Found a kitten

Notsosharp

Hello,

I went for a walk with my daughter today when we were accosted by a young kitten, I thought that maybe it was too young to be out so seeing as we were not too far from our house I took him back to my house where he is still.

I have been round the neighbourhood to ask and no one seems to be looking for him, I have also put a notice in the local shop but now I don't know what to do.......

I don't want to call the cats protection incase he does belong to someone and they are looking for him but I also cannot keep him myself as I already have two cats (who are now not speaking to me!)

Does anyone have any suggestions as to what I could do next? Do I just put him out tomorrow morning and hope he finds his way back to where ever he came from? He is very young, about 4 months or so.

Thanks in advance.

narabanekeater

How about taking him to your loval vets to see if hes microchipped?

mirrorimage0

notify all the local vets so if anyone is ringing around they will have your number to call, take him to the vet as above poster stated to see if he is chipped (they wont charge you for this) and put a few posters up where you see him

kiraroo

you'll be surprised how many people out there think that kittens will be ok outside. I once picked up three six-week-old kittens off someone's front lawn as they were heading towards the road and the owner said she thought they'd stay away from the road. Thankfully managed to convince her to let me take them and find them a new home.

Anyway whatever you do, don't advertise that you have this kitten. If someone has lost it and misses it, they will do the looking for it. By advertising you run the risk of unscrupulous people coming forward pretending it's their kitten. Afterall you have to think what sort of person would have let such a young kitten out on its own in the first place.

If it were me, I would try and look after it for a week myself and look out for lost kitten posters. Alternatively you could hand it over to a local rescue shelter who should (although best to check beforehand) hold the kitten for seven days before looking for a new home for it

Poppycat

You could post it on this web site as found cat

http://www.nationalpetregister.org/

gomer

How about putting it back where you found it? At 4 months old it's not too young to be outside or to find it's own way home, in fact it might not even have been 'lost' when you found it. I can't really understand why you took it home in the first place.

Rachel83

I completely agree with the above post, some cats are more friendly then others just because they 'accosted' you whatever you may take that to be you take it home?

ariba10

It is surprising how many posters on here FIND lost cats.

Notsosharp

ariba10 wrote: »

It is surprising how many posters on here FIND lost cats.

Err can I just say in my defence had it been an ADULT cat and accosted me, I would not have picked it up and taken it home unless it looked ill or something. I have two cats of my own and I would hate for anyone to do that to mine so I would not do it myself. And the last thing I need is another cat. Four months old is too young to be out, mine did not go out til they were neutered at six months.

Do you not think I feel guilty at the fact I might have taken someones pet? It was going to get hurt.....

We are talking a four month old kitten that was running around near a main road and I have tried my absolute hardest to find out who owns him by trailing round the streets for hours and knocking on peoples doors. I have also put notices in all the local shops. It was made harder by the fact that people did not answer their doors even though I could see they were in. Anyone I spoke to did not know who he might belong to, so its seems as though he might have escaped from somewhere otherwise he would have been seen about before, there are a lot of cats where I live and some I see every day.

Anyway, I took him to the vets, he wasn't chipped, the vet took my details and said they would wait for someone to get in touch. After seven days they will hand him over to the RSPCA. Meantime I am going to put posters up etc.....I am trying as hard as I can to find his owner but I do think they would have been out looking themselves by now. I might take him back after seven days but I will still rehome him, I have no intention of keeping him.

PS: I did used to have a cat that used to just come into my house of its own free will, I fed it but I did not take it in even though it was skinny and riddled with fleas. And this was because it had a collar on and it used to go back out after a while. Once the kitten was in my house it showed no inclination to go back out.

gomer

Notsosharp wrote: »

Do you not think I feel guilty at the fact I might have taken someones pet? It was going to get hurt.....

How do you know that it was going to get hurt? That's just your own opinion. It's also only your opinion that 4 months old is too young for a kitten to be outside - just because you didn't let your own cats out until they were 6 months old does not make it a given fact, can you imagine how many 'lost' kittens would be handed in if we all decided they are going to get hurt and were too young to be out?

Good on you for taking it to a vet but try and imagine that it was your own pet & someone came along and decided on your behalf that your cat was going to be hurt and was too young to be out & then took it home.

I am certain you felt motivated by good intentions but the reality is that a kitten that might not necessarily have been lost is now completely lost because you removed it from one area & took it to another area where it's owners are not very likely to think of looking for it.

Like i said, i'm sure you acted in good faith but the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Notsosharp wrote: »

. Once the kitten was in my house it showed no inclination to go back out.

So that makes a difference then?

Some time ago we had a very heated thread in here posted by someone who claimed a that lady down the road was trying to steal her cat, it turned out that it wasn't actually her cat but in fact belonged to the other lady and had been missing a very long time - she had found it outside and because it looked 'lost' decided to take it home and keep it.

As much as you meant well you have to think about the consequences in these situations because it's not always best to remove a pet hastily because we percieve as 'lost' because it might not be.

As wonderful as it is that you are rallying around vets, putting up posters, asking around etc, there really was no need for you to be a martyr in the first place. If you had genuine concerns for the safety of this cat/kitten then all you needed to do was hand it in to rescue immediately & allow them to worry about finding it’s owner and looking after it - your commitment would have ended there & your good deed for the day would have been done.

Instead (whether you want to hear it or not) you made the decision that it was ‘lost’ without really knowing at the time if it was & you have made a series of decisions about someone else’s pet based on your own personal views. You have decided that because you do not allow your own cats out until they are 6 months old other people should do the same, you have decided that because you think the cat was going to get hurt that it was, and you have decided that the animal needs to be kept in your custody for the next 7 days which in all fairness were not your decisions to make & were somewhat misguided.

The fact that you open a door and the cat makes no attempt to leave does not justify that it needed to be taken home with you and kept in your custody & the most sensible thing you can do is to just hand it into rescue today and let them worry about finding it’s owners. This is not your problem and you can still help find it’s owner without having to take it home with you.

Milford_Cubicle

I'm sorry, but I think a lot of posts in this thread are out of order.

The OP has done what s/he thinks is right and yet has been shot down. S/he has done everything s/he can to try and find the kitten's owner, yet that isn't enough. Perhaps you lot should wind your necks in and offer the advice s/he's looking for?

My own opinion is that 4 months (16 weeks) is too young for a kitten to be outside. They shouldn't be neutered before they're 20 weeks old anyway, so an un-neutered kitten being let out at this age is irresponsible of the owner. I don't believe the OP has acted rashly at all by taking this kitten in as s/he genuinely believed it to be in danger.

Why not support the OP rather than having a go at them?