If you are interested in what and how to feedkitten, then this squeaky miracle-yudo on thin paws and with a trembling tail has appeared in your house, which promises to grow into a brutal or imposing handsome cat or turn into a self-sufficient and smug kitty. But this will happen later. And now your house is filled with heartbreaking screams, which can only be stopped by another portion of food intended for the puny body making these sounds. And the screams will stop for a short time. A few hours later, you will run to the kitchen again to cook food for your loud-mouthed pet. And once again you will be surprised at how often and how much your not yet grown pet eats. And this can continue indefinitely. If only you knew how many times to feed a cat until she has grown out of such a tender age! Do not despair - we will help you: we will tell you how many times, how and what exactly you need to feed a small kitten. We'll break it down by week and month of his first year of life and introduce you to the feeding rules. And if you're ready for this educational program, let's get started.
Feeding a newborn kitten
Unfortunately, sometimes newborn kittensare left without a mother, and sometimes the cat for some reason cannot feed them. Then a person has to act as a wet nurse and nurse the helpless babies. Of course, a person is not able to completely replace a mother cat, but he is quite capable of helping a kitten survive. Let us immediately stipulate that feeding a kitten is a very, very troublesome and no less responsible task. Without food, the baby will die, and you will have to feed it very often. In addition to the feeding regimen, you also need to familiarize yourself with the method of feeding a newborn baby. Weight gain is the most important indicator by which you can judge the development of the baby. Therefore, for the first two weeks of its life, you will have to weigh the kitten every day. And starting from the third week, the baby is weighed every three days. Note that from this moment on, the weight of the little cat will grow faster than the weight of the cat. Slow weight gain indicates an incorrect feeding regimen or insufficient amount of food. A newborn kitten weighs from eighty to one hundred and thirty grams - it all depends on the breed of the baby. In a week, its weight should double, and then increase by about one hundred grams every week. Kittens at the age of eight weeks weigh about one kilogram. The first thing you need to do is buy a cat milk replacer at a pet store or learn how to prepare a formula for feeding yourself. Regular cow's (and even goat's!) milk is not suitable for feeding kittens, since the protein content in it is ten times lower than in cat's milk. To prepare the milk formula, you need to mix four parts of cow's (boiled) milk and one part of raw egg white. All this must be whipped until smooth and heated to the required temperature. You can also use baby food for infants. But to feed a small cat, this mixture must be diluted twice as thin as for a child. The feeding schedule is built in direct dependence on the dynamics of the kitten's weight gain. Every day, its weight should increase by about twenty grams, and for each gram gained, four to five grams of milk formula are added. But how many times a day a kitten needs to be fed can be seen from the chart.
- First week
For the first two days, the baby is fed every two hours.day and night. The third, fourth and fifth days - every two hours during the day and every three hours at night. From the fifth to the seventh day, the baby is fed every four hours. In the first week, the temperature of the mixture should be 38-39 degrees, and its volume - 30 milliliters per hundred grams of the kitten's weight in the first four days and 38 milliliters per hundred grams on the remaining days of the week.
- The second week
The baby continues to be fed every four hours.day and night. The volume of food is still 38 milliliters per hundred grams of the kitten's weight. But the temperature of the feeding mixture is reduced to 30-32 degrees.
- The third week
The volume of food is increased to 46 milliliters perevery hundred grams of the kitten's weight. The temperature of the milk mixture is lowered to 28-30 degrees and the kitten is fed every four hours during the day. Babies who are breastfed begin to be fed complementary foods from the fifteenth day of their life. But formula-fed kittens are given complementary foods only from the fourth week of life.
- Fourth week
You can start giving your babies other foods:scraped or minced lean beef, lean cottage cheese, egg yolk. But you should still continue feeding them with formula. From this point on, the food temperature is brought to room temperature, and its volume remains the same - 46 milliliters for every hundred grams of the kitten's weight. The first ten days of newborn kittens are fed only with formula. And from the eleventh day, you need to gradually accustom the babies to solid food. The easiest way is to alternate formula and very liquid semolina porridge. Only sugar should never be added to either the formula or semolina porridge. The first four weeks of a kitten should be fed only with a pipette, a very small nipple or a syringe without a needle. In the fifth week of life, you need to start accustoming the little cat to a bowl. This usually happens quite easily. The baby's mouth is lubricated with porridge or milk mixture and brought to a small bowl - the hungry kitten begins to lap on its own.
Feeding after the first month of life
From the second month onwards, the milk formula ceases to be usedthe main food of a kitten. From this age, the baby needs to be fed other products, but up to three months, the mixture should be given as complementary food. After the first month of life, the kitten menu will include almost all the products that an adult cat is fed. By the way, high-quality premium-class ready-made food can also be included in the kittens' diet. It is important that such food is intended specifically for babies. But up to six months, it is still better to feed kittens natural food. So, include the following products in your pet's diet.
- Raw or boiled beef or chicken. It is important that the meat is lean and well-ground. Boiled meat is preferably diluted with milk or broth to the state of gruel.
- Boiled fish - only boneless and only sea! Fish should also be crushed into gruel and given no more often than once a week.
- Porridge on milk and meat (low-fat!) Broth, cooked from mango, buckwheat, rice, oatmeal and yachka. Porridges must first be liquid, and then viscous, so that the baby can lap them.
- Hard boiled eggs are also ground and mixed with milk or broth.
- Low-fat cottage cheese and kefir, as well as other sour-milk drinks without sugar and flavors.
- Vegetables and fruits, grinded on a fine grater. They also can and should be given in raw or boiled form, adding to porridge or minced meat.
It is necessary to include vitamins and supplements in the baby’s dietmineral supplements, especially necessary for a growing organism. They can be purchased at pet stores or veterinary pharmacies. However, the dosage and frequency of administration must be calculated strictly in accordance with the instructions, or better yet, after consulting a veterinarian. It is permissible to feed kittens with baby food, but such food should not form the basis of the kittens' diet. The question of how many times a growing cat should be fed remains relevant at least during the first six months of its life. Up to three months of age, kittens are fed four times a day. In the fourth month of life, the frequency of feeding is gradually increased to three times a day and the growing cat or kitten continues to be fed this way until about eight to nine months. From this age, the animal is transferred to two meals a day. Only one type of food can be given to the baby at one feeding. However, this does not mean that the diet cannot be combined. It is quite acceptable to cook porridge in milk or meat broth, and also add vegetables or fruits to it. It is advisable to alternate different types of protein and give, for example, minced meat at one feeding, and cottage cheese or egg yolk mashed in milk the next time. The most important thing is not to overfeed the baby and leave it hungry. And one more important point. It is at a young age that a pet's food preferences are formed. If you accustom it to vegetables and fruits from a young age, then the adult cat will not dislike them either. And these products are the best source of vitamins! But if you treat a small kitten with ready-made food, then later you will hardly be able to feed an adult animal with other food. In general, owners should be very careful with ready-made food. The fact is that such food contains all sorts of additives that cause the animal to become addicted to it. It is often almost impossible to transfer a cat accustomed to dry or wet food to natural food. So be vigilant!
Helpful Tips
When feeding kittens, in addition to following the feeding regimen, it is necessary to monitor the hygiene of the babies:
- Milk formula for feeding should be fresh. You can store them no longer than a day.
- All bottles, nipples, pipettes and syringes must be washed after each feeding. And at least once a day they must be boiled.
- The first month of life is very important to give babiesfood only recommended temperature. Mixtures should be heated, but not overheated. If the food quickly cools, then its temperature can be maintained with the help of a water bath or simply lower the bottle with the mixture into hot water.
- If the baby is deprived of maternal care, thenit is necessary to monitor his hygiene: clean the eyes, ears and nose. It is necessary to help the child to go to the toilet after each meal. A mother lick her cubs. And you need a soft slightly moist gauze to massage the sides and tummy of the baby, so that it is relieved. A light and smooth massage under the tail will simplify the task.
In a word, attention and care never and for no oneare never superfluous. And when it comes to the life and health of pets, a person simply must be a caring owner. How could it be otherwise? After all, we are responsible for those we have tamed.
