What Age Can A Kitten Leave Its Mother
While most kittens are weaned by 8 10 weeks most experts recommend leaving kittens with their littermates until 12 13 weeks so they can be properly socialized.
What age can a kitten leave its mother. It can be tricky to tell but our at a glance kitten progression guide featuring darling the kitten and his siblings is here to help you out. First of all there is no set age on when the separation should be done. Benefits of staying with the mother and siblings. Twelve to thirteen weeks of age is the time that is almost universally considered to be the optimum earliest time to remove kittens from their queen and by this age the kittens should be ready to go out into the world and begin the next stage of their learning development.
8 weeks the organization cats international recommends keeping kittens with their fellow litter mates and mothers until about 8 weeks in age. By waiting until the kitten is 12 14 weeks old you will have minimized the risk for health and behavioral issues and maximized the chance for getting a healthy and happy cat. The time varies from one kitten to another since several factors come to play. At what age can you take kittens away from their mother.
That is how long we kept our kittens before we gave them away. However a kitten is typically ready to leave his mother at about 8 to 12 weeks of age. While you may want your kitten to stay as long as is needed with the mother the conditions on ground may leave you with no option. In many cases kittens begin eating strictly solid foods at around 8 weeks and then may be ready to leave their mothers for good.
By this age our mother cat had already weened them herself they were eating kitten. More specifically there are three main reasons for our 12 14 week recommendation. Despite this however you should ensure that the earliest your kitten leaves its mother is 4 weeks old. If you don t see her monitor the kittens from a distance for a few hours.
Expect to separate the kittens from their mother when they are around 12 weeks old. Why the wait is necessary. A kitten should stay with his mother until a minimum of 10 weeks but preferably 12 weeks. The weaning process usually continues for about another month until the kittens are fully weaned between eight and 10 weeks of age.
The next month of life is still full of essentials for a growing kitten even if it isn t consuming its mother s milk all of the time. Kittens rely on their mother s milk for proper growth and development. If their mother returns leave them be.