To obtain more advice on neutering and to answer any questions you may have, access our Cat Neutering pet advice page. When is the right age to adopt a kitten? Their mum will still also be helping them toilet — not only stimulating their motions through licking but also showing them how to do it on their own. Kittens learn from their littermates too — growing up around their brothers and sisters develops their social skills. Without it they can grow up fearful, skittish or even aggressive.
If you plan on getting a kitten, always make sure you know exactly how old it is and how long it spent with its mum and siblings. Spare a minute to sign up and receive Battersea emails so that you can get all the latest tips and tricks from our animal experts.
Skip to main content. How to care for your pets if you're ill or have to self-isolate due to coronavirus Lost and found dog advice Lost and found cat advice Dog advice Cat advice Puppy Advice. An autumn kitten was facing depleted prey numbers and harsher weather. In those days, and today with feral cats, it is true that an autumn kitten faces a harder job of life, and more aggressive kittens would be more likely to succeed and survive than a less aggressive litter mate.
Cats born in warm, safe homes to happy well-fed mothers will not face these struggles. One example of this is Patsy who went into the care of Helping Pets North-East as a thin and starving stray. She was extremely thin, so much so that parts of her spine and ribs could be clearly seen and felt under her fur. Poor Patsy was so starved and dehydrated that every time she ate she bloated out with gases, which as you can imagine, was very uncomfortable for her.
She had started to go into liver failure, walking hurt and she needed stairs to get up onto a sofa. Patsy would have not survived many more days on the streets. Yet Helping Pets North-East would not give up on her and nursed her back to health even though she was an old lady of undetermined age. They kept her in permanent foster care and it was only when she could no longer walk and had developed fluid on her lungs along with heart problems that she was eased into peace.
The basic principle is to trap the feral cat in a humane trap by luring it into the cage with something tasty and smelly tuna for instance! Once caught, the cat is taken to a veterinary clinic to be neutered and have its ear-tipped. The ears are tipped to show that they have been neutered if they are ever caught again.
The feral then needs time to recover from the surgery and any other treatment it may have needed. This is because it is a familiar and safe place and they will have an established hunting ground. A feral is never returned to an unsafe place, a new environment is found that will be suitable to their living needs. Not only does it help with over breeding, but it is beneficial to their health, and in the case of Tomcats, reduced spraying to mark out their territory and they are also less likely to fight.
The benefit to the queens is no back-to-back pregnancies, growing one baby takes a toll never mind multiple pregnancies. One un-neutered queen can easily turn into fifty-three cats within three years.
Although the volume of calls being received during lockdown is less than the same time last year, the charity is now only responding to emergencies. Dr Samantha Gaines, head of the RSPCA's companion animal department, said: "The kitten season this year will continue despite Covid and so the charity is bracing itself for even more cats. ES Money. The Escapist. The Reveller. The Optimist.
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