Baby seems to be delayed

[Bree2292]

Hi all I’m new here but I wanted to see if anyone had any of these issues with their kittens.
I have an almost 1yr old calico that for her first and hopefully only litter had 7 babies. The first day everything seemed fine, then on day 2 I noticed that 6 of the babies would go to eat and one would just stay away. I tried multiple times to get her to latch to her momma but she won’t even open her mouth to try. At that point I decided that it was gonna be bottle fed right away. Mommy does clean her help her go to the bathroom and will cuddle her when the others are eating which I believe is great. They are 4 weeks old now and starting to wean, as the other 6 will take food very well from a plate and they get wet kitten food mixed with formula she is not even interested unless it is on my finger then she will only eat a little nothing like her brothers and sisters. I thought maybe she is just a little behind and I want to make sure she is still getting everything she needs and I still feed her formula with a syringe but she will not latch to the nipple on that either. She is much smaller then her siblings weighing only 280g and brothers and sisters are pushing up to the 500g mark now. My husband also noticed that she likes to just lay around more and I thought it could be just because she is smaller but her back leg never fully extends. Birth was very easy for my calico and she did not have any complications with each being delivered rarely quickly with my supervision on all of them. I am with them quit a bit throughout the day to make sure she is okay and play but the not eating is very concerning. Please if anyone has had this happen I would love to have some help so I quit worrying about her.

 

[di and bob]

Everything really sounds kinda normal for a bottle fed kitten, they usually are a little behind, especially with eating wet food on a plate. Some of them take kitten formula MUCH longer than nursing kittens with a mama. As long as she is eating some off your finger and syringe feeding, that is good. what concerns me is that leg not extending. She should see a vet and see what i going on, maybe some gentle stretching exercises could help her. I will contact the kitten experts, maybe they can advise you more. All the luck with that precious little mite! Sarthur2 and StefanZ

 

[Sarthur2]

The leg not extending is a contracted tendon issue, likely due to her being squished in the uterus with such a large litter. You’ll need to warm the leg slightly with gentle massage or a bit of heat, then try gently extending it and perhaps doing a few exercises to stretch it and push it back — extend, contract, extend, contract — but do not force the extension. It may take time for the tendon in that leg to loosen up to where you fully extend it, and each time the leg must be warmed up to avoid injury.

This needs to be dealt with now while she is young and the tendons are malleable. She needs to learn to walk and use that leg.

She also needs feeding often in order to gain weight and grow, but at 4 weeks she is not ready to wean. At 280 grams she is the size of a 2-week old, so that is how you must view her feeding schedule until she gets bigger.

Do keep us posted on her progress. With TLC she should grow and learn to walk and be a normal kitten over time.
Bree2292

 

[StefanZ]

Agree with the above.
A tip: An IR-lamp may help up with warming up of these leg tissues, makig it easier to gimnastisize them.

That said, its not impossible baby is a little behind, so to speak. It happens with humans, it surely may happen with cats.
Out in nature, or for a breeder. it would be serious, for a home inside only cat its no big deal...