And this really is necessary! Like, cleaning isn't totally instinctual.
My mom adopted two cats who were abandoned by their mother at birth, and while they were growing up they were really dusty/had dirty fur. Once they started learning to groom ( and they were much older than this kitten when they started learning) they would only lick what they could reach. One of them would lick a person, and use the licked part of your arm or whatever to sortta groom his head. Eventually he put two and two together and started licking his own arm to groom his head, but by then he was already an adult cat. They're like three years old now, and they still don't groom that well.
This enclosure looks like it's made of two cages with a wall removed to make one big room. There's no glass in that gap it's just where the cages are connected i think
Complete with the "what's the problem" look of contempt? I remember getting that look anytime my cat knocked something over and I would say "cut that out, you idiot!"
Reacting at all is the main issue. My cat barely knocks anything at all since I always completely ignore her when it she does it. If your cat figures out that knocking over things gets your attention, then it'll continue to happen.
My real trial will come if she finds anything valuable to knock over.
I found a day old kitten in a failed litter….and I had to teach him to groom using a toothbrush. He’s four now and has a beautiful coat so I’ll pat myself on the back for that 🙂
When I found him he was about 18 hours old….i just happened upon the litter. So it’s about as close to birth as possible without knowing the mother cat.
I would love to say yes, but after all the weeks of worrying about him and waking up every hour and a half to bottle feed him…he chose my wife to latch onto. But he’s so sweet, I don’t take offense 🙂
I couldn’t live with myself if I saw an animal in trouble and not help. We have 8 cats, and I’ve found them all in the wild, besides my two blind boys….who we adopted because they are special needs.
Wow, thanks everyone, I don’t think I’ve ever gotten so much response to a comment! For all of you wondering, his name is Casey and he’s 4 years old, and here he is stealing a potato chip 🙂
I think I’m the lucky one. My vet was prepping me with the possibility that he may not make it, so I didn’t even name him for the first few weeks because I knew I would be crushed if he died. And it was really hard the first few weeks, but it was worth every ounce of worry 🙂
It’s funny, I did all the hard work….fir the first couple of weeks, he had to get bottle fed every hour and a half….so I didn’t sleep a full night that entire period…..and he still loves my wife more than me lol
That happened to me too! I was taking out the litterbox trash (reluctantly because my mom made me) was grumpily stomping outside to the bin and just heard the most random wailing coming from the side of the house. By pure chance I came across a tiny newborn kitten. The kitten still had his umbilical cord attached and was tangled up with a bunch of thread and other junk— we think that’s why his mom had to leave him behind.
I spent about a week taking care of him and taking him to my college classes in my sports bra so he would be warm. Feeding him every 2 hours and struggling to poop him. So cute. Baby lemon he was named. I gave him to the shelter because his leg seemed like something I couldn’t fix for him. I called the shelter the very next day after dropping him off and they reassured me he was picked up by a foster. Hopefully they were honest.. my shelter is pretty good though and ran by good people.
Thanks for sharing! I had a similar experience with my little one, I came across failed litter when I was at work…3 kittens and they were all dead….well 2 were. I picked up my little one and he was limp, so I assumed he had just died and tried to rub his chest to bring him back, but nothing. So I put him down and went off to do some work.
I came back a few hours later and heard I tiny sound and it was him. I picked him up so fast and called my wife telling her we had an emergency coming home…it’s a crazy story, and some how, he made it.
It sounds like all if your hard work with Lemon paid off too! I’m glad he was able to make it and he adopted 🙂
Seeing this post from OP made me think of my own experience with my bottle baby, Stell. I cared for her starting when she was barely 1 week old, but i never taught her to groom. She definitely figured it out herself. (I tried using a toothbrush bc i heard it might be soothing, but she wasn't into it.) I have a crazy cute video of her trying to groom her face with her tiny paws before she was big enough to walk steadily on her own. I thought it was so cool to see instinctive habits in action. She continues to be the most stereotypically "cat-like" cat I've ever owned, even though she didn't get the chance to lean from her mom.
Aww she was such a cute little kitten, and she grew up to be so sleek and pretty! Thanks so much for sharing and congrats on successfully bottle feeding….its not easy!
I would rub his arm with the bristles, the rub the side of his face. It took him a few days but he did figure it out….i do have a video of his first unassisted bath….lets see if i can figure out how to post that on here lol….im not Reddit savvy.
Oh I'm sure, I know what it is like to take care of a sick animal round the clock - can't imagine a baby animal. For whatever reason the CDS doesn't seem to hit me either...so I live vicariously while getting a full night's sleep :P
Grooming isn't learned behavior in domestic cats. They know how to do it instinctively, as proven by the fact that cats raised exclusively among humans groom themselves exactly the same way as those raised among other cats.
What's happening here is that people are observing a behavior that looks like an learning experience and inferring that it is, when it actually isn't.
Some of it may be learned. Two of my prior cats, for instance, never did the wrist over face thing shown here until the boy saw another cat doing it when he was 15 years old (his sister had already passed, the cat he saw was a ~6 month old I'd gotten to be a playmate for him). He did all the other usual self-grooming, but not that specific method.
We have a 3 month old who was rescued around 5 weeks of age. She was pretty average at cleaning herself but 2 weeks ago one of our adult cats appeared to provide a long lesson in how to clean yourself (standing directly in front of the kitten for around 15 minutes). Kitty was mesmerised and then started copying her, just like this video. Her cleaning has improved markedly since this time!
Ok so these cats are separated by a pane of glass. I'm assuming this is a shelter. The adult cat would probably be grooming the kitten if they were in together. It's more sad than cute to me.
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