rescue kitten won't eat

[nipersvest]

we have a 13 week old kitten who came to us from a local rescue centre a week ago. we've had cats before but its been a long time since we had a kitten in the house, 17 years to be exact.

there are notes from the rescue place saying she's been done with flee stuff and wormed (although their flea stuff didn't really work as she was absolutely riddled with them). for the first couple of days, she was fine, ate but not loads. but since then, she's barely eating. i have gone through so much cat food to try different types, brands, flavours, all bar the odd nibble has been refused.

in desperation, i took her to the vet yesterday. no temp, heart seems ok, vet wormed her again and gave an injection to combat nausea. typically, she ate a random dog biscuit she's spotted on the side while at the vets! vet also gave me a tin of prescription appetite stimulating food.

since then, she's had diarrhea, that'll be the wormer. she is eating the prescription food but not in any great quantity and has still not touched any of the other food.

am really worried there's something wrong with her, next step would be vet again and blood tests. anyone else had problems getting a new kitten to eat?

Try feeding her fresh chicken mixed with plain boiled rice.

done chicken, she'd eat a little bit but again, not in any great quantity.

Did the vet have a good look in her mouth to rule out, say, palate abnormalities?

Are there any foods she really adores, like tuna to stimulate her appetite? If you go the tuna route, make sure it's in spring water, not brine because salt's very bad for cats.

Have the fleas gone now? If not that could be putting her off.

Also stress can really affect the appetite. She may just need to settle with you.

Is she peeing, nipers ?

she is weeing, and i've been flea combing her every day, got about 30 out on the first day, yesterday got none.

she's quite playful, and very cuddly, follows me everywhere and likes sitting on knees. just really worrying that she won't eat. she has now had diarrhea 5 times today, still the wormer coming through her system i suspect, am just going to keep trying every day, although will go easy until the diarrhea stops. if not, back to the vets for bloods. she had her first vaccinations the morning before we picked her up, and she had been at the centre for about 10 days prior to that so there is a chance she's picked up a virus there.

am hoping its nothing congenital, we've been down that road before with a kitten who lasted till 18 months of age but was very ill her whole short life.

Her systems sounds as if it's overloaded. Just bland food I think. Maybe a bit of boiled egg, chopped up.

Our kitten had the runs at first as he was run down. He's firmed up now though .

Best of luck with yours.

been back to the vet and had blood tests, all normal bar a few slight raises which could just be down to her not eating, am also having the snap test done for feline aids and leukemia, results will be ready later.

still at a loss, have put down cooked chicken and tuna, again, just nibbled a bit. i feel really sad my kitten seems to be wasting away. vet also gave a vitamin injection and appetite stimulant tablet, which we've got more of to give her every 3 days.

Call the rescue centre and find out what food was given there. Did the vet say that weight was normal?

If you're offering the same food as she had at the rescue, she might just be upset at the move. Cats hate disruption to their living environment and she might just be a bit overwhelmed.

She won't let herself starve. Leave plenty of fresh water, give her lots of space and tempt her with little morsels from your hand. I'm sure she will rally.

FWIW when we first got our rescue kittens they hid under the dresser and refused to come out, even for food. We ended up posting a dish of biscuits under the dresser for them.

weight normal but she's now slipping underweight. i have the food the rescue centre said she was being fed, iams kitten food and whiskers tins, she's not touched it.

other than not eating she seems quite perky, she follows me around, will play and is quite up for cuddles.

Try putting down gravy - when my cat was out of sorts all she would do is lick up gravy.

Then try adding some boiled crumbled egg yolk with it.

You may need to hand feed to stimulate her appetite.

She may come out at night to eat and drink. I would leave a small dish of food by her water and see if she eat during the night.

I had to do this when I moved houses. My cat hid under the dresser and woulndt come out for weeks. We knew he was eating and using the litter box, but just needed to acclimate to the new house.

Good luck to you and your new little cuddle bug.

update - progress, i was making a sandwich and had ham in my hand and she scaled my leg to get to it, so i fed her a bit. she likes ham! not the best thing for her but at least she was eating, tried her again on one of the tinned foods we'd bought and she went for canagan. started slowly with her just eating half a small tin on friday and since then, we've now got her on 2 tins of that a day.

fast forward to today and we finally have a kitten who is asking to be fed, plus she's a lot ore playful again. she's still on canagan but will start mixing the foods and wean her onto kitten food.

such a relief but am still taking it a day at a time, still don't know why she stopped eating, illness, reaction to the jabs, psychological, we may never know but at least we are making steps forward.

she needs to put weight back on and then go back to the vets to see if she's well enough to have the second lot of jabs.

thanks for all the advice!

I recall that when Seniorboy came to us after my Mum died, he lived mainly on ham for a good few weeks. (He had gone into hiding somewhere in the house and only came out when we were all asleep.) In our defence, no-one expected him to live more than a month or two so we were indulging him on the basis of ' What the Heck - he can go out happy'.

That was when he was 13/14 and he's lived a life of indulgence ever since! I think he has a particularly iron constitution though so you're right - ham ain't the best thing for them but at least it keeps their system turning over after a fashion. I really think that without that, Seniorboy would have got out of the habit of eating, fallen into a despond and popped his clogs.

Glad she's eating again - and at least you know what her favourite treat thing is for future reference.

How's she doing, nipers ?