What do I need to consider before getting a kitten?

[eggyblackett]

A friend of mine's cat has just had a litter and there's the possibility of us homing one of the kittens.

As I've only ever had older rescue cats before please can you tell me what its like with a kitten?

On the plus side we live in a rural area, have cat experience and I am on mat leave so will have time to do multiple meals a day and litter train. The negatives are that I have three young dcs and two (very soft) dogs - is this a recipe for disaster? The last thing Is want to do is bring a kitten into an environment it can't cope with.

Please.....I want to be sure I'm making the right decision. If it were a puppy, which I have experience of, I'd be thinking no bloody way - but cats are different.

How much work is a kitten?

Cat's piss smell, pooing and weeing in your house.

Do you work, will you put it out during the day or keep it in?. Could it get run over?. Will you get it neutured and all jabs? Will you pay emergency vets fees if it gets in a fight/run over?

Ignore stupid comments about cats' piss

Shut the kitten in one room for a week or two and keep your kids very quiet if they go in to see it. You need to socialise and play with it. Encourage the children to be really gentle - stroking not picking up is best to start with.

Leave it at least a couple of weeks before introducing your dogs.

Yes the litter tray may get whiffy if you don't clean it daily.

I do work, but DH works from home. I would put it out during the day, but obviously give it free rein to come and go as it pleases.

Absoloutely yes to getting it neutered, jabbed, wormed etc. We have two very healthy dogs - it wouldn't be treated any differently to them. Pet insurance is also a must for us.

TBH I'm not worried so much about the long term challenges of cat ownership, more the short term ones of having a small kitten. Just how much piss and poop are we talking about here :o?

The cat will also piss around your door to mark it's territory. Ignore stupid comments telling you to ignore the cat's piss smell.

Our cat died last week (run over), beautiful cat, I'm sad he died. Animals wee and poo and will do it in awkward places for various reasons. But most importantly they all require a cetain amount of work.

I am waiting on the emergency vets bill, which I presume will be around 300 euro for the emergency care.

Is the kitten likely to be litter trained on arrival? Sorry, I am a complete kitten novice.

ahem. (rolls up sleeves) Some of my recent experiences:

Pissing behind the TV when it rains because they don't like getting wet**

Randomly pissing on the rug at the front door (new one to me)

House smelling of cat pee.

Half eaten magpies.

Insurance - my Bert would have cost me ££££'s if I hadn't had him insured, he was injured at 5 months.

Befriending every cat in the neighbourhood so that your garden resembles a freeking rescue centre!

Newly redecorated hall - kitten undecorates it by ripping a mahoosive piece of paper

Wires - chews through them, broke the Sky box, the phone and a mobile charger.

Holidays - can you afford to put him/her in a cattery while you are away or do you have somebody to rely on to look after them?

Putting aaalll this aside. He's bloody lovely and entertained me so much this evening when he tried to get into the bath with me - I stopped him at the point he was shoulder deep in water

**(so, won't pee in the rain but will get into the bath with me!)

I would seriously consider taking two.

Like pretty much all mammals (maybe not hamsters), they really do thrive on the company of each other. If you watch kittens play they are always together, also when sleeping, grooming, etc. To deprive them of that is to deprive them of quite a lot.

There's a common misconception that cats are solitary animals - they're not - but their "society" is not laid out in the kind of "vertical" way that ours is, and that of dogs is - it's more "horizontal", so to speak.

Anyway, in the long run, not only will the kittens be happier with each other, it'll be easier for you as they will keep each other company and entertain each other. Kittens love to rough and tumble with other kittens, and it's how they learn to be cats.

It's probably best, with most mammals, to make sure that they are not the only one of their kind in their home. (There are exceptions, obviously.)

Molly so sorry to hear about your cat. That's terribly sad.

I'd also recommend two, kittens like a lot of attention, whenm there is two they entertain each other i'd add

pissing in the clean pants and socks

pissing in the bathroom

clooks in the sofa from scratching

ditto the carpet

lots and lots of scratches
to Rustys list.

I wouldn't be without them though.

I have 2 10 mth old kittens (sisters) - we got them at 9 weeks old.

They were litter trained but hadn't had any jabs - they needed 2 sets, cost for those around £30 per kitten. They've been spayed as well, that cost about £65 per cat (charge is according to weight I think)

They can go out after the second set of jabs - around 12/13 weeks. For the first few weeks they went outside them came back in to use the litter tray! We gradually weaned them away from this by putting it outside them removing it completely.

we have fed them on felix & whiskas kitten food so far (they have gone onto adult food this week) When we first got them they were on 3 meals per day + dried food; now they have 2 sachets of wet food each per day + a bowl of dried.

We have only had 1 accident in the house, when we were having some work done and I think one of them was too scared to use the cat flap.

They are a delight; great company and fun to play with. The only downside is that they ruin your furniture!!

I currently have 2 cats, neither of which has ever pissed in the house (except when they were young and used the litter tray).

Kittens should arive house trained - they copy mum using the litter tray.

I did once have a cat that was slightly nervous. We had builders round for weeks and they insisted on bring a yappy Jack Russell. After about a week my cat came upsatirs and pissed on me when I was in bed!
I took her hint and told the builders to leave the dog at home!

If cats do piss indoors you can get Feliway spray which is a synthetic cat pheromone. It makes the cat feel all chilled out and relaxed so it doean;t need to mark its territory.

That's the theory, anyhow.

Oh and I have loads of friends with cats and have only ever smelled cat's piss at one of their houses. That was someone who had about a dozen of them - apparently they find it stressful living in large groups.

My cat only wees in the house if he thinks he's under house arrest. Then he does it and looks me straight in the eye while he does it too.

we have 4 cats and in the process of re homing 5 kittens, yes litter trays can smell (kittens use only) a bit if you dont keep on top of it, they will if allowed to, find other places to wee as they can be lazy, but if your keep and eye on them and plonk them in the litter tray often, there shouldnt be any problems, we also live in a rural area, so we have to flea and worm them every 6 weeks instead of every 3 months due to the wildlife and of course all the yummy take aways they catch to eat, always best to get kittens neutered asap can be done from 8 weeks old that will stop them spraying (males) and females from getting pregnant as they can get pregnant as young as 6 months, and it also reduces their roaming area, ours have to put up with a very hyper 5 year old, 2 teenagers and all their frineds in and out, 2 dalmations oh and of course each other, our oldest cat is 16 and our youngest is 2 years ( had a litter of 6 beautiful ginger kittens 7 weeks ago) and booked in to be spayed next week