A Different "Tail"

This is a “tail” of twin kittens, Muffler and Sandlot.
They came to us one cold October, 2012. We later calculated that their birth date was about October 5. They were born on a farm. When they were about ten days old, their mother was killed by a dog. They may have had brothers and sisters that the dog dispatched. We do not know. The owner of the farm found the two and took them to the local animal shelter. The people at the shelter told the farmer that they were not equipped to care for such young kittens and all they could do was humanely euthanize them. Fortunately for the little girls, a person at the shelter knew a good friend of ours, who breeds, raises and sells Russian, Siberian kittens and contacted her. She went to the shelter and gathered up the two little kittens.
The next day, my wife, and I were out for dinner with our friends and their family, and they began talking about the two kittens. They had mentioned them to me the day before. They said the two kittens were truly pitiful and he did not think they would make it through the coming night. They were so weak from hunger they had trouble holding their little heads up. They had two mother cats that had recently littered, so they hoped one of the mother cats would adopt the two poor, hungry kittens. But the two mothers were in the process of weaning their own litters and would not feed the kittens. Looking at my wife, I knew she had to go get those kittens.
Later, my wife went by and collected the two tiny kittens. The night before, our friends had managed to get a little bit of kitten cereal and some cow’s milk into the kittens’ empty stomachs. Cow’s milk is not good for kittens, but it is all they had to offer. Whatever little nourishment they had gotten into the kittens was enough to get them through the night. On the way home, after picking the kittens up, my wife stopped by a veterinarian’s office (not our own vet) and had the kittens examined. The vet looked the little girls over, thinking they were boys, and gave my wife some medicine for the kittens’ eyes which were infected shut and told her they needed Kitten Replacement Milk (KRM) and told her were to get it. He also gave her some tiny baby bottles to feed them with. “Gave” equals one hundred dollars. He asked my wife what their names were. Apparently, vets need animal’s names to treat them. My wife immediately answered, “Muffin and Sandy.” As a young girl, she had had favorite cats with those names.
When she got them to our home, the kittens were weak, hungry, and dirty. Their eyes were still infected shut and they had fleas. They weighed a mere four ounces each. We do not know how long they had gone without proper nourishment. At only four ounces weight, kittens of this age could not survive more than a couple of days without food. When my wife told me their names, I said, “You mean Muffler and Sandlot.” The names stuck. Our lives immediately changed. The kittens had to be fed every three hours. We began training them to bottle feed. Feeding from a bottle does not come naturally.
After feeding the little dears, we had one more task to perform. Many may not know this, and we were among them, but newborn kittens do not automatically pee or poop. They need to be stimulated to do so. The mother cat does this by licking the kittens’ butts and, well you know. People can stimulate kittens to pee and poop by licking their little butts. I wouldn’t. I suggest a damp paper towel. We do not know how long it had been since they last peed or pooped. Might have been painful. I don’t know if they explode or what if this is not done, but we did it and they did it. Stinky little things. Imagine trying to hold these squirming little kittens by the tails, their little back legs kicking, while wiping their bitty butts until they do number one and two. Later, the first kitten to poop on her own was Sandlot. She pooped this two or three inch long, spaghetti sized turd, then turned to admire it. You would have thought she had sculpted the Venus de Milo. She was so proud of it.
We fed, peed and pooped them and put them to bed that night in a spare bedroom were my wifehad prepared a basket for them with a heating pad underneath it. They were, for the moment, content and no longer hungry. Their immediate needs satisfied, they fell asleep. My wife set her alarm clock for three hours later. When the alarm went off, the little kittens were ready and they were letting us know it. Their eyes were now open thanks to the eye medicine. Their strength was rapidly returning. They were quickly adapting to their new lives. The second time they heard the alarm they knew exactly what it meant. Chow time.
The next evening and about a dozen feedings later, their strength had returned. They were just getting used to their little legs and were beginning to learn to walk and play. After feeding, peeing and pooping them, we bathed them in a soup bowl. I picked about a dozen fleas from each of them. At only four ounces, it would not take a dozen fleas long to severely render the kittens anemic. Afterwards, we put them to bed in their heated basket and covered them with a baby blanket. They fell asleep instantly. They may have never have felt so good; fed, warm, clean and fee of fleas. They soon learned that when we covered them with their blanket, it meant sleepy time.
Each day, they gained strength, skills and knowledge. They had learned to bottle feed. They were mastering the use of their little legs and were now scampering all over. We kept them on top of the bed in their room while feeding. They were too small to jump off. It was difficult to feed them single handed. They both fought for the bottle, stiff legging each other when the sister kitten went for the bottle. My wife is a registered nurse and works at night, so often only one of us was available to feed the kittens. Lots easier for two to feed them.
One day, I went to visit out of town friends. My wife was working which meant she could not feed them for twelve hour stretches, so I had to take them with me. It is amazing how much gear it takes to replace one mother cat. I took four baby kitten bottles, several cans of kitten replacement milk, a roll of paper towels, a small cat litter box, a couple of waste baskets, a stack of wash clothes and towels, their sleeping basket with heater, and a storage bin to put them in to travel. Filled the trunk.
We have other cats that are disease free. The kittens were too young to be tested, so we kept them separated from the other grown cats. The kitten’s veins would not be large enough to find until they were about six weeks old. We did, however, allow them to come downstairs to play on my favorite chair. They didn’t think they could jump down, so they ran all over it testing their tiny legs, feet and claws. When I sat in my chair, the kittens ran all over me and liked to play inside my sweater. They would often fall asleep while playing in the last position they were in, sometimes tail side straight up.
When they were six weeks old, we took them to our veterinarian to be tested. The doctor decided to blood test only one sister since they had both been together since birth. I wish I had videoed this. The vet chose little Sandlot. She stuck a needle in Sandlot’s left hind leg and took about a drop of blood. Afterwards she put a small yellow bandage around Sandlot’s leg. When we got the kittens home, declared disease free, we released them.
At home, Sandlot ran all over the house with her left hind leg sticking straight out. If it were not so funny, we would have taken the bandage off right away. Sandlot was thinking, “Good grief! Look what they did to me!” Finally, we took it off. She licked her leg for about an hour.
We had not intended to keep either of the kittens. But it is not easy to find homes for thousands of kittens and puppies that so desperately need them. We thought we had a home for one sister but we had become so attached, we were not looking forward to the day. When the day arrived, the adoption fell through. We could not have been happier. The girls had known each other since birth and we could not find it in our hearts to separate them.
Since it was winter and the kittens needed to be kept warm, we let them sleep with us. These little critters would sleep side by side between us purring their heads off. Amazing how loudly such small kittens could purr.
As they grew, they found their places among the other cats. Aero, our Siamese female acted like she was not that interested. Clover, our calico, showed passing interest. The kittens really didn’t care. They had each other. They had a home.
One day, the two appeared a bit lethargic and would not eat, although they showed interest. The two never barfed before, but now they were barfing and it contained green plant material. They had been spending time out on our screened porch were my wife kept a lot of her plants. We concluded they must have gotten into some of them. Their coats became kind of oily in appearance and they began losing weight. At mealtime, they would sniff at their food but would not eat, and eating was one of their favorite things to do. They would not even drink water. They slept much more than usual. They did show a little interest in playing, so we were hopeful. I looked on the internet for house plants that are harmful for cats to eat and almost all of them are. We took the two to their veterinarian who kept them overnight. She administered inter venous fluids and gave them something to stimulate their appetites. They did not appear to be improving. The only nutrition I could get into them was this high calorie paste from a tube. I stuck the tube in each kitten’s mouth and gave it a small squeeze. They would just barely tolerate it, but they kept it down. They slept in their heated basket all the time now with the baby blanket covering them. Aero, who had feigned lack of interest earlier, was now sticking her head under the blanket to check on them hourly. Finally, Sandlot looked like she felt better. She even licked a bit of food on her own. Her fur began to look better too. The next morning, Muffler followed suit. We were extremely relieved. We moved all the doubtful plants out of their reach. There are plants that are harmless to cats and my wife grows some for them. They yell and yell when they realize my wife is giving them a (safe) plant to chew up.
My wife had this three or foot tall, wrought iron plant stand that was not too stable. It had a fern in it that was safe for cats, although my wife did not want them in it. She placed it right next to our breakfast table. Bad choice. Each young cat took her turn attempting to climb into the plant from our breakfast table. We do not allow any of our cats on table tops, or counters. Aero and Clover understand this rule and respect it (Or at least they did.). The kittens know about the rule, but their attitude is,” I know I am not supposed to be up here. But, hey, they aren’t going to kill me. It’s worth it.” Sandlot is always the instigator. She will study a situation that could be potential fun then make her move. Muffler is more timid, but once Sandlot hatches a plot, Muffler is on board. I am sitting across the room, now having chased the two off of the table and away from the plant about a dozen times. I look over at the table just in time to see both have jumped up on the table. Sandlot makes her move. She leaps into the fern which instantly begins to go over. Sandlot is holding on like a bronco rider and rides the plant stand beautifully until the whole thing crashes to the kitchen floor sending dirt, plant and broken ornaments flying all over. Did she run off in fear? Hell no. She immediately whips around to admire the chaos and destruction she had just committed. Muffler was on the table in awe. Thought it was just about the coolest thing she had seen that day and jumped down to help critique the performance. My wife was just thrilled to the bone. But the kittens were correct. We didn’t kill them.
We had expected our senior cats to teach the youngsters proper decorum. Backfired. Instead, the kittens showed the older ladies that an occasional countertop excursion would not result in death.
We have several rooms with ceiling fans in them. Another favorite pastime is to jump up at the ceiling fan if it is reachable from atop a bed or table and try to snatch the fobs that hang below each fan. So we were always finding fans we knew we had turned off now running. Once, I heard this racket from the dining room where there is a fan. They were both sitting on the dining room table. One of the little dears (I bet I know who) had managed to snag one of the chains causing it to snap upwards over the top of the fan. It was now dangling into the fan blades clanging away. Fascinating! I had to go around and remove all the fobs that were reachable by leaping kittens.
For reasons known only to Sandlot, she likes to walk atop our television. It’s thin, so there is not much space to stand on. All the buttons are on top and sometimes we come home from being out and the television is on, sometimes fairly loudly. Other times, I cannot get the buttons back in right position or sequence to get it operating again. I have had to fool with it for 20 or 30 minutes at times.
We decided to let them have their way with this large hanging plant next to our dining room. It is attached with a very sturdy hook and is woven of large cord. The plant in it is on the “OK to eat” list. They took great joy in swinging from it and trying to see how far away from it they could leap into it, often leaping from the dining room chairs. That is until they realized we were allowing them to play in it. No fun if it is allowed.
The kittens are now a year and a half old. Their antics have not stopped. And Sandlot is still the inventor. I often think they think of themselves as an extension of the same kitten. They think of the same mischief at the same time. One thing they still do is launch at each other from across the house then jump up and collide chest to chest. Fortunately cats like to sleep a lot, up to 16 hours a day. But during the waking hours, we hear the constant thunder of cat feet as they chase and hunt each other. They still sleep with us most nights, purring away. Sandlot likes to sleep against my wife’s head and purr. My wife says it feels good.
We now don’t know how we got along without them.