# Barn Kittys, graphic warning



## nancy d (Oct 5, 2007)

A few weeks ago we had a doe come here for breeding. She did not look pregnant. Long story but she came, five minute ride....a week later had two kids. They were dead when I saw them. I was not here when she had them. The two barn kittys were helping clean up..it looked like they ate the ears off of one and a few bites off the nose of same kid. I do not know if they were viable kids but they looked full term. Since it was someon elses doe I did not take them for necropsy. 
Am I going to have to keep these cats out of the kidding pen in the future!!?? Or was this just a freak thing? Anyone have any experience like this with their barn cats?


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## Sara (Oct 5, 2007)

Wow! Nancy that's really freaky. I've never had barn cats before but I've never herd of them doing that.


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## kelebek (Oct 5, 2007)

They will do that if they are dead. Cats are still carnevoirs (sp) even though we have domesticated them. That is why they eat mice and what not.

I think they will be fine around live babies, might get to the afterbirth and what not though.


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## sweetgoats (Oct 18, 2007)

WOW, I had a doe that was given to us, I took her to a place to be bred, and they called me and told me that she had babies. We had no idea that she was bred, neither did the person that we goat her from. She was FAT, but we all thought it was just fat. When I took her to the buck she had no bag at all, she was like 11 years old then. 
I could not imagine a cat getting near my baby goats. If they just try to look in the pen, the mom chases them right out.


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## nancy d (Oct 5, 2007)

Thanks Kelebek, I hopeyou are right, that they WERE dead when kittys got to them. They were licking blood and just about to open the body when I got there. 
The poor little things weighed a total of 10lbs....Looking back I should have known the doe was pg. Even tho she was only a little "fat"
After the end of July she was their only goat. So I don't know if she was all stressed out because of it, got butted while she was here or what. She was born here herself. 
It didn't look like they even tried to make it...laying on their sides .a couple of feet away from each other. I arrived on the scene within an hour or so, she had already passed the afterbirth. She was down in a corner outside under the canopy on a mild day, the rest of the herd had cleared out.


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## kelebek (Oct 5, 2007)

Sounds like she knew that there was something wrong and so she went to do what she had to.

Although I have never had babies at my ranch YET, I have been a veterinary nurse for 7 years, and it was not uncommon for a mom to deliver dead babies, and then walk away from them either because they were dead or knew that there was something very wrong with them to where they would not make it. It is a survival instinct on the mom's side. 

I am sorry that you lost these babies, but for some reason they were not ment to be. 

Good luck!


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## nancy d (Oct 5, 2007)

Its OK about the babies, these things do happen. She was standing around the birth spot crying, even after I removed the babies. Thats what broke my heart; her wailing.


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## fcnubian (Oct 23, 2007)

i didnt read all the replies...

but my barn cats are just fine with the kids, newborns included. i have one cat that is a good hunter, she gets anything from birds to chipmunks, to mice. She hasn't eve acted like she has any interest in the kids.


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## nancy d (Oct 5, 2007)

thanks for your input too Amy, I have this gut feeling that they would not bother anything live, but being new at all this wanted feedback!


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## goatnutty (Oct 9, 2007)

My cats sleep with my goats.They have never bothered them.


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