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Taking Your Kitten HomeYour
new kitten will be used to the company of the other animals in our
household and might take a few days to get used to his new companions.
It can take anything between 5 minutes and 5 days for them to
settle with their new non-human friends.
When
you get home with your kitten, put him in a safe room with doors and
windows closed (and make sure he can't get access to up the chimney!)
and give him a litter tray with Snowflake cat litter in it - this is
what he'll be used to. (He will be trained to use this but he
should be encouraged by placing him in the tray from time to time,
especially after sleeping or eating, and if he should have an 'accident'
elsewhere, which is unlikely, then he should NEVER have his nose rubbed
in it, but should be gently placed back into the tray and told that this
is where he should do it, and he should be praised for using the tray).
Also give him a drink of fresh water (never give cow's milk - this
can upset their tummies, but if you do want to give milk as a treat then
get milk that is made especially for cats from the pet department of a
supermarket, or a pet shop). Offer some dry food - he will be used
to Hilife Kitten, and some wet food – check with us to see what the
kittens are enjoying before they leave us. When
he has had a chance to settle for a while (noise and excitement will
frighten him at first), introduce the other animals, the most placid
first, making sure he has somewhere safe to retreat if he is afraid at
first. This could be the open carrier that he came in. If he
does retreat to a 'safe area' then make sure he isn't cornered by other
animals (or children) in the household. Never hold the kitten or
the established cat when introducing them because they feel they can't
get away if they need to then. For much more information on
introducing a new kitten to other cats in the household, please see 'New
Arrivals' on our site. Your
kitten will be used to being fed wet food at approximately 8am, 12
o'clock mid day, 5pm and last thing at night. Feed as close to
these hours as is convenient to you, but make sure there is always
plenty of dry food down during the day and night. (And, of course, fresh
water).
Our
kittens are all sold as indoor cats, but if windows are left open, they
would jump out - they can leap very high. If you want to open
windows, we would suggest you obtain screens such as the ones we show on
the 'Keeping them Safe' page on our site. A young kitten is more than
capable of jumping 4 or 5 feet – so don’t think they will be safe if
you leave a top window open. They
are also very capable of jumping on a door handle and opening the door,
so if you open a window and then close the door you could well find your
cat has opened it and got out of the window (I know of a case where a
kitten – not one of ours - actually opened a door, ran up on to the windowsill, and fell
out of the first floor window and one of ours was found on a first floor
windowsill, having climbed out of the window). Young
kittens are very likely to get underfoot, so be careful about stepping
backwards because he could quite likely be sitting right behind you.
Also, they dash about in front of feet when young, so it’s a
constant case of being aware of where you walk.
If you think this is difficult with one or two kittens, give us a
thought with a whole litterJ
We get used to sort of shuffling aboutJ An
extra few words of warning here - NEVER LEAVE THE LID TO THE TOILET OPEN
- kittens jump up on to things, assuming there is a solid surface, and
some have been heard of drowning by falling into the toilet. And
NEVER RUN HOT WATER INTO THE BATH FIRST AND LEAVE IT UNATTENDED - I have
a photo of what happened when a kitten, not one of ours, jumped into
scalding water. Also, we're always really careful to never leave
sharp knives etc. around, or staples, or paper clips or anything else
that a cat could hurt themselves with. In fact, if you imagine the
kitten to be like a two year old child, and what they can get up to,
this would be about right. Never
leave washing machine doors or tumble dryers open - cats and kittens
will climb inside and several have been killed in a horrible way.
Anyone who has been round our home will see that we pack towels behind
the bed, so that kittens can’t get stuck behind the headboard.
Thanks to Kerry Gower for these links - anyone who has electric wiring
in a place where kittens might chew it will find these links useful: http://www.tlc-direct.co.uk/Main_Index/Cable_Accessories_Index/Cable_Tidy/
http://www.pctable.com/?siah_product_group=55&siah_product_page=1&siah_product_slot_id=44
A
word about candles. Candles are OUT. Candles are a huge risk
to cats and kittens, as are open fires, or any sort of uncovered flame.
If you have a cooker where the top will stay hot when the pan is taken
off, then if the cat has any chance of getting near it, cover the hot
area with a pan of cold water while it cools down. Kittens may try
to jump on to worktops and walk on hot surfaces (behaviour like this can
be discouraged by using a spray of water, from something such as a well
washed out windowlene spray), and make sure dishwasher powder and any
other chemicals aren’t left where a kitten can reach them. Irons
and ironing boards can be very dangerous - ironing is better done in a
room where the cats can't get in, and I’ve even heard of a kitten
pulling a cold iron down on top of himself. Don't leave drinking
glasses or bottles where they could be knocked onto a hard surface and
break - glass can do a huge amount of damage to the outside AND inside
of a cat! Don't leave bleach anywhere where a cat could lick it or
tread in it, which amounts to the same thing. If a cat treads in
bleach it will lick it off it's paws and die a horrible death of
internal caustic burns. Chocolate
is poisonous to cats. As
soon as I hear of any accident befalling a cat, I add to this list, and
the latest one is T bags! Don't leave T bags where a cat can get
to them, because I've just heard of one swallowing the bag bit where it
lodged in the stomach and needed an operation to get it out again.
It was only quick thinking by the breeder, when the kitten owner phoned
to say the cat was ill, that saved the cat's life, because he was rushed
in for an emergency operation and was then OK. Could have been an
expensive cup of tea! Vertical
blinds can be dangerous for cats and kittens - they can get caught in
the chains at the bottom of the blinds and the cords at the sides.
We've removed the chains at the bottom of some of ours and we tie the
cords up where the cats can't get to them to prevent them getting caught
up and strangling themselves. Please never put a collar on your
cat. They might look very
cute, but Abyssinians are active cats that are very likely to get a
collar caught on anything such as door knobs, handles etc. and a collar
could end up killing your cat. This
is particularly likely if there is more than one cat in your household
– they play together and it would be easy for one to get caught in the
other’s collar.
Your
kitten will have been vaccinated for flu and enteritis and leukemia.
You will be given the certificate for vaccination and a booster will be
required annually. He will be registered with the GCCF. He
will be insured with PetPlan for the first six weeks, and they will then
give you the option of continuing the insurance with them. We
suggest you do this. You never know if there could be some sort of
accident etc. when you would be grateful to have continued the
insurance, even if it's not likely.
He/She
should be neutered by about the age of 4 months - you should consult
your vet about this and we suggest you take your kitten for a visit to
your vet within a couple of days of collecting him from us, which will
introduce him to your vet. We suggest when you take a cat to the
vets you don't put the carrier on the floor - you never know what
infections the cats could pick up via the carrier, and if you might have
to wait in a waiting room where there could be other cats with possibly
infectious diseases, take a towel to cover the carrier, and act as a
barrier between the other cats and yours.
Please
never give your kitten any food with bones in (i.e. fish or chicken with
bones). They will enjoy the odd meal of chicken breast, but since
manufactured cat food is especially made for cats and better balanced,
chicken breast/fish should not be fed for more than a quarter of their
daily diet. The drinking bowl should always have fresh water in,
and should be thoroughly washed and dried twice a day. Some people
clean their litter trays less frequently, but we do ours every day,
scrubbing them with neat bleach, rinsing well and then drying.
If you choose to use something else to wash the trays in please make
sure that you don't use a product that goes cloudy in water - this means
that it contains phenols, which is poisonous to cats. You can buy
products in the supermarket or pet shops that are suitable for using as
cleaners/disinfectants for cats. We
use Parvofresh (or Trigene) for many jobs in the home, and this can also
be used safely for litter trays. If
you want to order some, then contact Propack, on 01482 654976. This works out incredibly cheaper than what you buy in pet
shops, and we’ve found it to be an excellent product. Cats
don't like using dirty trays and this is the most common reason for cats
choosing not to use them. Our kittens are excellent with their toilet
training here and we rarely get accidents
at all, so I would expect that once they know where the tray is in their
new home then they shouldn't have accidents there. But on
occasions, if the cat is worried about something or some other odd
reason they may have the occasional accident. If this happens then
please contact me and I will help.
Kittens
love to play and will enjoy some toys, but please make sure these are
safe - avoid leaving them unsupervised with anything with cords,
threads, elastic, sponge that they can chew pieces off of, or Christmas
decorations etc. Ping-pong balls are a big hit with kittens and
are very safe, and there are a lot of other safe toys as well.
Your kitten will be used to using a scratch post - it is a good idea to
have at least one in your home. He will be used to a soft cosy bed
- we use the 'Vetbed' type of fleece bedding (available from pet shops)
in a plastic basket. Kittens should not be left without heat in
the winter. If you don’t
have heating you can leave on overnight, we would recommend the use of a
snugglesafe microwaveable heat pad – these are obtainable from: http://www.purrsonaltouch.com/fslibrary2a2.htm
- You’ll need to purchase the pad and a cover that fits well over it
(so the kittens can’t get in contact with the warm pad) from them, but
you heat it last thing at night and it will hold it’s heat for quite a
few hours. Or you can buy
an electric heatpad that will hold it’s heat continually.
These only cost pence a week to run.
Some
houseplants are poisonous to cats - if you are in doubt about any plants
you have, please take a leaf (or the whole plant if it's small) to your
nearest garden centre - they should be able to tell you if what you have
could be a danger. There is a list of plants, etc. poisonous to
cats on our site. Cut flowers too, can be lethal, especially
lilies, so avoid having those in places where your cat can chew them.
In the unlikely event that your cat is stung by a wasp or bee,
you can give half a Piriton tablet to an adult cat (less for a younger
cat) and put vinegar on a wasp sting or bicarbonate of soda on a bee
sting (as well as getting the bee sting out) and take them to a vet, but
if the sting is anywhere near the nose or mouth or IN the nose or mouth
the cat should be rushed to a vet very urgently - their airways can
swell immediately, leaving them unable to breathe.
We
are currently looking into getting kittens vaccinated for Bordatella.
This disease seems to be increasing in the UK, although not very common
in most areas at the moment, but at the present time, because we don't
want to be overloading the kittens with all the vaccines at once, we've
decided not to get them done, but we suggest kitten owners talk to their
vets about this issue, and if they want to get the kittens covered, then
leave it a couple of weeks after they've gone to their new homes, and
then get it done. It's an intranasal vaccine - just squirted up
their nose, so it's not a big thing to have done, and it's around £10.
If you are considering putting your cat into a cattery at any time then
it would be worth covering them for Bordatella.
Or if you have a
dog, then it’s worth making sure the dog is always covered for
Bordatella (Kennel Cough).
Just
a couple of tips you might find useful:-))) We have a few ornaments that
are of sentimental value to us - we stick these to the surfaces they are
on with 'Blue Tack' - this stops cats knocking them off:-))) If you
have lever type handles on doors and don't want your cat to open a door,
say overnight, tie a piece of ribbon or fabric tape to the handle on the
inside of the door, bring it up and over the door, and tie to the handle
outside - this stops them jumping on the handle and opening the door.
If
you should ever need to re-home the cat/kitten, for any reason, please
contact us before doing anything and we will do our best to find the
kitten a loving home for you, and will pass on to you any payment that
we get for the kitten/cat. If
the cat should ever become seriously ill, we ask that you inform us
immediately and consult us before any extreme action is taken by a vet.
As
you will already know from speaking to us, our cats are very precious to
us, and so are their kittens and we do everything to make sure that they
will have a long happy healthy life with you, their new owner. If
there is ever, at any time during their life, anything that we can help
with, then please feel free to contact us. We look forward to
hearing from you from time to time, to hear how the kitten is getting
on, and photos are always gratefully received. Have a wonderful time
with your new kitten.
We would be very grateful if you could phone or e-mail the day
you collect your kitten and again the following day, to reassure us that
all is well. ChrisChris
and Derek,
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