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Old 29-08-2008, 11:53 AM
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Re: New to site - Cat pregnancy/birth advice required

Hello and Welcome G-700Girl - how exciting - a new queen. Well I think you have lots of advice but to fill in any gaps and here I cross my fingers and hope that I have not missed that someone has already posted this ... the key things to look out for if you do not have a date as such, might be these:

1 Normal gestation is between 63 and 68 days but as Kim says, queens do behave differently and you can never rely on a textbook delivery. My own queens have typically delivered on days 66 to 70. For guidance, expect babies around day 65, plus or minus a couple of days.
2 nipples start to become pink at around 21 days
3 tummy begins to swell with growing babies and appetite increases at around four weeks
5 at 7 weeks you may be able to see tiny movements in queens tummy, queens likes to eat well and sleeps more
6 at 8 weeks you definitely should be able to see some movements and queen tends to eat more frequently but smaller amounts - she will also be showing nesting behavour, finding nooks and digging around, treading fabrics to form a bed, trying to find hidy-holes.
7 at nine weeks she might be more sedentary and perhaps a little more clingy.

Sometimes a queen will refuse food the day before the birth but some queens tend to eat normally. Just before the birth you will see a slight colourless discharge. Birth can be expected around 24 hrs afterwards.

Breeders tend to allow for kitten watch over a period of several days.

Regarding your question about how to know if there are any more kittens, well the trick is, if you are inexperienced, mostly trust your queen, she will make it clear when she is "done". All you need to do, as Kim explained, is to make sure that you have (or have seen - some queens will eat an afterbirth) the same number of afterbirths as kittens. The queen will be happily licking her kittens and lying back for them to suckle or cleaning herself up etc.

Experienced breeders or some vets will be able to palpate the tummy to feel for any kittens still inside if necessary. Cross that bridge when you come to it. My guess at the moment is that your daughters queen will be so natural that she will make it plain when she has completed delivery of all her kittens.
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