John and I are suckers for an animal that needs a home. Honestly you name it we have taken them in. From hamsters to horses. Swans to hedgehogs, geese chasing cars down the center of the road, as the owner had been taken into hospital and they wanted food. Three goats locked in a barn and the same sort of thing happening to them, sadly one died. Hamsters that we were told were all girls and I had the biggest shock of my life, when I went to clean them out and found this pile of embryonic wiggly things in the corner. Honestly I jumped. I have no idea what they were. To top it of another one gave birth and we ended up with 23 to get rid of. As I say suckers or very naive.
Then this summer one of the feral cats gave birth. Her first time so she just had them all over the place. ( Yes we can not help ourselves John feeds them ) anyway she had one under the caravan one in the field. Both dead and then Sammy one of the border collies walked across the yard, as we sat out side eating dinner. I knew he was up to something. As far as he was concerned, he had found a new squeaky toy.
I walked over and said Ok, what, you got, give it here. The tinniest kitten just born. Not harmed at all bless him. A helper we had here said ohhhhhh you can't let it die. So John went in and got a syringe and started to feed it goats milk. Then out came the heat lamp and a box and it was set up in the kitchen.
To be honest I have to say I was oh hell not again. I was not impressed because as normal it would end up falling to me to look after it. The problem is with any baby animal, people think Ohhhhh how sweet. They forget that with out the mother some one has to feed it. Baby animals of any sort are full on. Morning, noon and NIGHT and when I say night, this little thing was a 24 hour a day task, for weeks and cry. He would keep the hole house awake crying until you turned up. After a while we got so sick of this the box was brought in to the bedroom. At first that was fine until he worked out how to get out. Then it was up on the bed in between the pair of us. You then worried that if you turned in the night it would be a little bit swigged kitten. He has since worked out that the best place to sleep is at the top of my head or better still on my face at 4 am.
After about 8 weeks and by this time I was getting worried, because he had slowed right down with growing. I went out and got some kitten food and pushed it in his mouth. when we had tried before he was just not interested. At long last he started to eat a little bit.
He really struggled at first and his little tummy swelled up. When you held him he was just like a pear and why he got called little bit, fat belly. This has stuck and it's now LB. His bowels really struggled with solids and for a while he needed all the help he could get, not pleasant. By the way kittens when first born have to be helped to pee as well and why the mother licks them all the time.
Any way he is now nearly six months old, lives in side totally although the last few days he has started to follow me out of the house. Watching him is a full time task. The first time he saw a duck was hilarious as he walked over to the duck all bold and it went to check him out with it's beak. Like any small child it was run to Mum and he dose think I am Mum. If I go out he will stand at the door and cry, I am told. He follows me from one room to the next. If he has not totally warn himself out after making sure EVERYTHING is on the floor from ware ever it was. Or chasing Moomoo our other cat who at first was not impressed about some one taking over what she thought was her home. However she can well and truly put him in his place
Yesterday he was running around going mad with her and in the end she was tiered of him. At one point she gave him a swipe of her paw, just leaving me alone was very clearly being said. The funniest thing was when a crate fell on top of him, that had been leaning up to go out. Moomoo just promptly got on top of the crate and lay there. Classic, you have to love him
Have a great week love and blessings to you all Karen xxx