If you own a pregnant feline who seems to be due to give birth, there’s a good possibility you won’t require to do much but support her. You could even get up early to find that your feline has delivered and is feeding her babies peacefully.
Since the environment has the ability to take care of everything, you must be aware of any complications that may arise when your feline is birthing and whatever you can do to assist.
If you decide to deliver babies at home, below are a few easy but necessary steps you could do to ensure that your kitty is comfortable, fit, and capable of delivering in a stress-free atmosphere.
Signs of Impending Cat Birth
A feline’s gestation period lasts around 65 days, plus or minus five days. If you’re not confident how much further your pet is, look over the early symptoms of approaching birth.
- Nesting: Your feline would look for a peaceful and secure area to birth her babies one or two days before she goes into labor. She might select a secret room you provide for her, or she might seek protection in the corner of a cupboard or beneath a bed.
- Behavioral Changes: You might observe active walking, sweating, increased grooming (particularly around her genital tract), and extreme verbalization from your feline. She’ll give up eating as well.
- Physical Changes in Labor: The temperature of your feline’s genital region could fall below 99 degrees Fahrenheit, causing her to vomit. Some weeks before birth, the stomach may “drop,” as well as the feline’s nipples may grow bigger, darker, or redder.
- Active Labor Signs: Your feline might screech through the intensity of cramps, which are the uterus motions that propel the baby towards the vaginal canal. There might also be blood or mucous release.
Prepare Yourself Mentally
Throughout the feline deliveries, the essential aspect is to stay calm. Keep yourself focused, and don’t freak out. Your feline can sense your distress, and it would be the worst thing she wished for before giving birth.
The birth process would make your home a bit messy. There would be significant blood, as well as some release with water bursting. The newborns would be conceived in a pouch, giving them a stretchy appearance. All of this is entirely natural. To assist the baby’s breathing, the mom feline would rip the pouch using her fangs and clean them.
Every kitten would be surrounded by a placental, which is a reddish slab of meat. The mom feline would break the umbilical that joins the baby to the placental, then she will, certainly, consume the placental, and anything else slips out. Everything above is considered in a normal delivery process.
Preparing for the cat birth
Make absolutely sure everybody in the household understands to be relaxed and silent near your feline throughout the last 2 weeks of her gestation, particularly kids, who are naturally enthusiastic about the idea of babies to cuddle with shortly!
Throughout this period, make sure to keep mom as quiet and idle as practical, and persuade her to rest in her new gestation mattress. Even the coziest plush mattress may not always attract her, yet, some felines would choose a spot inside a closet over your proposed maternity bed! But ensure she does have an option about where she wants to give birth, and do not try to sway her off her decision.
Have Help on Hand
Your feline’s delivery needs to go easily; however, it’s a good idea to have someone on board to hold her peacefully if anything goes wrong.
Before your feline delivers a baby, not down your vet’s after-hours contact information, as deliveries commonly occur at midnight, and they may require immediate assistance. If the mother has trouble while delivering her babies, you might have to consider taking her to the veterinarian, so ensure you have the car ready.
Whenever you suspect labor is on the way, have several items ready ahead of time, along with a fresh bowl of hot water, fresh towels and clothing, dental brushes, and rubber gloves, as well as a feline cage and your veterinarian’s contact information. It’s essential to get these items on standby in the event of an emergency!
You’ll have to keep the kitties cozy whenever you shift them far from mom at any point. Experts suggest using a precooked thermal sack rather than a heating pad because their strong fangs and nails might create holes.
Supplies for the Birthing
Your feline may wish to disappear in order to deliver kittens. You may, nevertheless, make a delivery place out of a storage container or a waste bucket filled with clothes or pillows. It would be better for cat owners to see and assist in the delivery if their felines choose this location.
- Absorbent pads: Prepare absorbent pads to surround the birthing location.
- Towels: You’ll require fresh towels or hand towels to sanitize the location and, if required, encourage the babies.
- Nesting box: If you’ve taken your expecting feline to the doctor and remember how many babies to anticipate, purchase a nesting container big enough to support the family. The usual litter size is 4 kittens; however, a feline could have anything between one and twelve kittens. An average 8-pound feline should be comfortable in a 16-by-24-inch container. The huge the feline is, the wider the container she will require.
- Heating pad: To keep the babies warm, place a warm compress on the surface of the container and cover it with a sheet or many blankets. Never lay the babies on a hot water bottle directly; it will hurt them. If the container doesn’t have a covering, wrap it with a dry cloth to preserve the warmth inside and breeze away.
- Refuse bin: After the delivery, you’ll get a lot of dirty blankets, so prepare a laundry bucket, trash bag, or additional container prepared to dispose of them.
- Dental floss with sharp scissors: If the corpus callosum is not broken apart by the mom feline, you must clip it off and gently cut it.
Cat birth process
The cause of the labor and delivery is uncertain. However, considerations involve the uterus’s thickness and mass, the babies’ length and mass, and the biochemical equilibrium of the unborn babies and the mother.
Throughout the labor and delivery, syncopated vaginal cramps progressively intensify to force the baby out from the womb and into the cervical tube.
It might take anything between 5 to 30 minutes for a kitty to be born. The mother would eliminate the umbilical pouch once the babies are delivered. By cleaning the babies with her scratchy tongues, the mom feline will encourage them to inhale. She’ll also bite on the amniotic sac, around a few centimeters from the baby’s body, to cut it. She’ll be able to consume the placental as well. The babies would instinctively seek a breast, grab on, and breastfeed.
If the baby is left in its pouch and the mom feline avoids it, delicately puncture or rip the mucous flap and encourage the kitty’s respiration by softly stroking its nostrils with a firm, dry cloth. If the mom feline is having trouble chewing off the amniotic sac, securely twist dental floss all around the cord 1 inch apart from the kitty’s body and snip it and give it to your feline to consume.
If a placental somehow doesn’t fall out along with every kitty, ensure that it is expelled during 24 hours of delivery. One placental must be delivered with every kitty. Counting the umbilical cords is an excellent idea. You’ll have to consult a vet if the placenta is still in the feline.
During deliveries, approximately 30 to 60 minutes can occur, although longer durations are not rare. If there happens to be a gap of more than 4-6 hours but you are certain there are still babies, you should get the mother examined by a specialist. Regardless of if the delivery happened effortlessly or not, your doctor must inspect the mom feline and babies 24 hours after delivery.
Total Delivery Time
A mother gives birth to almost all of her offspring in about half to a day usually. The initial kitty must come within 60 minutes of intense labor beginning.
The mom feline will relax somewhere between babies and must be encouraged to breastfeed and groom the newly born babies. If you’ve been maintaining the babies in a different compartment, bring them close to the mom feline and assist them in finding a nip. During a period when she is not giving birth, you can give her meals, kitten breastmilk substitute, or bland, unsweetened yogurt.
Consult an authorized doctor if you believe the cat hasn’t delivered all of the babies within 12 hours.
Problems during cat birth
Surprisingly, most mothers are capable of delivering their offspring without the assistance of humans. Yet, there is a chance that difficulties will arise.
- Extended contractions without birth: Bring your feline and any offspring to the doctor if she has had longer than 60 minutes of intense labor with no improvement.
- Retained placenta: A uterus abscess might occur if your feline does not remove all of the umbilical cords. Even though the mother consumes the placentas, count them all. The number of umbilical cords and kitties must be the same.
- Kitten lodged in the birth canal: The majority of kitties are delivered with their heads first. Breech (tail-first) deliveries account for around 40% of all pregnancies and are regarded as acceptable. A kitten that has been stuck in the reproductive tract for longer than 15 minutes is most certainly in pain. If a kitty remains blocked in the reproductive tract for longer than 10 minutes and if you detect greenish leakage without a baby in 15 minutes, contact your veterinarian. Your veterinarian might advise you on the appropriate actions to take.
- Stillborn kittens: It’s also not unusual for 1 or more kitties to be stillborn. Eliminate the deceased baby from the location so that the mom could keep giving birth to the remaining babies without interruption.
- Postpartum hemorrhaging: While some blood is common after delivering a baby, severe bleeding or clotting is a medical issue that needed prompt treatment from a doctor. The mom feline may suffer if she is neglected. Get veterinary help if the daily hemorrhage lasts longer than a week since delivery, or even if it pauses for a while and then resumes again.
Your cat should be looking for and nursing the kitties after they are all delivered. Your pet’s calorie requirements might arise when she is breastfeeding. Ascertain that she has plenty of kitten mix feed. Your pet’s higher nutrient demands would be met by high-quality cat food.
Something may be wrong if your feline isn’t lactating or feeding, appears to still be in discomfort, or is drowsy. A bad odor, as well as regular hemorrhage, might suggest an illness or a kitty that has been trapped. If something like this is going on with your feline, consult a veterinarian right away.
Read also: How often do cats go into heat?
After Cat Birth
Although it may appear that time flies, the complete delivery could take around 5 to 10 hours. It could even go more than 24 hours in certain circumstances! If you find mom having difficulty giving delivery at any point, call your veterinarian to evaluate your possibilities. Consult your veterinarian immediately if your feline seems to be struggling pointlessly for 60 minutes or longer throughout the delivery.
The average litter size is 4 to 6 kittens, while it’s not uncommon for the number to be greater or fewer. Allow your feline time to groom and nurse her babies once they are all delivered. Tend not to engage excessively, also don’t be scared to carefully approach babies as it will educate them and offer mother a much-needed rest!
If the babies haven’t been nursed by their mother within 60 minutes of birth, you might have to direct them to their mother’s nipples, as they’ll be quite hungry! If you have more babies than nipples, you may have to switch them till they start sharing.
Contact your veterinarian right away if the mom doesn’t appear to be caring for her babies, isn’t washing them, or isn’t nursing them.
Read Also: Caring tips for newborn kittens and mother cat
Final Thought
The arrival of kittens is grounds for joy. Once you’re fully organized, you’ll be the happy caretakers of some new felines that arrived safely. Whenever it is discussed about the preparation regarding cat births, ensuring that the cat gets the necessary nutrition at the appropriate times, building a secure resting spot for her around the birthing period, and having backup plans in location would all assist in ensuring a smooth delivery.