So relieved to have found this site.
Found a tiny wee black kitten in garden on Sunday day after fireworks in village. I've had brillant help from our local cat rescue and have managed to trap it. Its currently in the garage in a puppy pen with all comforts.

I feel I have upset it more as have handled it for 1st time today and had to use deflea spray. Naturally its even more frightened of me - hisses and spits like mad. I know I need to bring it in to the house but didnt want to bring in fleas too!

My question is, should I leave it to settle for a couple of days by not attempting to offer it food by hand, just to go in several times a day put in food , talk to it , clean it out etc?

Any advice appreciated.

I have had a semi-feral before and it took a lot of work getting her used to us.

I found that I just had to patient. To start with I just had her shut in one room where she felt safe and I would go into that room for about 10 minutes at a time throughout the day and just sit there with her. I made sure that I was the one that fed her and cleaned out the litter tray and gradually, she would let me stroke her and get closer to her.

She would suffer terrible setbacks though like when we took her to the vets for her spay, she turned wild for a good month or so.

Sounds like you have done a really good thing by taking her in and I hope it goes well

Lou
X

Put in a box with a hole in so she can hide from you, it will make her feel alot safer.Don't try to hold her just feed her and change her litter and stuff talk to her the whole time so she gets used to your voice though and just sit there near to her cage but not to close.

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aw! sweet of you to look after this kitten. if you can get a cat carrier and fill it with a blanket and some catnip toys then place it in the area the kitten is in. see if the kitten finds refuge there and becomes comfortable. give it a few days of just going in with the kitten and just sitting and reading or listening to music. when you come in bring in something like a treat or food. so you will be associated with nice good things. eventually you will need to get the kitten to the vets but this will most likely take time. with the flea spray if you are using Frontline spray you can spray it on a brush and comb the kitten instead of spraying directly. just make sure you brush back towards the head and then back down towards the tail so it reaches the skin. the best thing to remember is patience. All the best and i'm sure many people will be along to give you other ideas as well.

Any idea how old it is? I had this once, found a kitten in the garden that as far as I could work out was about four weeks old had to be syringe fed for a few days. She was a snarling hissing little monster at first but that didn't last very long at all - after all she was very young - but there was a sort of hangover of her behaviour in that she took to biting. Fortunately the person who adopted her was very patient and before long she turned into a lovely cat.

Liz

We've got two kittens that were living in a garden and were pretty wild when we took them on. We've had then for coming up to five weeks now and they've come on miles.
We decided to keep them close to us so that they got used to humans, so we bought them in straight away and kept them in the living room so that they would get used to the noise of us moving around and our voices. We kept the cat carrier open with a towel in so that they could retreat there if they needed to and we made sure that they saw us putting food down, close to their carrier when they needed feeding. Obviously we couldn't get close enough to put flea stuff on their coat, so I managed to find a tablet that de fleas. I ground it up and put it in their food and also wormed them this way.
For the first week or so they hid from us constantly, especially under the sofa and if we looked under the sofa at them, they would go nuts and hiss. I think they eventually decided that under the sofa was their safe place, cos they would pretty much stay there when we were in the room and only come out for food.
After about a week, we managed to get them to play with toys with us, particularly one's on sticks as it meant out hands weren't really near them. We carried on with this and feeding them and after about a week, we started sitting close to where they were eating and stroking them every now and then when they were distracted by food. When we were playing, we would also stay close to the floor so that we didn't appear too big to them and scare them. We also managed to trick them into jumping on our legs/tummy with toys.
After about two weeks of this gradual interaction, we started to put food on our laps, so that they were forced to come to us to eat. We also started to feed them out of our hands so that they would get used to our smell and begin to trust us. I found that they went nuts for cheap chicken paste (make sure there are no onions in it though). They started to eat this out of our hands and lick our fingers.
When they started to eat out of our laps, we found that we could gently stroke and groom them and that they didn't mind too much. They also started to get less weary of us and would come closer to play. While they were playing we kept gently stroking them and then stopping so that they weren't quite sure if we had done this or not.
We carried on doing this for about four weeks, and now finally, they are less scared of us. We can get closer to them when they are lying on a cusion or the floor and manage to stroke them and make them purr. We've even started to pick them up and put them on our laps to pet them there, and they'll stay for a bit, although they might have to be bribed there with a toy.
They still have good and bad days, for example I think I pushed one a bit too much yesterday as I picked him up and carried him a short distance. He was a bit skittish this morning and ran away from my hands when I fed him, but I know that if I take something too far and they react like that, I just need to back off and leave him for a little bit and that he'll come round again in a day or so.
I took them to the vet on monday and thought they would hate me forever as they wouldn't come near me for the rest of the day, but by tuesday mid morning they were happy enough and one kept coming over to lie next to me where I could stroke him.
I hope this helps!! We're still progressing with our kittens, so happy to help in anyway as it can be hard work and feel quite disheartening sometimes.

Youv'e all been marvelous, thanks so much!

I've put radio 4 on for it as hopefully the talking will help. put an extra blanket in box today and with my hand under it mangaged to touch it it didn't protest at all, so I'm pleased at that small inroad.

Well done on rescue this kitten - all your hard work will pay off i'm sure. My very first cat when i was about 8 was a feral (i found it living wild i the chicken shed eating the feed), I grabbed it and brought it in to the house, she scratched my arms to pieces that day! She was always a little shy around strangers but gradually after loved grew to love us all. She lived to be 17 and a half! We basically ignored her for the first few days, just sat in the same room with her and let her come to us, then we started with toys and soon she came around. Good luck, with this one, i'm sure you will do well.

Thanks for your encouragement. Even further progress today as after a session of hand feeding - fresh cooked chicken - it allowed me to touch and caress it all over! I put a feathery toy over its face first and then it didn't see my other hand coming. It puured its head off and I nearly cried. I think its a girl and have named her POPPY has she was caught on Poppy day.