Advice for Breeders 125
Natural weaning vs weaning following hand-rearing
Weaning by the mother cat is a process that naturally causes a sense of conflict and
frustration for the kittens. This is because their availability to suckle from the queen
decreases and her nursing behaviour becomes unpredictable. She will intermittently
and increasingly deny them access to feed from her by keeping her distance and by
adopting resting postures incompatible to nursing; she will even get up and walk
away whilst they are feeding. The frustration experienced by the kittens at this time
is an important part of the weaning process in two respects:
- It encourages the kittens to seek food elsewhere, and increases their desire to
attempt and learn predatory behaviour. - It teaches the kittens how to cope with the emotion of frustration when it is expe-
rienced in later life. Cats that are unable to cope with this emotion are more likely to
experience stress and can have an increased propensity to become aggressive when
expectations are not met or anticipated rewards are delayed.
Frustration will also be experienced by the kittens during their early attempts to catch
and kill live prey presented to them by their mother.
In contrast, kittens that have been hand-reared and weaned by a human caregiver
are less likely to experience the same level of frustration as mother-reared kittens and
may be more likely to exhibit frustration-related behavioural problems in later life.
The following advice for carers of hand-reared kittens may help to prevent this:
● Do not offer solid food by hand as this can teach the kittens to associate human
hands with food. It is better to offer solid food mixed in with formula milk in a
shallow dish and gradually reduce the amount of milk and increase the solid food.
● As weaning commences, it is advisable to become more unpredictable in the feed-
ing schedule and do not feed on demand.
● As the kittens start to take solid food, or food mixed with formula, start to withdraw
the feeding bottle when there is still a small amount of formula left in the bottle.
● Once the kittens are eating solid food on a more regular basis, start to introduce
simple puzzle feeders and food foraging games (see Appendix 1) (Bowen and
Heath, 2005; ISFM, 2017).
Fig. 8.3. Do not separate
the kittens from the mother
unless unavoidable.
Frustration is a normal
part of the natural weaning
process that hand-reared
kittens are less likely to
experience, and lack of this
experience can result in
behavioural problems later
in life.