The complications during the post-natal period
Post-natal bleeding (haemorrhage)
Vagina haemorrhage after light delivery is not typical. It more often occurs during the complicated delivery affected by rupture of delivery ways. The hold-up of the fetus or placenta can provoke the haemorrhage. In rare cases it’s connected with sub involution of uterus (insufficient reverse of its development after delivery). Your vet will solve all your problems after cat’s examining.
Sharp haemorrhage can provoke shock or even death. If more than 10 minutes there is red blood haemorrhage call your vet immediately. You should not confuse vagina haemorrhage with reddish or dark-green delivery secretions which last for some days (up to three weeks).
Mother cats which don’t take care or offend their kittens
The relations between mother-cat and its kitten begin at once after its birth. Mother-cats teach themselves to recognize and take care about kittens, lick and feed them.
Sometimes this connection is not so firm, especially if the kittens were born by Caesarean section. Rarely it occurs if some kittens were born before the operation and in the case when they were put to the nipples before the cat’s awakening.
First-born female doesn’t often pay attention to the kittens some first hours after their birth. It’s not strange. With a little help you can teach her to feed the kittens and carefully walk around them (not to step on them).
Psycho-emotional disorder of your cat can be forced by noise and fuss around her, or when her kittens are taken by children or strangers. All these facts can influence badly mother’s instinct of your pet. That’s why some hours after the births you should protect your pet from curious glances, especially when your cat is irritated and doesn’t want to be with people.
Spoilt pet doesn’t take care of their babies, they prefer master’s communication.
Sometimes the first 24 hours the mother-cat hasn’t got milk because of hormonal disbalance. At this time the cat can renounce the kittens. Oxytocin and some other hormones effect the lactation, as soon as milk appears the cat will take the kittens.
Other reasons effect mother-cat enmity are related to after-birth infections and complications such as milk fever, mastitis and sharp metritis. If it’s connected with cat’s illness, the kittens are fed artificially, and the mother-cat is cured.
Hypothermia kitten (with low temperature), sick or weak kitten is thrown out of the nest by the cat. It’s the law of nature.
When the kittens are four days old, mother-cat can take them to the other nest. It’s a very ancient instinct. Mother takes the kittens from the old nest to cover the tracks and trick the predator. If the chosen place isn’t good for the kittens you should take them back to the box. Be near your cat, talk to her tenderly till she will be calm in her old place. Don’t frighten and irritate your cat when she carries the kitten, otherwise she can tight her teeth and hurt the baby. You can avoid carrying out the kittens, if mother-cat will be familiar to the box for having kittens and sleep in it.
Cannibalism is violation of mother’s instinct, when cat eats her babies, especially first-born. It’s typical for nursery cat. As a rule the cat eats placenta and dead-born kittens. The cat can eat the kitten together with placenta by accident or hurt it cutting the umbilical cord especially if the kitten has got a big umbilical hernia. In some cases the cat can eat weak kitten or kitten with the defect of development. In other cases nervous, aggressive cat defending kittens can hurt them because of feeling of scare, jealousy, anxiety, bitterness or for preserving her own life.
The majority of cases when cat hurt or refuse kittens are connected with psycho-emotional defects of mother-cat. In particular it can be the liability of psyche.
Preventive measures. The box for delivery should be placed in the calm, dark place far from passage-ways and irritations as for the pet feels herself confident and in full security.
If the mother-cat eats her first-birth kitten you should isolate all the kittens which were born later. Put them into dry warm box up to the finishing of the delivery. It’s desirable to put the kittens to their mother during the first 24 hours after the delivery for the kittens get colostrums. If she is still aggressive to her kittens you should isolate them from the cat completely and feed them artificially (or you can put them to another mother-cat).
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