My Cat had KITTENS! Five of 'em! (Pics here)

[Maddy McCall]

Ten days ago, my cat Kitty had five babies. This is a long post, because I want to explain my naivety and how I plan to make up for it.

I live in a cabin deep in the woods, and my cat Kitty preferred to stay outside. I didn't even know that there were any cats around, nor that she was in heat. Well, 63 days later, there are five kittens to prove how wrong I was.

Ten days ago, as my county was under a tornado warning, Kitty came to me in distress. I had wondered why she had not been nesting, as I had read that she would. I had read that she would find a secluded place in the house to have her babies...but she never nested. Instead, she became clingy to me, not letting me out of her sight.

Little did I know that she had chosen her nesting site. MY LAP. Ten days ago, she crawled into my lap, as I sat on the chaise end of my couch, and her water broke. Within four hours, I had five bouncing baby kittens in my lap. Kitty wouldn't even let me up to fix a drink for myself. She delivered all five babies, with a little assistance on the first one, literally IN MY LAP.

She now has a Kitty Kube in which she is raising her family, as my schnauzer Lucinda looks on. I don't know if you guys remember, but Kitty nursed on my never-pregnant schnauzer until she was six months old. So, Kitty is allowing Lucinda to be a nurse maid. When Kitty feels she needs a break from the kittens, Lucinda puts her nose in the cube and watches the babies until Kitty returns.

I felt tremendous guilt about my ignorance as a cat owner. Kitty is my first cat since I've been a responsible adult, so I have guilt about her becoming pregnant. HOWEVER, I love these kittens, and as soon as Kitty finishes nursing them, I am having her neutered. I will only agree to adopt out the kittens to families that promise to have the babes spayed or neutered when they reach the proper age.

So, enough of my story. Here are the wonderful kittens, their mother, and their nursemaid Lucinda. The kitten most often photographed is Stormy, the first kitten born, who entered this world during the tornado warning. She's also the most loving, and craves human contact. My son wishes to keep her, so we just might do that. My uncle has dibs on Jinxy, the black and white kitten.

Here they are:


The kittens in their cube.



Jinxy and Stormy hangin' out on the couch, where they were born.



Stormy sayin' "GET BACK, HUMAN!"



Lucinda the schnauzer keeping a watchful eye on the kittens.



Stormy trying to get out to play with Lucinda. (Lucinda has grabbed her gently in her mough a couple of times, and brought her onto the carpet and groomed her. Mom Kitty seems not to mind, as she lies nearby, watching.)

So, please don't beat me up about not being as vigilant a cat companion as I should have been. I will remedy the situation, I realize my mistakes, and I hope my story will allow other cat owners to know that no cat is safe from becoming a parent. :D

[benburch]

1. They are adorable!

I know a shelter here that does low-cost spay/neuter/shots/etc.

I'm in the Chicago area, but I bet you could find similar near you.

[Maddy McCall]

3. I have a great friend who is a vet.

I'm hoping that she will give me a break if I have more than one in for fixing. But I'll pay whatever it takes to have Kitty and Stormy fixed. :D

[Placebo]

2. That second pic almost looks like a 2-headed-kitty!

:o

So cute!

Best of luck! :)

[Maddy McCall]

4. Those two are really inseparable.

They are the two who fight over the same ninny, and who are always cuddled up together.

Thanks for saying they're cute. I'm in love with each of them, and I wish that I could keep all of them. :D

[GreenPartyVoter]

5. Oh! So cute! And how cool (though messy) to be the birth site!

[Maddy McCall]

6. Really, it wasn't too awfully messy.

I kept a towel across my lap. Kitty cleaned up after herself, although THAT part of the birth process was the absolute grossest, and made my son throw up. :D

[fleabert]

7. those are great!

stormy needs to be on mycathatesyou.com, along with my little black kitty (whom I hope makes it onto the site)



that picture of stormy close up is hilarious! and what a birth story, thanks for sharing!

[Maddy McCall]

8. How do you submit photos?

Little Black Kitty has the "funk you" look mastered. :D

[fleabert]

9. go to www.mycathatesyou.com and

click on 'contact'
click on 'submit your cat'
follow instructions and see what happens!

LBK has that look ALL the time, it's so funny. she also likes to stick her tail in the air, arch her back way up, and run backwards...omg, I can't stand it it's so cute! :rofl:

[Maddy McCall]

12. How old are your kittens?

The cute Blackie looks about the same age as my kitties. :D

[fleabert]

18. that pic is a couple of weeks old, they are about six weeks now...

here is one from a few days ago...


they just got their teeth three days ago, and two of the four are starting to eat soft cat food occasionally. all four have peed in the litterbox and one is pooping too! I am such a proud foster mama!

[Maddy McCall]

21. Precious!

In the bottom photo, the second from the left, the tortie, looks like the mother of my babies. Too cute for words.

[fleabert]

24. our Momma cat is a tortie as well, or maybe a calico, we aren't sure.

is there a difference? I've been calling her calico, but I have no real idea, lol!

[Maddy McCall]

28. Someone at DU told me that Kitty is a tortie...

But I don't know the difference. I always thought that, since she's got a lot of white on her, she was more of a calico.

:shrug: LOL!

[hyphenate]

30. Torties and Torbies are both types of calicos

A calico cat is considered any cat with three colors--red, black and white. However, for aesthetic purposes, the calico is considered mostly to be mostly white with red and black markings. A tortie is a calico with more black than white, but with dilute portions like a "tortoise shell" which is where the name "tortie" comes from. A torbie, like my Jessica, has patches like a harlequin, but that the "tabby" markings are distinct in the color mix. That's where "torbie" comes in.

[Maddy McCall]

34. So Kitty IS a tortie!

Thanks for explaining all of that. :D

[hyphenate]

39. No problem!

So many cat lovers here, it's cool to be of help!

[Robeson]

10. Very cute....

...I tell my wife all the time, that I wish I could help them all.

[Maddy McCall]

11. I am going to make absolutely certain that the people who adopt them...

hear my story and promise to have them fixed ASAP, so that we won't contribute to the problem of cat overpopulation.

I'd keep them all if I could. I am pretty certain that I will keep Stormy. My uncle is taking Jinxy--he's an avid cat lover and will have Jinxy fixed.

I love them all and can't wait until they are able to prowl around the house a little more. They are so sweet. :D

[Robeson]

13. You're doing great work....

...:thumbsup:

[Lorien]

14. One thing you might want to consider

is to hand them over to a no kill rescue once they are weaned for two reasons; 1). there are people called "bundlers" out there who search for "free to good home" pets to sell to research facilities (they sell 90,000 dogs and cats each year). Bundlers are experts at passing themselves off as the perfect new parents for your pets, so it's hard to detect one. and 2). Promises are easily broken. Most no kill rescues won't adopt out any pet UNTIL they've had it fixed and given it it's vaccinations. The rescue I work with puts about $300 worth of vet services into each of our kittens, then we adopt them out for a $95 fee (which keeps them out of the hands of bundlers). We've had cats come to us who were pregnant who were still kittens themselves since many new pet owners just don't understand how quickly a female kitten can come into heat.

[Robeson]

15. "bundlers"!!....

...thats one of the sickest things I've heard of. I'm speechless.

[Lorien]

16. I read about it in an issue

of "Catfancy" magazine about two months ago. It was one of this year's issues, so it may be on their site. Bundler's make about $125 each for adult cats (less for kittens)and $200 for dogs. Yep, it's sick-there's a lot of animal research done in this country for nothing more than Federal grant money-but that's a whole other topic.

[Maddy McCall]

17. I'm not going to adopt them out to anyone I don't know.

...and I mean to anyone I don't know WELL-to people I visit with, who know me well.

And if I can't adopt them out to people I know well, I will keep them and have them all fixed, at my expense. I already have one going to an uncle. So I may end up keeping four kittens. I can deal with it. :D

[fleabert]

19. you are a good person!

:hug:

[Maddy McCall]

20. Thanks! And I never thought of myself as a "cat person"...

but I absolutely love their mother Kitty. She is no trouble at all to have around, unlike my dog, who's an attention hound...pun intended. :D

Cats are so self-sustaining. They groom themselves, eat when they need to, visit the litterbox when they need to, and Kitty goes to the door and howls when she wants out.

Yeah, I can tolerate four of her babes around, if need be.

Hugs back! :hug:

[xmas74]

23. My vet works w/ a program

where they take unwanted pets, vaccinate and neuter/spay them and then give them to the elderly along w/ various supplies as a start-up for their care. He said that research shows that a pet can improve a person's health and wellbeing so he thought that this was a great program to get involved in. He has also kept a few dogs and cats to take to nearby nursing homes for visits-they just have to be tame and decently mannered.
You might want to look around for someone who participates in something similar.

[Arugula Latte]

37. That happened to my little female.

She got knocked up by her brother before I had her spayed (I thought they had to be six months old, and she was only four or five months).

Shhh. It's the family scandal. ;)

[roguevalley]

22. I'm dying of cuteness overload. Congratulations on your darling babies.

[Maddy McCall]

26. Look at your precious doggies.

My best friend had a dachshund (sp). That was the smartest dog I have ever been around.

[xultar]

25. Jinxy is kute!!!! She's my favorite!

[Maddy McCall]

27. My uncle had a black and white cat for twenty years.

Tom passed away a couple of years ago, so my uncle told me that, if we had a black and white kitten, he had dibs on it. Well, lo and behold, Jinxy was the second kitten born. Unk was very happy. :D

[ronnykmarshall]

29. They are adorable and I love that story.

I have this vision of you trapped on the couch with mama cat birthin'.

Maddy's all "I gotta peeeeee ...... hurry up!".

[Maddy McCall]

31. I kid you not. I had to have a coke and I had to pee...

so I got up for maybe two minutes, and she howled so loudly and hard that she popped kitten number 3 out. So I had to make haste and get back to her. :D

[bertha katzenengel]

32. Maddy! Wow!

You're a regular cat's midwife! Congratulations!

[Maddy McCall]

35. LOL! That's how I've referred to myself to my friends and family.

I've always been a little squeamish with things bloody, but, I'm tellin' ya, Bertha, if I can sit there while the mother kitty takes care of the afterbirth, I can sit through anything. :D

[havocmom]

33. About your naivety, that neuter thing...

that's for tom cats. Lady cats get spayed. ;)

When still in high school, Havocpup had a math teacher with a bmper sticker on her file cabinate. It read: 'I ::symbol for the spade suit in a deck of cards:: my cat'.

Havocpup sketched on the back of her notebook: 'I ::Symbol for a different suit in a deck of cards:: my dog'. Her math teacher spit coffee all over the place.

[Maddy McCall]

36. Thanks for reminding me of that.

Love the bumpersticker! :hi:

[Arugula Latte]

38. You are my hero!

Letting a kitty give birth on your lap because that's where she felt comfortable -- now that's my kinda person!! :yourock:

Those kittens are adorable. Stormy has the face of a little wise soul.

[Maddy McCall]

41. Awww....thanks!

I've had Kitty since she was five weeks old. She's my baby always, and she rules this house. I really didn't have a choice. :D

[Lauri16]

40. Congrats, "Momma"!

They're all so adorable, but i'm in love with Stormy!!
,,,=^..^=,,,

[Maddy McCall]

42. Yes, Stormy will be staying with us.

:D

[samplegirl]

43. Lucky you!!

Enjoy them...they are precious.

[Maddy McCall]

44. Thanks!

Yes, I've enjoyed cuddling them. Mom Kitty sits nearby, and keeps a close eye on me...she doesn't like her babies to be out of the cube.

[bertha katzenengel]

45. kick!

:bounce:

[Maddy McCall]

46. Thanks, BK

when they get a little older, I'll post more photos. :hug: