I just had to share this...honestly, I am still kinda shocked by the whole thing!
On of our feral barn cats had two kittens in the hay and while we were doing grading work with noisy machinery yesterday and today, she must have been disturbed and carried one of the kittens off, leaving the other behind. I left it alone, hoping she would come back for it, but it screamed all day, obviously hungry, so tonight, I got the craziest idea....
A stretch I know as the only two options were for her to feed the kitten or eat the kitten, but it was going to die anyway, so I had to try. She only has one HUGE three week old puppy, so there's more than enough milk. She never hesitated, took the kitten right away and now gets very worried if I even pick it up. She cleans and feeds it just like it's hers! The kitten was slow to suck, but finally caught on....Bella worried herself to death over it because it screamed the whole time it was trying to figure out how to suck. She is such a good mama...and this is her first "litter!"
My only concern is whether or not the puppy will grow up with a complex from being raised with a kitten for a sibling....or maybe the kitten will want to be a "Schutzhund cat" when it's grown! ;)
No the pup will not have a complex, Myah my GS raised a newborn kitten and at the time she had 7 pups Nooknook the cat grew into a beautifull LC boy and actually thinks he is a dog, when I work my dogs he works with us. Nooknook was put on my porch in a shoebox as a newborn, I am not a Catperson did not know what to do so I put it with Myah and her newborn pups this was 2 years ago. he is now neutered and has been part of our family.
If I would know how to put pic's on here I would share what he grew into.
We had a similar situation with my Tasha's first litter of seven puppies. While Tasha was pregnant our family cat was also pregnant and the dog and cat were buddies. The cat was an outdoor mouser "a working line feline" and had the kittens one day but we never found them and assumed they died as the cat was always around the house. A couple days AFTER Tasha our german shepherd gave birth to HER litter, the CAT showed up with this near dead little orange striped kitty, it weighed only a few ounces, she then showed up with another sad looking gray stripe the next day. She clearly was not feeding them but brought them to us/Tasha for a reason. Like you I knew that the kittens would be dead if I did not intervene. I put the kittens to Tasha and she was so sweet and they began to nurse. We had to hold them up since they were so small but they did nurse.
The newspaper and Television crew came out and filmed the "family" because it was so unusual- quite a site 7 big pups and these two tiny kitties. Unfortunately the little grey girl only lived a week and died inbetween Tasha's paws one morning. But Garfield thrived and became part of the litter. He was so tiny compared to them but FOUGHT with the Much larger pups for his place at the nipple just like one of the pups- a real survivor! He breaks in all the new pups and adults to proper cat/dog behaviour!
The real miracle of this story however was the mother cat. She really was not acting like herself during this whole time and I took her to the vet - he diagnosed her with a terminal disease and we had to put her to sleep. So she KNEW the only way to save HER kittens was to bring them to her buddy Tasha the dog to feed and nuture. It gives me chills when I remember and realize the bond between them and how she instinctively knew that was what she had to do. Wow.
I wish I could post the story or news interview but it has been 5 years and it is not archived any longer. The other photos I have are all on disc somewhere. The photo above is when Garfield was about 5 or so. He thinks he is just one of the pack and went on hikes, splet andate with the dogs and everything.
Neat story Rocking Ranch Coincidentally the above photo was Garfield with OUR "single pup" litter , a little female we named Solo!
to both "ranchers" - great stories and pics! just what i needed before i go back to scraping my bathroom floor of old tile gunk. then i get to put up venetian plaster! o boy...
rockinrkranch, keep posting on the teeniest little "gsd" i've ever seen :)
Rockinrkranch, I've had puppies and kittens together (but never nursing since I don't breed) and the cats usually grow up to think they are dogs. Doesn't seem to work the other way around. You may have a "schutzkatze" on your hands. Cute picture. I want to send it to a vet friend. OK?
Great picture. I had a Border Collie that had 2 kittens for "siblings". The bitch had 7 puppies and also 2 kittens. It was so cute to see the pictures of them. All of the puppies and both kittens were black and white. You had to look hard to tell which were the kittens.
Awesome photos. Last year our 12 year old cat died. He was very close with our GSDs and they acted depressed. We got a 5 month old russian blue male from animal rescue and our GSDs immediately accepted him. Our alpha female licks him all over once a day and has tried to nurse him many times. She interferes if we try to correct the cat for some of his antics like knocking things off of tables just to get a reaction from us. She thinks her boy can do no wrong. If the cat starts doing something he knows is off limits, she immediately comes over and sits in front of us. If we tell the cat no she pushed her head against us and whines. The cat has become very aggressive like mama GSD and imitates her every move. When folks come to the door or we have visitors the cat runs to the door with the GSDs to see who it is. The cat constantly plays with the GSDs and acts like he thinks he is a GSD. The cat has no fear of our GSDs and hangs with them all day. And the GSDs absolutely love our cat. We are often amazed at the awesome character and capacity to love that GSDs have and how they gety attached to poeple and other pets. They are a great blessing.
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