The Cat's Pregnancy

PREGNANCY AND CAT BIRTH PATHOLOGY

It seems surprising that in most cases conception, bearing, birth, upbringing and maturation is aimed at starting all over again and continuing the birth.

But at each of these stages, something unexpected can happen and the kitten may not live to be an adult. This is one reason why a cat usually has multiple offspring and many pregnancies during the mating season, except in winter when kittens have little chance of surviving.

Failure to conceive or give birth to enviable kittens can be for many reasons, such as an unbalanced diet before or during pregnancy, physical defect of the genitals, stress, poisoning, hormonal failure, poor fetal formation, body dysfunction - just to name a few of the reasons for reproductive failure.

Different infections also prevent normal reproduction. The cause of miscarriage or death of newborn kittens can be toxoplasmosis panleicopenia, viral rhinotracheitis, which should be vaccinated against Viral leukaemia and infectious peritonitis in cats affect many organs, including the reproductive system. So if you want to have healthy kittens, keep your kittens clean, provide them with good nutrition and good bridging conditions, and give them all the vaccinations and anti-glysis prophylaxis they need. 

PATERNITY IN CATS

Cats are considered good fathers if their breeding success is higher than their cost. A positive assessment of them as producers is determined by the number of pregnancies in cats rather than the number of kittens brought up.

Most cats, with few exceptions, do not stay with the cat, do not participate in the education of their offspring and do not distinguish their kittens from others.

In the wild, cats can kill their newborn babies when they meet a cat and kittens. As a cat will soon start to flow again after giving birth, an aggressor cat can become a father again.

A friend of mine told me about the trauma she suffered as a child. When she was six years old (and now she is sixty), her beloved cat gave birth to kittens on a cold snowy March afternoon and carried them to a wicker basket in the barn. One morning, the girl looked there and found the kittens dead, with their throats torn apart. According to her father, the cat did it. The woman still can't forget what she's been through and has a tooth for the entire cat tribe that treats her offspring this way.

I have never heard of kittens born in March, but I think that a stray cat in search of a partner could go to kill kittens to have sex with a cat.

I think someone might say it's a natural survival path for the most aggressive and strongest cats and cats. However, I recommend keeping the cat in a safe place during feeding, away from such strange cats is, by the way, another argument in favor of neutering stray cats.

SENSE OF MOTHERHOOD IN CATS

It's interesting that a cat with an acute sense of motherhood in the first week after giving birth can accept a completely different breed of kitten - bring a kitten to its muzzle with the back of its body and if it has started to lick it, it has.

A new kitten should not be carried with her head as this can cause aggressive behavior on the part of the cat. A cat will accept other people's kittens if they are less than a week old or if they are at the age when they should be weaned.

If two or more cats who give birth at about the same time are in the vicinity with their broods then they can take turns taking care of all kittens. A more cheeky cat may try to take kittens away from more timid cats.

The relationship that develops between mother and offspring in the raising process determines how the cat recognizes its kittens. But if you take your kittens from her after birth and raise them separately then she will usually not recognize them. Recognition is a good reason and a guarantee that helpless kittens will not be lost. The relationship between a cat and kittens in the first week after delivery is based on licking and feeding, which stimulates all maternal senses - vision, hearing, smell; in fact, she will recognize her kittens by tasting their urine and faces.

According to preliminary data, within three days after delivery, women have an increase in the number of hormones associated with motherhood (estrogen, protactinium, steroid-rich) and, as a result, women in labor have the ability to identify their children accurately by their smell and voice.

In one experiment, several blind women were asked to detect their newborn babies by touch and touch. 70 per cent of mothers correctly identified their babies, which was almost twice the expected result by mere chance and luck. Many women said that they identified their babies by the temperature of their pens and skin. In other cases, when women identified their children by the smell of the pens, the recognition rate was even higher.

The more time a mother spends with her child, the more likely she is to succeed.

Young mothers can easily recognize the voice and shout of their baby, distinguishing it from others.

It was found that in the brain of rat mothers changes at a microscopic level, which is due to the hormones that are produced during pregnancy and after childbirth. Interestingly, such changes are reversible and completely disappear with the cessation of breastfeeding.

The main ability of all females - taking care of their offspring is necessarily associated with elements of learning. Monkeys who did not receive maternal attention at an early stage of their development, often abandoned their children born after the first pregnancy. However, if pregnancy occurred a second or third time, they overcame the rejection of their own children, and all their normal maternal instincts were restored.

Apparently, the very nature of the woman and the animal-female desire to become a mother. If, for some reason, they abandon their offspring, then great effort and incredible patience are needed to bring them back to the path of motherhood.

MATERNAL CANNIBALISM

Cases of cannibalism are quite rare and occur when the offspring are too numerous or there are sick, weak or ugly newborns.

In the wild, cannibalism on the part of the mother is caused by the desire to help the healthy part of the offspring survive: when there is not enough food and the number of hungry mouths is large, a decrease in the number of eaters increases the chance of survival of the healthiest offspring. Eating your own kittens reduces the need to leave the nest for hunting. Destroying sick kittens reduces the chances of others getting sick.

Why do cats eat kittens ?

Eating kittens with any defects before they die serves as a food source and prevents scavenger-eating animals from attacking.

Oddly enough, cannibalism also exists in domestic cats who do not suffer from food shortages. About 12 per cent of newborn kittens who feed on their mother's milk die for this reason. The more nervous a cat is, the more likely it is that it will become cannibalism. Stress from crowding, excessive noise, malnutrition and frequent visitors can scare the cat and it can simply eat them in an effort to protect kittens.

Eliminating the source of stress, good nutrition and tranquilizers can have a beneficial effect on a cat.