this all from thesincerity of my heart, having
been through this myself.
I picked up a kitten.
I didn't even need to pick upthe kitten.
The kitten had already beenrescued by some ladies at a
church.
But I had to be a busybody andget all involved in it because I
thought, oh, I know that myveterinarian has adoptable
kittens in her lobby andcertainly I can just bring this
(11:12):
kitty cat up here.
And so Pickles the cat who Inow still have, by the way, 14
years later, you know I took herfrom these church ladies and
said, oh, I can take care ofthis for you.
And I drove straight to my vetand they were like yeah, no,
(11:35):
sorry, and the rescue was full.
And so Pickles the cat is nowmy cat.
So you will get stuck if youdon't, if you don't think that
process through.
So let's talk about a couple ofdifferent scenarios.
If you come across thesekittens, you know if the mom is
still around.
So you've done the flower test,or you've used your game camera
and you're like, yep, she'sstill coming back to feed them.
Ideally, you want to leavethese babies with their mom as
long as you possibly can.
So you've got a couple ofoptions.
(11:57):
One would be to trap or capturethe mom and the babies, and
ideally you would.
If you think you're going totake them to a shelter or rescue
, you would contact theirshelter or rescue first to see
if they'll take them.
Or you have a plan for keepingthem safely indoors until the
babies can be weaned and adopted.
(12:17):
What you might have a challengewith there is sometimes these
moms that are having kittens outin the community are friendly
former house pets or have beenraised being handled by humans.
Sometimes they're not.
Sometimes they were raised outin the wild and they're kind of
like wild cats.
So if the mom is feral or youcan't catch her in any way,
(12:39):
ideally what we try to tellpeople is leave the babies at
least until weaning age, so atleast until they're a good four
weeks old assuming they're safewhere they are, assuming they're
healthy and let mom care forthem before you intervene,
because otherwise you'redepriving them not only of the
physical most appropriatenourishment from their mother,
(12:59):
but also the socializationskills that she's going to teach
them about how to be a cat andhow to get along with other cats
along the way.
The problem is you don't want towait too long if the mom is
feral and again, if you plan onat least capturing these kittens
to see if maybe you can getthem adopted.
The longer you wait, the moreferal they might become,
(13:22):
learning from their mom'sbehavior, and the harder it will
be to tame them down the road.
So we have found at StarlightOutreach and Rescue that kittens
that are 12 weeks or olderbecome very, very hard to turn
into house pets.
It's not impossible.
Some of them you can do itreally easily and some just it
doesn't happen.
And so you know you probablyare looking at that.
(13:45):
More than four weeks, but lessthan seven weeks somewhere in
there.
You know if you can safelyleave them with mom for about
six or seven weeks, that's great.
If you need to pull them alittle bit earlier and finish
the weaning process, it'sprobably better than allowing
them to stay out feral, unspayedand unneutered.
(14:06):
You also are going to have todetermine and you might not have
any choice on this, because youmight come across kittens that
are older or younger, but partof the process is figuring out,
you know, is this mom andkittens a family that I can get
adopted, or would it be betterfor me to intervene in the form
of getting them to aveterinarian to get them spayed
and neutered and putting themback where I found them?
(14:28):
So that's a question you'regoing to need to ask yourself,
based on your situation, basedon the behavior of the animals,
how old the kittens are when youfind them, etc.
If you find that the mom is notaround, then you probably need
to trap or capture those kittensand take care of them.
If you can't intervene in someform or fashion, the kittens are
(14:49):
not going to survive,especially if they are super
young kittens and not able toeat solid food and nobody's
feeding them.
So, moving on to our finalquestion, and this is a tricky
one for a lot of people and it'sinteresting because people will
call and they'll say oh, Ifound these tiny, tiny baby is
they've never seen a tiny, tinykitten.
You know that newborn kittensare probably the size of three
(15:26):
quarters of a hot dog, maybe alittle bit wider, but you get my
drift on that.
So they're pretty darn small.
And so if they're up and theireyes are open and they're
walking around and playing,those are probably some older
kittens.
But either way, there's easyways to make some determinations
.
A great great website to checkout is kittenladyorg and
(15:51):
actually if you go towwwkittenladyorg forward slash
age A-G-E, the kitten ladyHannah Shaw has some fantastic
charts that give you an idea ofhow old these kittens might be.
So definitely check that out.
But generally newborn kittenskittens are going to, you know,
(16:13):
like new newborn less than aweek old.
They might still have umbilicalcord attached, their eyes are
going to be closed, their earsare going to be scrunched down
and kind of folded over, and oneof the most important things
about them is they cannotregulate their body temperature
at this age.
So if it is cool out, if mama'seven if it's not that cool out
(16:33):
if mama's not around thesekittens definitely need to be
taken in quickly and put on aheating source because they
can't maintain their bodytemperature At about a week or
so generally, your kitten's eyesare going to start opening as
early as eight days, but couldbe as late as two weeks.
So that you know if the eyes areopening or starting to look
(16:55):
like they're wanting to open,you can actually see the slit in
the eyelid.
That can give you a little bitof an indication that those
kittens may be somewhere between8 and 12, 8 and 14 days.
The ears are probably stillgoing to be folded, but the
umbilical cord should be gone atthis point.
At about two weeks or so theireyes should be pretty much open.
(17:17):
They're going to look like theyhave blue eyes and they may or
may not be walking around.
If they do, they're going to besuper duper wobbly on their
feet.
From there on up it's a matterof looking at things like teeth
and ears.
So a kitten that's about threeweeks or so old is going to
start having its teeth are goingto start to emerge, the ears
(17:38):
are going to look more pointyand erect like a regular cat and
they can start figuring out thelitter box as early as that age
, assuming you give them an ageand size appropriate litter box.
And from there on out it's apretty subtle growth process.
It's about when teeth areemerging.
How well are they walking?
(18:00):
When can they start eating,which is you're probably looking
at about five weeks to startgetting them onto canned food.
So you're bottle feeding upuntil then.
Another guideline that weoftentimes will use is the
weight of the kitten, is thatonce they get after about four
weeks or so, they generally gainand again, this is just a wide
(18:21):
ballpark, but they generallygain about a pound a month.
So sometimes you can put thekitten on a postage scale or a
food scale and get an idea fromthat.
But you know, at six weeksthey're, you know they're going
to have a lot more teeth.
They're going to be eatingpretty well on their own At
seven weeks.
Their eye color, their true eyecolor is going to start showing
(18:42):
up by the time they get to beeight to 12 weeks, which is
generally about the time thatthey get adopted.
They are usually doing a prettygood job of eating dry food if
you feed dry food and you know,once they get to that point,
that's usually our decidingfactor as to when we start
thinking about adopting kittensout if they are reliably eating
(19:02):
dry food on their own, drinkingplenty of water, although we
really don't like dry food.
We know that a lot of peoplelike to feed that because it's
convenient, and so we generallywon't let kittens go to adopters
until we know they're able todo that, because we don't want
them to become malnourished ordehydrated or anything like that
.
So, again, make sure you checkout the wwwkittenladyorg forward
(19:26):
slash age.
Those are some great charts onthat website, but there are also
other sites as well that youcan find those charts.
So I hope that gives you atleast a little bit of an idea of
what you can do if you comeacross some kittens.
Taking them in, as I'vementioned, is a huge
(19:47):
responsibility.
Don't take it lightly.
Make sure you do it witheducation.
You've gotten a little bit inthis podcast episode and I hope
it was helpful.
And if you want to get involvedin helping baby kittens when
they end up in rescues,definitely check out your local
rescues, your local shelters.
Find out if they have an infantkitten bottle feeding program
(20:08):
or if they have a need forbottle feeders.
I will say, although it is alot of work and you lose some
sleep over it, it's incrediblyrewarding to see these tiny,
tiny babies grow and developunder your care.
So if you're in the Houstonarea and you want to reach out
to us atstarlightoutreachandrescueorg,
(20:29):
and we'd love to have you onboard as a volunteer.
Thanks for listening toStarlight Pet Talk.
Be sure to visit our website atwwwstarlightpettalkcom for more
resources, and be sure tofollow this podcast on your
favorite podcast app, so you'llnever miss a show.
If you enjoyed and found valuein today's episode, we'd
appreciate a rating on Apple.
(20:50):
Or if you'd simply tell afriend about the show, that
would be great too.
Don't forget to tune in nextweek and every week for a brand
new episode of Starlight PetTalk.
And if you don't do anythingelse this week, give your pets a
big hug from us.
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