We have four abandoned kittens...can we feed them canned cat food?

Four week old kittens are usually still nursing on the mother but given that the mother is gone, you must of course feed them something.

Most of the time you would have to get replacement formula for the kittens and bottle feed them at this age.

But given that they are eating the canned cat food easily and are eating what you think is enough for them each day - use your own judgment or call a vet - then it should be okay to continue feeding them canned food but see if you can find canned kitten food. It has more fat and, I believe, more protein in it than regular cat food.

I would also add some dry food in a week or two simply to give the kittens the choice of either canned or dry - many older cats eat one or the other or a mixture of both.

As for the fleas, you can try using a flea comb and a bowl or glass of soapy water. You comb the fleas off the kitten and stick the comb in the soapy water and shake off the water and the fleas. You can also draw the wet comb along some paper towels to knock off fleas. The soapy water will suffocate the fleas and kill them.

In a couple of weeks, the kittens may be old enough for you to use something like Frontline, Revolution, or Advantage for fleas.

Do you have a vet you have used before? If not, pick one. Then call the vet and explain about your kittens and see if they have any suggestions or if they think the kittens should be examined.

If the kittens have worms - and most kittens do have worms- they were passed from the mother, not from the food.

If it were me in this situation, I would be planning to take the kittens to the vet in the next few days for a full checkup and to get the vet's advise on how to continue to care for them.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with the canned food if the kittens are ready to eat it. I would buy high quality food like Wellness. Four kittens will eat a lot and Wellness has the extra large cans of food which will be more economical than the 5.5 0z cans.

I don't know where people get the idea that canned pet food which is processed at very high temperatures and put in sterile cans could possibly contain worms! The same goes for pasteurized milk (don't give cow's milk to kittens!).

It can take a lot of elbow grease to keep the fleas off four young kittens - you need to comb each one as much as four times a day. The environment will still be breeding the fleas even with great diligence. Please consult your vet. I believe rescue organizations use one or two drops of the flea medication for a young kitten and you MUST NOT undertake this without a vet's advice as to dosage.

The kittens probably still need milk at 4 weeks. Use KMR or Hartz kitten formula, not cow's milk. The liquid in a can is better than the powder. If they're taking food from a dish, you can give it to them that way, otherwise they'll need to be bottle fed. Canned food is fine and it will not give them worms. The canning process will kill anything that might have been in the meat. You can mix the milk in with the canned food. Taper it off at about six weeks of age. Feed the kittens all they will eat three times a day and keep fresh water available all the time. Canned food is actually much better for cats than dry food, which is essentially meat flavored cereal. Cats don't get any nutrition at all from grain.

As for their fleas, call the vet. She may need to prescribe something gentle enough for kittens.

I had a similar situation with a foster once. I had a mom and her kittens, but the mom got sick and died right around the time the kittens were four weeks old. The vet said to feed them wet food (KITTEN wet food, and yes, high-quality), but he wanted me to mix it with kitten milk so they would take to it better until they got used to it. I don't remember if there was something about them digesting it better or not - been too long. I think he also wanted them to get the nutrients from the kitten milk they should have been getting from mom's milk just a little longer too. In any event, I didn't have to mix it with the milk for very long. The milk can be easily found at pet stores, by the way. It is not the same as milk we drink - not cow's milk. Never give that to a cat. They usually can't tolerate the lactose. But check with the vet. They'll let you know if they feel the kitten milk is necessary at this point.

For the fleas, check with the vet too. If the vet okays flea meds, there will be a specific dose. Flea meds are done by weight. The person who suggested the flea comb is right. It is invaluable as a tool to remove fleas and eggs from the fur. Have your vet explain how often to comb and all that.

Oh, and one more thing. Since they are still so young, how's the litterbox thing going? You might have to play mom and train them on how to use it and where it is. My kittens weren't quite ready for the box when their mom died. She was still licking them to stimulate them to go. One of the bigger kittens actually ended up taking over that particular training duty (no pun intended) - fortunately for me! But they didn't take too much longer to get the hang of things.

The canned food should be fine for now. I a week or so you could try to start offering them a good quality dry food moistened with water.

Flea shampoos are usually only for kittens 12 weeks or older. I would get a regular shampoo that is safe for young kittens and try that for now. There might be some home remedies for fleas that you could try.

No, what your mother-in-law says is false. In fact, cats should be on a canned diet for their whole lives. Many cats end up obese, diabetic, get UTIs or be in kidney failure because of a strictly dry diet. Another myth is that dry food cleans teeth. This is false as well.

I would buy some kitten milk replacer (KMR) at a pet store as kittens often still nurse until 8-10 weeks. These guys are only one month old, so they DEFINITELY need milk for a while.

For fleas, gently comb them with a special flea comb. You should ask your vet for specific flea products due to their young age.

boy, have you got problems. first, these kittens are WAY to young to be orphans. there is so much the mother cat should teach them in the next 6 weeks.

the flea problem is another thing. they are way to young to have regular flea products used on them. ask your vet. or contact manufacturers of medications for such young kittens. they are so easily poisoned doing this. by all means, DO NOT use supermarket flea products. they don't work and can be very hazardous to their health.

do your research, learn all you can about kittens and what kind of food they should be eating. your grandmother is half right about the worms. the fleas will carry tape worm eggs which will infest all the kittens. they probably have them now.

Canned food will not GIVE them worms, but you should probably start to introduce some dry food since eating all caned will be just awful for their teeth. for the fleas: Boil a pot of water, take a couple lemons and slice them in half and put them into the pot of water (DON'T SQUEEZE THEM you don't want the lemon juice) let the pot and lemons sit over night then pour the liquid into a squirt bottle, spray the cats several times a day with this, do not worry, the lemon will not sting them, i've tried this on my cats and my dog and they have showed no signs of pain what so ever since it doesn't actually have the juice. Fleas do not like citrus, and this is a very natural way to get rid of fleas with out worrying about harmful chemicals.

Its ok to give them wet food as long as they have teeth and their eyes are open and are running around. But if they are not standing or barely beginning to stand and their eyes are not open then u need to bottle feed them. You can give them a bath but make sure u use nice warm water not luke warm cuz its not going to be warm enough. use kitten shampoo and when they are all nice and clean make sure u dry them off, and keep a one of those plug in heater with a fan. This will make sure they dry off completely and still stay nice and warm at the same time. And as for fleas go to your vet and they will give u REVOLUTION they have a kitten dosage u can use. Good Luck and have fun with those little guys!!!

The way that kittens get worms is from the mother cat who passes them on from having fleas or they have fleas themselves.

Also, it depends on how old they are. If they're really young I would suggest getting kitten food/milk from the pet store and giving them that only, it would be like the mother's milk. Kittens need the nutrition.

I've bathed my kitten in Dawn dishwashing liquid and that kills the fleas. No chemicals and washes off well. You can also just use a flea comb. Comb them daily and thoroughly removes the fleas. They get stuck on the comb and then you can kill them by dipping the comb in hot soapy water.