Stray mom and kittens in dire straits. Please help!
Posted Jun 20, 2022, 8:31 PM UTC
548
This stray cat is at a friends house. She's extremely young and malnourished. She just had a litter of kittens and they really need help. Can someone offer tips for getting traps (need to be free), luring tips, and local agencies that can assist in adoption? Any help is greatly appreciated. I don't want them to get hit by a car or something tragic.
6
First thing to do is make sure the mother has plenty of food and water and a safe shaded/cool space during this heat wave. A cheap bowl with cool tap water and a bag of cheap dry cat food from a local grocery store is perfectly fine, maybe a couple cheap cans of Friskies wet food if the kittens are a bit older. After that, reach out to one of the agencies, resources, or individuals that people have linked. Young kittens are good candidates for foster homes and adoption.
But you will need to put in some effort to get a local option involved, there are lots of stray kittens every summer and limited resources available. You are this animal's best advocate right now.
1
The Oakland aspca should be able to help you with traps and low cost spay / neuter
6
I needed help trapping some kittens and the lovely @ericalikescats on IG was nice enough to come by and help. If you want to try trapping them yourself, I believe Feral Change in Richmond lends humane traps for a refundable deposit. Also, you might wanna try posting on Nextdoor. Many people are willing to come out and trap or lend you their own traps.
3
You may have to do some legwork as many orgs are volunteer based and overwhelmed during kitten season.
The EB SPCA has a resources page: https://eastbayspca.org/get-involved/community-resources/feral-cats/.
Also you could try ICRA https://icraeastbay.org/ (Edited to fix link)
2
Best thing to do is feed the mama cat so she can nurse her kittens. If your friend has confined the mother (it's not clear what "at a friend's house" means) she won't be able to nurse her kittens.
Feeding a feral cat is easy, just leave the cat food in her presence, then go away because she'll be afraid to eat while you're there. If you give her wet food, you won't need to give her water separately.
I would offer her water regardless of wet food. While it offers some moisture it is not sufficient for a cat to survive.
My friend cannot afford to care for the cats. That's just not an option.