so hi to everyone that's watching our livestream um we're here with two of our volunteer kitten
socialisers we're just going to tell you a little bit more about what kitten socialising involves and
how it affects the welfare of the kittens in our care here at Cats Protection so yeah so kitten socialising is
something we do with all the kittens when they're between two to eight weeks old that's when their
sort of brains are still developing and more susceptible to all of the experiences they
have when they're that age so it's important for us to get them used to things like human
contact and different types of litter being sort of poked and prodded a little bit as like a
vet would for their vet checks just to get them used to these things so they're not scared of
them when they're older and it sort of prepares them for going into their new homes we've got a
couple of people on the live chat asking why um you guys are wearing sort of like gloves
and everything so just tell us a little bit about what that's for yeah so that's really
important because at this age the kittens haven't had any vaccinations or anything
so they're quite susceptible to diseases and nasty things like that so it's just
important for us to make sure we've got proper protective equipment on so that we don't pass
anything on to them that could make them poorly and it's also very fashionable as we can see
and how old is this litter of kittens currently so these guys are in between four and five weeks
now so they're quite big and they've already had quite a lot of socialisation already since they
were two weeks old so as you can see there's quite confident and energetic and um they've got quite
used to a lot of the stuff we do with them already like looking into their ears and checking their
paws and things like that just to get them ready for their vet visits when they're older
it's hard to see with the camera angle but someone's just asked how many kittens
there are in the litter because they're all over the place yeah there's five in this litter we have
been struggling to identify who is who because they all look exactly the same they've all got
the white socks there's one of them that's got a white tip on its tail this one here yeah that's
one discernible feature so I think this one's called Roger but all of the others they are very similar makes
socialisation a bit difficult because we can't tell who we've done the checks with and who we
haven't so that might be why these guys are very well socialised because we've done it multiple times
and you're using the straw a lot to play with them as well is that a good sort of basic tool
for kittens a little bit to make sure that they get used to that yeah it's good to get them used
to playing with different toys because they also they obviously have their natural hunting instinct to
pounce and stalk things so it's good to get them used to using different toys when they're little and
we find the straws are quite helpful because when they're kittens and naturally quite curious
and they want to quite often play with your fingers or toes um so we try to distract them
from that by getting them to play with the straw instead and obviously is quite cute when they
play with your fingers at this age but when they're a bit older if they get used to doing that it's gonna
be quite painful for their new owners so it's better to use something a bit safer like a straw
There are a lot of people on our live stream saying how lucky
you guys are to do this job I'd just like to point out it's not actually a job you're volunteering
but yeah it's basically still a good way to spend your time. We feel very lucky we get to do this
it can be quite exhausting at times when they're this energetic but it's a pleasure
and do you guys come most lunchtimes and socialise the kittens how long roughly do
you spend with them um well I mean it's best to socialize with them as much as
possible really until they get worn out um but we try and yeah come over every day almost
at lunch times and usually spend between that half an hour and an hour with them
and that's usually quite enough time to wear them out you'll find and we can pack quite a
lot to those sessions do all the checks and have a lot of playtime and stuff
just for anyone that's new that's joining us on the stream how how old will these kittens
be if they're four or five weeks now how old will they be and they finish their main socialisation
period and they're ready for rehoming so they'll reach the end of their
socialisation period about seven to eight weeks old and then at that point they will be ready
to move up to our homing wing and find their new owners and they'll also be neutered before
that and vaccinated and microchipped before they go to their new homes then it usually
doesn't take the kittens long to find homes they're normally snapped up pretty quickly
again it's important to note about the neutering that's one thing we do put quite an emphasis on here
at Cats Protection it's just making sure that we don't end up with more unwanted kittens in
in our care they can actually get pregnant from quite young yes yeah we usually try to neuter
them when they're around eight weeks before they go to their new homes and as you can see
obviously they are very cute but the center does get quite overrun with kittens especially in the
summer when that's kitten season and it's not really fair in their mums either but because
it's obviously a very stressful time for them to give birth and then so a lot kinder to neuter them
especially when they're this young they bounce back from their operations really quickly you'd
be very surprised usually even the next day they're running around like mad things again
Someone has asked if the litter will stay together until they're rehomed yeah until they're eight weeks they will all
be together still and in the same pen and then when they're eight weeks they may be separated
um into smaller groups if it's um if they're sort of showing signs of getting a bit fed up
with each other by that point but um so most likely all going to different homes
and some of them may be rehomed in pairs but usually they go off to separate
homes I think five kittens is more than enough for anyone a lot of people
don't necessarily know but cats are actually solitary animals a lot of the time they prefer to be on
their own anyway although they can like to be in pairs and things it's not it's not a lonely experience
for a cat to be rehomed on it's own is it at this age they get on with each other but I think it's about
four to twelve months when cats reach social maturity at that point they can decide they don't like eachother anymore
which is very fair enough so it's best for them to be rehomed separately really they get more space that way
so I think we're going to wrap up here now on our Facebook live give these kittens their final
checks get them back in their pen for some lunch so thank you everyone who joined us on the
Facebook live and we'll be aiming to do this every Monday for the next few weeks brighten up our lunchtime
so join us again next week and we'll bring you more kittens live from Cats Protection