A hero mum cat came to the aid of an orphaned, male kitten recently, when she accepted him in her litter and brought him up as one of her own at The Mayhew Animal Home.
Despite already nursing four of her own kittens and being blind in one eye, one-year- old rescue cat Carrie quickly stepped up to become a surrogate mum for ten-day- old Spiro, who was found as a stray without his mum and was desperately looking for some feline, motherly love.
The Mayhew’s Animal Welfare Officers were first alerted to Carrie when a concerned member of the public called to say they’d spotted a heavily pregnant, stray cat with a bad eye living in West Kilburn, North London.
Straight away the Vet Team spotted that Carrie’s right eye was in a bad state; it was inflamed and there was a layer of scar tissue overlying the eye – it was evident she could not see out of it.
After two days at the Home, Carrie gave birth to six little kittens. Sadly two of her kittens passe away very shortly after birth and could not be revived by the Vet Team. Thankfully, Carrie’s other kittens, named aptly after famous Carries’ such as, Fisher, Bradshaw, Mulligan and Sissy (Spacek), were all healthy and happy.
Two weeks later, The Mayhew’s Animal Welfare Officers were called out to rescue ten-day- old, black and white kitten, Spiro, who was found abandoned in a garden without his mum.
Being so young, the Mayhew’s cattery team knew that for Spiro to be able to grow up into a healthy, normal adult cat, he would need either hand-rearing or a surrogate mum.
Though The Mayhew try to do everything they can to step into the mum’s paws, there is never a real replacement for a caring, feline mother, and so the team decided to see if Carrie would take Spiro under her wing.
The Mayhew’s head of animal welfare, Gillian Notton, said: “We suspected that Carrie would make a good surrogate mum as she has such a gentle, caring temperament.
“As her kittens are also a very similar age to Spiro, we also knew that her milk would be at the right stage for his development and that the others weren’t old enough to push him out of the litter.
“We slowly introduced Spiro to the litter, and despite the other kittens hissing at him at first, Carrie did not seem upset and appeared happy to welcome Spiro into her litter. After about ten minutes, Spiro settled down and joined the other kittens suckling for milk, and thankfully Carrie did not seem to mind, happily taking on the abandoned kitten.
“We kept checking in on the litter every five or ten minutes throughout the day and night, but Carrie seemed relaxed and happy with the little edition to her family. No more than a day later, Spiro was completely settled in the litter.
“Being a young mother who’s blind in one eye, Carrie’s been so brave through everything and truly is the world’s best mum.”
For more information visit www.themayhew.org
