We have made some enqiuries and maybe getting two rescue cats :D :D

Not sure though on what sexes. I have always had female cats but not sure whether we should go for a boy and a girl ? Does it make any difference in them getting on ?

Also I presume the younger they are the better to get them used to two mad Labs and also the maybe newbie pupster in a few months time ?

I have asked for black cats as have always loved them :)

Lucy
xx

Ahhh - lovely !.

Kittens will be ok together, boys, girls or boy and girl. Older females who haven't been raised together aren't a good idea. Queens fight !.
As far as I know, an adult female will be ok with a kitten female and an adult male is ok with a kitten male.

My cat is a rescue, from the Blue Cross.....................and he's black !. Always had females before but I've found it true what they say, males are far more cuddly, real lap cats.
Best idea would be one of each - best of both worlds !.

Val

I've had two neutered toms, two neutered queens & one of each(which is what I have now except they haven't been neutered yet)not much difference really, all my cats have been friendly & "normal"(all except the one who thought he was a dog !)

I've had mine from kitten-hood & my present kittens are litter mates so they are closely bonded to each other. If your dogs are used to cats & good with them then older cats aren't too bad(depends on the cats of course)

If your dogs aren't used to cats then younger ones are better

My two came here 4 weeks ago today, I put them on the floor, my Cavaliers went to say hello, the kittens hissed & the Cavaliers walked away as they are used to cats. My BC had never seen a cat before so obviously thought they were little dogs, they hissed at him & he went & hid !!

Now they are all fine with each other & I often find the cats with the dogs fast asleep curled up together !

I think we will go with a boy and a girl as Mike is the only man in the house so I think he would appreciate another male to bond with :D :D

There's always pedigree cats looking for homes too in case anyone was interested?   I know of a couple of sites where British Shorthair (You might be lucky & get a black) rehomes are listed and lots of other breeds carry a rescue page too.  Most will be neutered, probably fully vaccinated and looking for a loving home, sometimes singletons, sometimes in pairs.

With BSH it's the males that are the 'teddy bears', so laid back and loving.

Now this is a coincidence as I am looking to rehome two rescue kittens in mid Spet too after my holiday. I am thinking if I have a choice boy and girl littermates, not fussed colours, but choice brother and sister as I have found my two Oz and Cleo brother and sister lived happily togther for 24 years. :) so going with what worked for me boy.girl but can't say it matter neutured/spayed its the individual cats personality that will come through. But whatever is available will be fine.

Have you thought of names yet? I think I would go Merlin and Marcus for two black boys.

CoCo & Cinnamon for my next 2 (Won't be black tipped with names like that!).  :) ;) :D

Sexes doesn't really matter, personalities does. :) Kittens virtually almost get along, adult females as well, only dodgy part CAN be adult males (regardless of if neutered or not) but problems only tend to occur when the numbers creep up say over 5 males together. Cats are also quite  "racist" for want of a better word and usually prefer their own breed/type and yes even colour. :) But with only two, virtually anything goes as you won't have two or more that can gang up against the odd one out. So just go with your heart!

ooh, black.  As long as they are black you can't go wrong.  Sadly, I'm kidding but I am a sucker for black cats.  I'm curious, is black a hard to adopt colour where you are?  Black is not favoured here, except round about Halloween when most humane societies won't adopt out any cat, especially black.

Now now Lucy, you will turn into a house like mine :-
3 dogs, 2 house rabbits and 10 fish!!!!!! LMAO
Just let us know when you are getting them so we can come down before as Ric cant breath around cats!!!!!! LOL (good job I didnt get one when I was going to earlier in the year!!!)
When you getting the chickens and a goat??? :D :D :D
Lea :)

Lea, you make my house look like a zoo!! :D

I've read/heard that about a lot of rescues, that goes for dogs as well - black animals are harder to adopt out.  There was an article about it in Dogs Todya (maybe Your Dog) a few months back.  Don't know why - love em myself, with two black (well, and tan :D) dogs and my oldest cat was a black tabby.  Blackish anyway!  My sister also had two black cats with white bits - Fishface and Pilchard :p - they were gorgeous!

Yes I wondered that as I read that black smooth coat dogs are the hardest to home and some US shelters put them straight to sleep knowing there won't be any takers.

I have always liked black dogs horses and cats.  My first dog was a Long coated black breed (don't like short coated in any form really).

I now sit on the fence as I own a double coated grey breed so neither long or short coated, nor dark or light, typical of a Pisces

I love black dog & cats, would always choose black if it was on offer, although Dakko and our first cat were the only solid black ones we had most of the others have been Tri, black &tan or Black and white. But the number of other dogs who used to attack Dakko (black Swedish Lapphund) followed by their owners saying '? doesn't like black dogs ' was unbelievable.

But the number of other dogs who used to attack Dakko (black Swedish Lapphund) followed by their owners saying '? doesn't like black dogs ' was unbelievable.

I have to admit I'm seeing this in my own dogs. Not to ATTACK, but my dogs have found it much, much harder to accept my MIL's rescued Black Labrador than any other dog they've met, and it does seem to be a colour thing -she looks so different to the rest of them. I would imagine it's possible they also find it harder to judge facial expressions and eyes in a black face?

Yes, a lot of dogs are less keen on all-black dogs because of the body language/expressions thing.  Think about how hard it is to get a decent photo of an all-black dog!  Soli will react to most dogs, but all-blacks - labs especially - are the worst, she really has trouble getting used to them.  Even the ones she's met a few times (she freaks then tends to get used to dogs) she'll react to.  With the dark eyes as well, it's understandable really.

We have been to the Blue cross today and were shown two litters of feral cats.

They were all very timid and aparently have caused a few scratches if anybody has treid to handle them.

One of the litters was mainly black and the other litter were torties.

We have reserved one little black boy called Smartie and one little tortie girl called Galaxy. ( She was very sweet and was the only one who came upto me to investigate :D )

We have to ring tomorrow to confirm we want to go ahead and they will arrange a home visit.

We have two concerns.

1. With them being semi feral will this mean that they will always have a wild side to them ? Tog my mother cats was semi feral and was always a bad tempered cat so my experience of this has raised concerns.

2. We have a young tom cat who lives next door. Do you think that the little boy they will be prone to scrapping with him having their territories so close together ?

There is another litter where there is a single female kitten available but they said they won't rehome two single from different litters together

Any advice on all of this ?

Thanks

Lucy
xx

Lucy,

You will need to do a lot of socialisation with them if they are semi-feral.  They will have gained a suspicious instinct from their mother that man is to be partly feared.   As for scrapping, males and females will fight each other outside not just male & male (Neutered or not), all neutering does is make them less prone to wander to find a mate/get mated!

Have they been tested to make sure they aren't suffering from anything infectious/contagious eg. FeLV/FIV etc.

http://www.feralcat.com/taming.html

You may find the link helpful.  I found it after "habituating" a couple of ferals, both kittens and adults.  The business of "scooping" them up for a quick cuddle and back down before they even quite know what has happened is amazing.  I was doing it anyway and very suprised to find it given as a direction for handling these cats.

I have said habituating, in quotes, instead of socializing because I think you may find these wee mites do not become sociable with anyone but you and immediate family members.  That is what I have found and I believe it is the norm for ferals of any age.  Whether or not they are bad tempered will be a quirk of their own personal dispositions and have nothing to do with being feral, in my experience. 

I agree, there will be scraps with the neighbourhood feline population whether neutered or not.  And to tell the truth I have not found neutering to have much effect in curbing the tendency to roam in the males.  It seems to be a teenage male thing regardless of hormones, but I do it anyway to cut down on the feral population.

Oh, you are in for so much fun with those wee things.

Wanted to add something I think is important.  Other than the scooping I never hold onto a new cat or kitten.  If they want down from my lap I let them go, my idea being that sitting with me should always be a pleasurable experience and my lap is not a prison.  I do "cheat" and entice them back with treats or a string or feather dragged over my lap. 

Our cat is semi-feral too. He is more timid than our other cats have been, hisses at eveyone he sees but will then let you speak to him. He does fight with the cats close by though especially if they are in his territory. He is now 9 and the vet is always amazed at how light he is, he weighs practically nothing, despite having a good appetite and being regularly wormed, she is more used to seeing cats that are overweight. I'm sure the poor animal lives on his nerves, especially with my nutty dogs around. We have had 4 cats over the years and he is the second least cuddly ( my second black cat was a fiend in cats clothing), but he will quite happily curl up on my dad's knee for a sleep (my dad doesn't really like cats :) ) . If you can offer them a good home and have the time to socialise them then I would get them.
M

OH's sister rescued a litter of 3 semi-feral kittens from their uncle's farm.  2 males and a female  He was going to drown them as this is how he exercises population control :rolleyes:

They are house cats and lived together happily for several years.  To cut a long and unpleasant story short, due to unforeseen circumstances, the cats had to spend a month or so in a cattery followed by several months confined to one room at OH's parents house (his mother hates animals in the house and only reluctantly agreed because the only other option would to have rehomed them which would have broken his sister's heart).  During this time, the two males fell out and fought on occasion.  When they eventually went back to live with the sister in a new house, the fighting escalated to the point where they were intent on fighting to the death!  The male that was instigating the fights was removed and sent back to the parents where he lives happily as an only cat.  The other two remain happily together with sister.

I have no idea if the sudden fall out had anything to do with them starting out semi-feral or whether it was caused by the severe upheaval (4 different places in 6 months) or being forced to live in one room with no real 'space' to call their own when they had previously been used to free run of the whole house.

If you're going to let them out you will have a much less chance of taming them down....... The smaller the area they have the better really. I.e. for months just one room, then increasing it as they gain confidence. Personally I would never let them out of course, but even more so in this case. I bought in two adult cats last November, one was nervous -but certainly not semi feral, she's a persian. She was in hiding indoors for months and months.We never saw her. It wasn't until now when she's had kittens and has spent 10 weeks so far in one room only that she has finally settled enough to allow herself to be picked up easily without panicking. When she was still able to run off and hide, she did it every time, not having the possibility to run off is what settled her, and I have seen this a few times.

The stuff you were told about not rehoming two kittens from two different litters is total rubbish. :( There's no reason at all for that, kittens will mix perfectly happily and there's no better time to introduce them.

I'd say you need to think of what matters most to you. Rescuing a couple of kittens and giving them a good life, or having cats that will be people loving. Moggies are always pot luck compared to pedigree cats, just like with dogs, but even more so of course if you're talking feral kittens. I'm not at all anti moggy, indeed I show and judge mogs and ALWAYS have at least two rescues at home, and I even wrote a book about how great moggies are. :) But for the first ten years or so as a cat owner I was convinced cats were not for me as my experience was that they're not very friendly and loving, and it wasn't until I saw the difference in pedigree cats that I realised just how different they can be. Rescues can become fantastic, but it will take more time, and you have to be aware of the fact they may never be lap cats.

Like Christine said, you need to blood test the kittens for Leukaemia and FIV, especially if they are going out -but be aware ANY cat they meet outdoors and have a fight with may be positive for FIV and that is the one fatal disease you cannot vaccinate against and which can be carried unseen for years before any symptoms show.It is spread via bites.

Lucy our cat is of the feral variety.  She was left on a doorstep in a shoebox and we just happened to have lost our old cat (sadly she was run over outside our house on James's birthday) so were in a position to offer her a home.  She absolutely hates being indoors and always has done and has been happier since we gave in and let her roam and come in when she wanted to.  I did as Marianne suggested and decided that we'd offered her a home, shelter and food which was more than she would have otherwise and to expect her to be a lap-cat was too much and unfair.

She gets on fantastically with the dogs and will put them all into place but other than that she comes and goes as she pleases via the catflap.  She will rarely venture further than the conservatory but can often be found in the shed or garage (also with catflap) in her own space.

All of them have been tested and are clear :)

We are going to say no to these kittens as think we are not the right people for them after lots of discussions today and reading all your comments :)

Christine I think the two little ones are I think what we are going to go for

If you see this can you e-mail me with the owners tel number etc :)

Lucy
xx

Oh my little CoCo & Cinnamon! ;)  At least I'll get to see photos of them regularly!  I will email Sandra and explain and then get back to you.  Might not be until tomorrow evening as I'll be at SKC (Think positive vibes!).

You can be their Godmother ;) :D :D

BTW not sure if they will stay with the names but we will see ;)

If anybody wants to see our hopefully newbies them PM me :D :D

Lucy
xx

What's wrong with the names?????    ;)  Ok they may not be everyone's tastes but then Jack (Cat) is too plain for me, just as well I love the little blighter!  :D

Now I have a clear conscience about getting my Selkirk Rex girl!  

Nowt wrong with the names but we will have to see what they are like as I am sure they will have lots of personality and will make their footprint on thier new forever home to give their new names  :D :D

Oh Hurrah!!
your going to have Coco and Cinammon :D
(Ive seen them already! gorgeous!) Glad theyre going to a good home and cant wait to hear how they're doing :)

:D :D

They will be fine and I am sure once Moose and Duds make friends ( will be an interesting period :D :D ) we will have many funny tales to tell ! :D :D

Best of luck with them.

I had a kitten from a feral male and a pet female.  He was super but a Cat that I could not keep in at any price, despite using inverted fencing, he was out all day and night, he got killed on the road, he used to travel a LONG way just to get to the golf course where he spent most of his time, this meant crossing a busy road, one that in over 30yrs no Cat of ours had ever got anywhere near as it was so far away.

It upset me so much that I opted then for pedigree Cats and have 2 British shorthairs, they are very laid back, "cant be bovvered" Cats!  They never offer to go out of the garden.  I have also got a pedigree Persian, again no inclination to wander, and 2 rescue Cats, and this is the way I would of continued, but with the irresponsible breeding that goes on, the majority of rescue kittens are sired by or out of a feral, and Im just not willing to risk another life.
Dawn.

Firstly I have to say that I am not a cat lover as I find them unpredictable. However, a friend of mine lives in a lodge house at the gates of a huge estate. The Cat Protection League regularly catch the feral cats and neuter them but if one is pregnant they hang on until the kittens are born, neuter the mother and try to find homes for the kittens. My friend took one of the feral kittens. The first week was quite stressful as she was so timid. But what a superb kitten she has turned out to be. I love picking her up as she settles in your arms and just gives out a constant purr. She doesn't bring her claws out at all. Coming from someone who doesn't mind stroking cats because I can't be doing with them when they all of a sudden lash out I can say I could happily take this one home with me. Maybe he was just lucky but she is fabulous. Must also say that she has free running outside but doesn't seem to stray far from his garden and spends a lot of time in the house.

Good luck, Lucy :) :) :) Hope that it all works out well !!! :) I'm not a cat person at all - I was put off them when I was a child. Our next door neighbour had cats who terrorised the birds in our garden (which also led to my dead bird phobia :( ). We also lived opposite part of Epping Forest and were forever having cats run over right outside our house :( :( Put me off cats for life - although I don't mind my sister's two - except that I am also allergic to them :D :D :D

Daisy

Firstly I have to say that I am not a cat lover as I find them unpredictable.

It's just a question of learning to read their body language just like you do with dogs. :)

Funny but our semi-feral never scratches us either - have never seen him with his claws out except when Bramble decided to chase him as a puppy and got scratched for her trouble!

It all depends on whether the kittens were human imprinted ans handled from birth and at the time their eyes are open.  They will still be timid due to their mothers attitude to humans, but not the same feral nature that kittens that were not imprinted on people early in life.

I remember a very friendly farm cat with kittens, she was great, but because her kittens had never been handled they were just wild and hen I managed to catch one it clawed and bit like a fiend.  I was only 12 and didn't know any better having only ever had dealings with home reared kittens.

Alisongold said

I find them unpredictable.

because I can't be doing with them when they all of a sudden lash out

I find this with plenty of dogs! Its certainly not a cat thing, but they are exception creatures at knowing when people DONT like them!

I was trying to get across that this feral kitten is an absolute sweetie. Now you see, I can read dogs and don't find then unpredictable. Horses for courses.

OK, I'm confused.  Are you getting the two ferals?  Or two other kittens?

Jet,
2 others! ChristineW helped rehome them and persuaded her (led her astray more like!) :)

Hang fire until I can get hold of their breeder (Easier said than done now!)  but they are stunners especially with their orange eyes!

Oh my.   Put in big intake of breath here.  They do have stunning eyes.  Our black Sadie has orange eyes too.  Have to say, nearly all my cats have been ferals but mostly of the stray variety, like Sadie.  Only two were probably born feral and I confess I did spend HOURS and HOURS and DAYS and DAYS overcoming their fears.  With Itty Bitty Kitty it was even months.  I was successful and it was a joy and extremely satisfying but I was lucky to be able to afford the time.

We had a rescue cat once, we didn't find out until too late that her mother was more or less feral :(  Cleo was great as a kitten and until she matured but then she became more and more stressed by being indoors :(  and it's too dangerous to let a cat out here IMHO although some do, and some survive ;)  In the end we rehomed her to a quiet country locale and she chose her new owners :) as she hadn't chosen us ;)      

She became a very contented cat in her new home :)

Love the piccy of the two youngsters - those eyes!  Lovely British-looking faces too :) :)

All being well we will be going to pick the two little lovelies on Friday

Confirmed, we are going to be the new Mummy and Daddy :D :D

We have just got back and they are safely in their cage and settling in.

Coco is hiding in the litter tray and Cinnamon has gone under their bed :)

Moose seems fine with them and Pudley has already had the first spat and is now sitting in fornt of the cage watching them :)

They are very sweet little girls :D

I will try and get some photos off them as soon as they have decided to give up hiding :D

Lucy
xx

They are very sweet little girls

Lulling you into a false sense of security there, wait until they get their feet under the table! 

I saw excatly what they are like when we picked them up :D :D

I have already had blood drawn :D :D

They were two of about 10 cats and guess which ones were ruling the house ;)

Lucy
xx

ROFL!! :D
OOoooooh Im soo jealous though.
Cant wait to hear all about their antics..... (and world domination) :D