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Trouble with my Two female cats.

14:20:55

Question
The kitten
The kitten  

Two Cats
Two Cats  
Hello, I have two cats that I have raised since they were 6 weeks old. They are both female. One was born normally and the other was definitely the runt out of a litter of six. Both females in the first 6 months were inseparable. One is white and is considerably larger than the runt. She is a brown tabby like cat. They were always cuddling and loving on one another. They are now 1 Year and 6 months old. I noticed over the past few months, that the white normal sized cat became very aggressive and mean towards the tabby. It is definitely understood between the two that the white cat has power over the brown tabby. Two months ago, they both became pregnant by the same male. The hissing continued and small striking by the white female. The runt gave birth to only One cat in her litter. She is extremely unreliable and spends THREE times as much of her time away from the kitten than she does with the kitten. She does not nurse well at all. I have work from 5:30AM til 6:30PM. I come back from work and the tabby cat follows me around everywhere in the house away from the 3 day old kitten. My girlfriend keeps the peace between the two cats during the day. I noticed this morning that the white cat was getting more and more aggressive towards the tabby, then an unthinkable thing happened. The new tabby mother picked up the kitten in her mouth, brought it too the white cat, placed the kitten right in front of her, then turned her back and squinted her eyes. Every time the white cat is anywhere near the kitten, She hisses and gets very aggressive. It looks as though she is attempting to allow the white cat to slaughter her kitten. It seems like she would rather have her sisters approval rather than keep the kitten. This is the first kitten she has ever had. Currently the kitten is in a safe spot, but it is very difficult for me to get the tabby to stay near the kitten at all. I have to lock up the white cat in a different bedroom, in order to make sure no fighting goes on between the two sisters, or the slaughtering of the young kitten. Any and all advice would be highly appreciated. I hope you have heard of something along these lines, and know what to do in order to save the life of the kitten and possibly keep the peace between the two sisters. I would suspect the white female to give birth in 2 to 3 weeks from now. If possible I would also like to know if its okay to be touching the kitten as much as I have been since, the tabby has left the kitten in the middle of rooms, and close to places where she could fall very far. Thank you so much for your time.

Travis.

Answer
Travis,

I have a few questions to ask... How old is the newborn kitten? Is Momma feeding that baby that you can see? My concern at this point is that Momma is rejecting her kitten which may be why she's offering it to her sister... Perhaps she is young enough that she doesn't quite know how to be a mommy... I would suggest isolating Momma and her kitten in a room of their own. Keep a close eye on things - I would suggest checking the kitten's weight with a kitchen scale that measures in grams or oz daily. If the kitten is not steadily putting on weight after a couple of days then you will need to start bottle feeding this baby. I would also suggest having Momma spayed as hand raising kittens is quite a lot of work and sadly not all kittens grow up to have permanent homes. If you do need to formula feed this kitten try to allow Momma to do as much care as possible for the baby to ensure that this baby knows that s/he is a kitten and doesn't think that s/he is human. Kittens need to eat every 2-4 hours 24/7 while they are on formula... You may also need to stimulate the kitten to urinate and defecate if Momma isn't doing that - I use natural, unscented baby wipes that I've warmed up in my hand and you gently rub from genitals to anus repeatedly until you get urine. Babies don't poop at every feeding but you should get at least one good poop out of the kitten each day. I would also have Momma and baby vet checked to ensure that there isn't anything medical going on with either that could be contributing to Momma rejecting her baby.

As for your other pregnant Momma, since she is so close to giving birth it might be a good idea to get her in a room of her own with food, water, litter, toys and a nice box to give birth in. The Mommas should be kept separate from each other while they raise their babies since they seem not to be getting along at the moment. There may be hormonal reasons for why the girls seem not be getting along and perhaps having both spayed after the kittens are weaned will help. You may also need to do a slow, gradual reintroduction of the sisters if spaying doesn't completely solve the problem. I can give you advice on reintroducing the girls at a later date if you would like. For now the main priority is that the mommies and babies are healthy and kept as stress free as possible.

If you have any further questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me again at any time. I'm more than happy to help in any way that I can.

Kind regards,

Ali