Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1945-02-27
KITTEN CARE.
(ThGnkS to Mrs. L. F. B.,
WASHINGTON.

f1HGnkS 10 MRS. l.. r. b.,
Washington
In answer to Mrs. E. T. O., RS, re-
quest: When you have a 6-Week-old
kitten and 3-year-old boy you
have two babies on your hands. A
little kitten just taken from its
mother will be helpless, lonely and
hungry. You will have wonderful
opportunity to teach your young
son how to be kind to animals and
also give him the responsibility of
caring for it. If you just give the
kitten to him to play with as you
would stuffed toy you will be in for
trouble. The only way the kitten
can defend himself is to scratch, and
cat scratches are not nice things to
have and can sometimes become
dangerous. A little 3-year -old boy
will not understand why he can't
squeeze the kitten and grab it any
old place, but you can teach him to
pet the kitten and watch it play with
a ball or piece of string or most
anything. A little kitten is much
like a little child; it needs sleep,
warmth, food and play time, but
there is nothing as cruel as to let a
small child maui and hurt the ami
NAL and then when it defends itself
to be abused and thrown out. We
have had cats for years and we now
have one years old. She Is the pet
of my son who is now overseas and
she sleeps on one of his old sweaters,
and when I take it away she goes
around looking for it. When his let
tiers come she seems to sense them
and rubs against them as I read
and purrs her approval. When my
son was small he was taught to pet
the kittens and play with them, but
never to pick them up or pull their
tails.
Before you take a kitten home
you should obtain a pan or box "a
pan is preferable, as 1t can be
washeO and put some sand in 1t,
not a great deal, but enough (this
can be purchased at a pet store If
you do not have any arounO. This
pan should be placed near where
you will make your kitten its bed.
When I brought this last kitten home
from its mother I had the box fixed
behind the bathroom door and i'm
mediately upon bringing the cat into
the house I put it in the box.
If you have porch, the box
can be moved to the porch when the
cat is older and then to the ground
and then abandoned altogether.
A small kitten needs warm milk
and some meat or liver. You can
put some puppy crackers, which can
be obtained at most chain stores, in
the milk. Some cats like fish but
the cat we have now will not eat
any fish with oil on it such as sal
mon or sardines. She likes liver and
kidneys and some meat, all raw.
Each cat will have a different appe-
tite and you can try out different
things but a kitten should be fed
at least twice day. Cats do not
gobble up their food as dogs do.
They like to eat little and then
90 away and later come back and
eat more. When our cat was small
we gave it prepared food, but that
is not on the market now, but you
can get dehydrated food and mix
with meat juices or milk. Some OF
the stores sell lamb liver point free
and sometimes you can get pork
liver. It is best to cook this. Our
cat likes cantaloupe and I have a
friend whose cat likes avocados.
They are really funny and most
Never hit a cat with your hand.
Take a newspaper and roll it up
and box them with it. The noise
scares them more than the hurt.
You should also get some flea pow
der as the kittens usually carry
some f1eas away from their mother.
My cat likes to take a bath but I
think that is because we started
in giving it baths as little thing.
Be sure when you do give kitten
a bath to stand it up in bucket
and use'a sponge, and soap its head
first, but be careful not to get the
soap in its eyes, and leave the soap
IN its head until Won get the body