justginger
Ideal_Rock
- Joined
- May 11, 2009
- Messages
- 3,712
We usually start a run of foster kittens by taking in a pregnant mother cat and midwifing her through labor. This time we got the kittens on their own, born and in not-so-great shape. 
The mother had been hanging around a printing press in an industrial area for some time, one of the workers there was kind enough to feed her. He discovered she had kittens a few weeks ago, but it took a while for him to be able to get close enough to scoop them up.
They were obviously petrified and most unhappy when I got them two nights ago. They had been picked up by a stranger, taken away from their mother (who will be trapped, sterilized, and returned as she has become somewhat of a company cat to the printing press, and is too feral to be adopted), put in a box, driven to a house, left in the box for 4 hours, picked up by us, driven home, and deposited in a strange room with funny smells and dogs just outside of the door.
Thankfully they are not biting/scratching/spitting sort of kitties. They're scared, but they just back away and run. Now that it's been two days, and I've been hand feeding them, three of the seven are happy to get on my lap and have a crawl around. The runt sleeps on my lap and will cry for me when I put him down. Another one I managed to solicit a purr from.
The rest are still a bit skittish, the black one the most - he will not stay still for pats or touching or rubs or scratches at all. He just backs away and runs as fast as he can. If he's not at least tolerating contact in the next 2-3 days, I may have to separate him from the others for a few hours every day, so I can spend some one-on-one time with him.
These kittens were in pretty bad shape. They have slight eye infections, some worse than others. Their coats feel like straw. The runt was exhausted, weak, and skin and bones - I could feel every rib and vertebrae, and his hip bones were jutting out. I don't think he would have survived more than another day or two on the streets.
But thankfully that is not to be thought of now...he's safe and very well fed in my laundry, and already shows his appreciation so very clearly. When he's curled up on my lap (he's only the size of the palm of my hand, and is perhaps 4 weeks old), he just looks up at me with those crusty, scabby eyes and radiates pure love. It makes my heart swell.
Here they are, 7 little monsters.
I'd love to hear ideas for names. They must be somewhat unique, as our rescue database fills up very quickly with Shadows and Tigers and the like - it's impossible to keep them straight after they've been adopted. I also like to keep them linked in some way - either they all start with the same letter, or they follow a theme. We've had desserts (Pavlova, Trifle, Brulee, etc), Y babies (Yeti, Yoda, etc), Australian mines (Argyle, Telfer, etc), and a few other common beginning letters.
The mother had been hanging around a printing press in an industrial area for some time, one of the workers there was kind enough to feed her. He discovered she had kittens a few weeks ago, but it took a while for him to be able to get close enough to scoop them up.They were obviously petrified and most unhappy when I got them two nights ago. They had been picked up by a stranger, taken away from their mother (who will be trapped, sterilized, and returned as she has become somewhat of a company cat to the printing press, and is too feral to be adopted), put in a box, driven to a house, left in the box for 4 hours, picked up by us, driven home, and deposited in a strange room with funny smells and dogs just outside of the door.
Thankfully they are not biting/scratching/spitting sort of kitties. They're scared, but they just back away and run. Now that it's been two days, and I've been hand feeding them, three of the seven are happy to get on my lap and have a crawl around. The runt sleeps on my lap and will cry for me when I put him down. Another one I managed to solicit a purr from.
The rest are still a bit skittish, the black one the most - he will not stay still for pats or touching or rubs or scratches at all. He just backs away and runs as fast as he can. If he's not at least tolerating contact in the next 2-3 days, I may have to separate him from the others for a few hours every day, so I can spend some one-on-one time with him.These kittens were in pretty bad shape. They have slight eye infections, some worse than others. Their coats feel like straw. The runt was exhausted, weak, and skin and bones - I could feel every rib and vertebrae, and his hip bones were jutting out. I don't think he would have survived more than another day or two on the streets.
But thankfully that is not to be thought of now...he's safe and very well fed in my laundry, and already shows his appreciation so very clearly. When he's curled up on my lap (he's only the size of the palm of my hand, and is perhaps 4 weeks old), he just looks up at me with those crusty, scabby eyes and radiates pure love. It makes my heart swell.
Here they are, 7 little monsters.
I'd love to hear ideas for names. They must be somewhat unique, as our rescue database fills up very quickly with Shadows and Tigers and the like - it's impossible to keep them straight after they've been adopted. I also like to keep them linked in some way - either they all start with the same letter, or they follow a theme. We've had desserts (Pavlova, Trifle, Brulee, etc), Y babies (Yeti, Yoda, etc), Australian mines (Argyle, Telfer, etc), and a few other common beginning letters.
But, sapphire, emerald and amethyst would work, too.
<----- That's him. 
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