Ive intervened a couple of times,i find it worrying when mums more interested in the noisy kitts that have been born and ignoring the one squirming about in its bag!ive sat there and thought,gotta open bag,no give mum a chance,its a worrying time.Ive never severed cord,but had a couple chewed a bit over enthusiastically by mum.

Actually I wanted to start a good thread on how individual breeders deal with the placentas, cos even after 7 years I think I have stuff to learn...............so come on you guys how do you deal with the mucky stuff!

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I'd open the bag first Clare, get the airways going and then start worrying .........................

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Actually I think this good advice of Raa's should be made into a sticky Mark (somewhere).................

Hi Christine - interesting thread. Like you, I tend to let the dam take care of the first one and observe how she deals with it. If she does well, leaving sufficient cord before the kitten's tummy, I let her do another and so on. The trick is holding back and allowing the queen to do what she would do naturally.

If/when she gets tired, I take on the task of separating kitten from placenta, using my sterile round ended scissors and if these are not immediately to hand, then my fingernails come in useful (having first squeezed the cord to ensure it is closed before separating it).

If, whilst I am observing the queen dealing with the kitten, there is any danger that the dam may bite too close to the kitten, I intervene and make the separation at a place to leave about 2.5 cm or one inch from the kitten's tummy.

My queens usually eat the first two placentas but they don't bother with any others, contenting themselves with nibbling the cord to seperate the baby off the placenta. I sometimes have to take babies aside and rub them dry as the last couple arrive but the queen is usually good and licks each kit down to stimulate it, clear its nostrils and massage its little body into movement.

Any placentas not eaten (all are counted with each kitten birth, as you would expect) are taken away and once all kittens are born, snuggling with mummy etc and clean bedding has been provided, all rubbish and placentas etc are binned.

My particular weakness is to try to 'help' and start doing things. I am learning to leave things be a lot more now that my queen has shown me she can do it. One does learn with each birth what to expect and when to assist if necessary but having said this, each kitten birth is slightly different

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Excellent point Clare - extremely worrying. The first time I saw this, I was torn between which comes first - let mum cat do it or shall I - but obviously, as you can guess, its most important to let the kitten breathe so free the struggling one first, then offer it to mum cat for licks.

For this reason, I tend to separate the mother from her babies after numbers one and two are born (and of course, after the maternal bonding of first licks and cleaning has been done) so that she can concentrate on giving birth to the others. The newborns who are now clean and dry are kept in a separate bed with a hot water bottle or heat pad and a soft flannel to gently lay over them so they are warm, dark and can move about and breathe.

Meanwhile, back at the birthing pool, mum is busy with her labours .... when all babies are present, new clean bedding is given and babies latched on. Sometimes though, the birth can go on for many hours and baby number one may be many hours older than the last baby.

Sometimes my queen takes a break halfway through and I give those who are nice and clean and dry a chance to suckle from mum cat before she continues to give birth to the siblings still inside her. (More clean bedding of course )

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kind regards

Ra
http://www.bobergsiamese.com/

The only thing we differ on there Ra, is the changing bedding. Even though the first one is mucky I would leave it down for kits to get mum's scent and cause least disruption to the birthing and all that. Would maybe change the bed on day two or three depending on how messy. The bubbs initial bonding works on mum's scent so there is nothing like the birthing bed to start that off (if that makes sense?)C.x.

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Not sure there's anything much to add to this.
Mums usually take care of the placenta themselves here. I haven't had one reject them yet. I like to break the cord with my (clean) thumbnail myself - I get paranoid when I see mum chomping on the cord up close to baby's belly.

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Beautiful Bengal Kittens from Dollycats
Beautiful Savannah Kittens from Teardrops Savannahs

Oh but lass! what if your like me with no nails whatsoever just bitten stubs, lol

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Well Chris, I agree with you about the mum's smell being important for the bonding of kittens to mum etc. I did find, though, the most recent birth of kittens was ever so messy and wet and when you have wet bedding, it gets cold and little tiny bodies don't like being cold and wet. They soon bonded with mumcat when she had her babies back in the warm clean bed.

However, the litter before that was different - this was not so messy and I left the bedding in place until the last (6th) kitten was born. She just cuddled them all down the dry end of the kitten nest.

I agree with you about changing the bedding after a few days - not sure if anyone else's queens are like this but I found that my queen starts to worry about moving babies around the house if you leave the nest for too long with the same bedding.

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kind regards

Ra
http://www.bobergsiamese.com/

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SELKCAH NORWEGIAN FOREST CATS