Caring for your new Cat or Kitten

Thinking about buying a kitten?

When deciding to buy a kitten, it is easy to to forget about how much much care they need. The average cat will live for up to 10 years or maybe longer. My cat is currently 19 years old! You will need to provide it with lots of companionship and provide regular meals and water. All cats will need regular grooming especially if the cat is long haired, like a persian.

Bringing the kitten home

When first bringing the kitten home, remember that it will be a very stressful time for the kitten, especially if this is the first time away from its mother and family. You should give it time to adjust to the new surroundings in your home. Make sure all the doors and windows are closed and that there is a guard in front of the fireplace. Make sure that the kitten knows where its bed, litter tray and food and water bowls are. The kittens bed should be a refuge to retreat to if things become too stressful. It needs to be warm, dry, comfortable and draught free. There are many types of bed to choose from or you can put some warm bedding inside a strong dry cardboard box with a hole cut in the side. Putting it in a warm secure corner (near a radiator in the when the weather gets cold) will make it welcoming and the kitten feel secure.

Introducing other pets and children

Be careful when introducing or leaving the kitten with children. Children can easily injure a kitten unintentionally so always supervise play and do not allow the kitten to be picked up unnecessarily. Children should be encouraged to sit on the floor and wait for the kitten to come to them. Make sure that the kitten is allowed to stop playing when it wants to and is not treated like a toy by the children. Kittens, like many young animals, will need a lot of sleep and should be allowed time to rest.

Feeding

When you first take a kitten home it is important to feed it on the same food it has been used to. A sudden change of diet combined with the stress of adapting to a new home can cause stomach upsets and diarrhoea. If you want to change the diet, do so gradually by mixing it with the kitten's usual food. Kittens have small stomachs and have to be fed little and often.

Kittens aged 8-12 weeks need four meals a day, 3-6 months three meals, and kittens over 6 months old, two meals. You may want to provide some dry food occassionaly - it depends very much on your lifestyle, what your kitten likes and is used to and if you have other cats in the house with certain feeding routines and habits.

Do not give your kitten cow's milk as it can cause diarrhoea. If you wish to feed milk use one that is specially formulated for cats. Diarrhoea that persists for more than 24 hours requires veterinary attention and can be costly. An average visit to the vets for a kitten with diarrhoea can be around £70. It is best to provide fresh drinking water, which should be changed several times per day

Using Litter trays

Most kittens are very good at using litter trays, which they will have learnt by copying their mother. You may just need to show your new kitten where the litter tray is and place it on the tray on waking up from a sleep and also just after meals, or when the kitten is sniffing, scratching or beginning to crouch and looks as if it is about to go.

You will need a plastic litter tray which can be filled with sand or cat litter which available from most pet shops and supermarkets. The tray should be placed on newspaper to catch any litter pushed over the side during digging, a large tray will prevent such problems.

Place the tray in a quiet accessible corner where your kitten will not be disturbed. Make sure that the litter tray is not next to food and water bowls. The kitten may be reluctant to use the litter tray if it is too close to its food.

The litter tray must be kept clean and emptied regularly. Some disinfectants can be toxic to cats, so use only hot water and detergent when cleaning out the tray or ensure you use a cat-friendly disinfectant such as bleach which has been diluted as the manufacturer recommends and the tray rinsed thoroughly before use. If your kitten is inclined to mess elsewhere in the house, confine it to one room with a litter tray until the kitten learns to use it regularly.

When your kitten starts to go outside more often, gradually move the litter tray towards the door. A few handfuls of cat litter from the tray spread onto well dug soil in the garden will encourage the kitten to dig there. Do not remove the litter tray from indoors until your kitten has started using the garden.

Going outside

Your kitten should not be allowed outside until at least a week after it has finished its first course of vaccinations at about 13 - 14 weeks old (depending on the vaccine). Once it is fully vaccinated and has become used to life in your house, you can start to let your kitten go outside. Choose a dry day (if possible) and a quiet time and accompany your kitten outside, allowing it to explore the new environment. Continue to accompany the kitten until it is used to your garden and can find its way back to the house without difficulty. It is best not to leave your kitten outside alone until it is 6 months old.

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