Also it's a good idea to make sure kitty is doing well since she's in contact with your other pets. Plus you want to make sure she gets her vaccinations, which she should probably be getting before February.
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Got a Kitten for Christmas
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She already has all her required vaccinations. We are waiting until February to get her neutered, and to get her any other shots she can't get now because she is too young.
I'm going to move this thread to the kitten forum. 
They already vaccinated her? She's not old enough for her first shots yet if she's only five weeks old. That's a bit concerning.
My Starbuck used to do this when she was six weeks old. She would throw up and then go right back to eating. I took her to the vet right away for a check-up and asked the vet about it. Given her history they told me she was healthy but was eating too fast for her tummy to digest the food. They thought the behavior could be happening because she was scared her food would go away. I started feeding smaller more frequent meals on a schedule and the behavior stopped on it's own in a little over a week. Starbuck was abandoned out a car window when she was only four weeks old. She was saved right away by a friend's family who saw what happened and took her inside immediately. My friends tried to adopt her but one of their cats wanted to kill her so we offered to take her in and see if our senior cats would tolerate a baby kitten. We were very lucky because they adopted her immediately.
Frankie is adorable.
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Most vets in the united states will give you a FREE Kitten exam with a new shelter pet. You just have to call and and ask. They do this hoping you will choose them as your cats vet. She is too young to be away from the shelter, mom and siblings and too young to have received any shots.
I think you best look at her medical records as something is amiss. In addition most shelter pets are fixed prior to them allowing you to take them home. They made me wait till my cat was 10 weeks old to take home and she was fixed and had two set of shots by then. Rabies shot happens at 4 months.
Make sure you let many humans love on her and have her socialize with other cats and dogs-after she has her shots and they theirs so she will like other creatures. Don't leave her alone with grown animals they can hurt her.
She is a doll. The next 20 years of your life you are a mom.
I think you best look at her medical records as something is amiss. In addition most shelter pets are fixed prior to them allowing you to take them home. They made me wait till my cat was 10 weeks old to take home and she was fixed and had two set of shots by then. Rabies shot happens at 4 months.
Make sure you let many humans love on her and have her socialize with other cats and dogs-after she has her shots and they theirs so she will like other creatures. Don't leave her alone with grown animals they can hurt her.
She is a doll. The next 20 years of your life you are a mom.
My 2 cats both became sick within a week of arriving here. And I had a foster kitten who had tapeworms when she arrived. It's not unusual due to the stress of a new home and if the kitten came from a shelter, there may have been something going around. I would check with a vet. You can call the people who you adopted her from and get the name of a vet who is good with small kittens.
[article="29716"]Identifying Common Ailments In Cats Adopted From Animal Shelters And Rescue Groups [/article]
[article="29716"]Identifying Common Ailments In Cats Adopted From Animal Shelters And Rescue Groups [/article]
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Not enough information... for example, how soon after eating is she vomiting? has she been checked for parasites? has she had symptoms of a URI? is she stressed by your dogs?
In some cases, a bit of clear, kind of mucous-like vomit is just a sign of upset tummy. I know my (older-than-your) kitten did a few instances of this when we first brought her home, and it was because she went a long time during the night not having any food to eat (last meal around 5pm, and by 3-4 am, she was hungry with a little "acid tummy"). She had been used to eating at least once between 12am-4am, and we were trying to introduce her to 5 meals throughout daytime hours but with less food at night. With a kitten as young as yours, she will need to eat a lot and quite frequently (and I would try to feed her during a nighttime meal shift, too -- 5 wks old is YOUNG!)
It's a very good idea when getting a new kitten to have an initial, thorough well-check with a vet as soon as possible, so you can rule out parasite, health or other issues, if possible, and treat them if they exist. Franky is very cute!
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She hasn't thrown up at all today, and I think it was because I was giving her a little too much wet food. The hard food seems to give her better poop and I can leave it out longer so she can nibble whenever she wants. She has not been acting tired or anything and she was dewormed the day I got her.
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It's best to feed a kitten, especially one that small, frequent small meals. Wet food can be fed in meals, and then the dry food left out all the time. She needs to be able to eat whenever she's hungry.
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I've been just mixing it in with some hard food.
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Leave the dry kitten food out all the time so she can eat freely (She should be on strictly Kitten food for the first year to ensure she is getting all the nutrients to grow). Feed the wet food separately - don't mix with the dry. Wet food should not sit out any longer than 3 or 4 hours at the most to deter spoilage and bacteria growth which could make her sick. Give her small amounts that she can eat in one sitting and add a little more if she finishes it right away so you have an idea as to how much to give her at each feeding. Tightly cover and store the rest in the refrigerator until the next feeding. Four or five wet meals a day would be good. Be sure she has plaenty of FRESH water available! Sit it a little distance from her food so she doesn't gunk her water up with kibbles. Cat's don't like nasty water!
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I would be giving her kitten milk replacer- she's still young to be without mom. I had my kitten on it until around 8-9 weeks. Keep in mind they need to be dewormed more than once.
I know it sounds like a lot that we're mentioning here, but kittens are a lot of work! I hadn't had one in 13 years, just had adult cats that span of time, and when I got kittens in July I was in a bit over my head at first. Two 8-week-old strays that needed massive amounts of kitten food (wet and dry), vet care (several visits for several series of shots), several rounds of deworming (for them and my current pets because the kittens could not be isolated), and more toys than I could count. Thankfully the toys were all given to me by a friend whose kittens had outgrown them.
I really do think you should get the medical records from the shelter, because I don't think they could have given all of their shots, if any. You should have actually been given them on the day of the adoption. Or if the person who gave it to you as a gift has them, you may need to go to that person. Shots need to be given in a timely manner, particularly with distemper. Do you know what shot she was given beforehand you adopted her?
I learned a lot from having my kittens. Particularly, that older cats a lot easier! Kittens are cute but they are also crazy and I spent about $500 (for initial checkup, vax, deworming, neutering) on each one since I didn't get them through a shelter. I'm guessing in your case the shelter is footing the bill though for the upcoming vax / neutering.
I'm really surprised they adopted out so early. Most shelters I know won't even let people see kittens before 6 weeks old. And the one I went to, they can't be adopted until 12 weeks old and already neutered/vaxxed.
I really do think you should get the medical records from the shelter, because I don't think they could have given all of their shots, if any. You should have actually been given them on the day of the adoption. Or if the person who gave it to you as a gift has them, you may need to go to that person. Shots need to be given in a timely manner, particularly with distemper. Do you know what shot she was given beforehand you adopted her?
I learned a lot from having my kittens. Particularly, that older cats a lot easier! Kittens are cute but they are also crazy and I spent about $500 (for initial checkup, vax, deworming, neutering) on each one since I didn't get them through a shelter. I'm guessing in your case the shelter is footing the bill though for the upcoming vax / neutering.
I'm really surprised they adopted out so early. Most shelters I know won't even let people see kittens before 6 weeks old. And the one I went to, they can't be adopted until 12 weeks old and already neutered/vaxxed.
Midnight cost me $445 in her first four months due to vaccinations and a minor operation on her nose, not to mention kitten food, bedding, litter box (took to it immediately), and cute cat toys. Buying the bed wasn't useful until about a year later, as she slept on pillow at night! I would also suggest leaving the food out; some felines just take a bit longer. She got dewormed twice in her first 15 weeks, so know that this may not be as uncommon as some would believe. Goes without saying (but I will do so anyway) that kittens need LOTS AND LOTS of affection and love; you are his or her new parent now after all! (I replaced her water 4 times a day, cats do not and will not drink skanky H2O!)
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She is sitting on my shoulder as I type this. I have no special formula just kitten food hard and wet. She seems to not like the wet very much and usually just goes for the dry which I leave out for her all the time. I'm contacting where we got her from soon. My mom may have even talked to them today. We will get her shots sorted out. All I know right now is that she was dewormed the day we got her.
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People keep bringing up shots to me, and I am contacting the place where I got her to see what she needs. All I know is that she was dewormed the day I got her. I will also talk to the vet. She was a Christmas gift, I don't know every exact detail about where I got her.
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I think getting her checked over by a vet is the best thing to do. If you have a contact number for the shelter where you got her it would be a good idea to pass this on to the vet. Your vet can then find out everything they need from the shelter vet.
Good luck with your kitten, she's adorable.
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People are giving you general kitten advice because that is what you originally asked for. She's just very young, which is abnormal from a shelter, and we are trying to help you to be as informed as possible. Now you know the questions to ask, and you can proceed to keep her as healthy as possible. Best of luck to both of you. Let us know when you hear from the shelter.
She's adorable! I got my kitten at 6 weeks and she's fine. It might be worth getting a free kitten check from a vet in order to make sure she is alright and to discuss caring for her. I'd definitely be careful when the dogs are eating, one of Pumpkin's brothers almost got himself killed trying to eat the dog's food.
