after giving birth care

Question
Mr Auspitz,
I have a cat that has decided to adopt us as her family about 3 months ago, well on June 3rd she has given us 4 kittens. I went on line and did some research when she started getting a fat belly. I would have taken her to a vet but she was not quite domesticated enough to pick her up and do that, so I went on line and did some research, it stated to feed her kitten food. My question is how long do I continue to feed her kitten food? And is there anything special that I need to do as to care for her and her kittens? Her kittens are in a covered box outside on my porch with plenty of food and water, I also have an open box if she choses to use that. Thank you in advance for your advice.

Answer
Janice,

Bless you for caring for this mama and her kittens.

I will give you some guidelines, but a really good book to pick up is:  

"Kittens for Dummies" by Dusty Rainbolt, Wiley Publishing Co., Hoboken, NJ, 2004.

For the most part mama does everything for the first few weeks.  She nurses and cleans and potty's the kittens.  The most important thing she does is keep them warm.

Around 4-5 weeks of age, mama should start weaning the kittens.  If she will let you get close, you can see if the kittens will eat a little bit of meat babyfood off your finger (meat babyfoods only ingredients should be meat and broth, avoid anything with extra salt, onion, or garlic added).

If the kittens will eat this (and, by the way, get used to you handling them), then after about a week you can mix some ground kitten food into the baby food and get them eating that.  By 6 weeks they should be eating on their own.

If mama will let you handle her, you will want to get her to the vet and get her spayed as soon as the kittens are weaned.

Good luck and feel free to ask further questions.

Best regards... Norm.