Kittens trying to nurse on a male cat

[gailc]

I can't say I've ever run across this before.
Inky & Badger are about 14 weeks old and this started about 2- 2 1/2 weeks ago.
Bakker my 7 yr old neutered male is a social groomer. He licks anything!

Anyhow Badger was being groomed by him and she nuzzled in like she was trying to nurse on him. Inky has done this as well but not as much as Badger-mainly in the middle of the night. Not quite sure what they are sucking on!

Anyhow Bakker lets them. If it was a momma cat she would get up and walk away but he seems to enjoy this. I usually end up picking Bakker up and off the bed to stop this behavior. Maybe when they lose their baby teeth this would stop? Should I let this continue or how to stop it?

 

[momofmany]

My OTB Max allowed 2 kittens (Boris and Bogart) to nurse off of him. After a while he actually started to lactate. I asked the vet about it at the time and he said no harm, but couldn't tell me if the kittens were getting anything nutritious.

Boris died very young from FIP, but Bogart and Max developed an extremely close bond their entire lives together.

It's weird, but no harm in it.

 

[sk_pacer]

FWIW, my neighbour and I shared a tomcat (wild and not neutered) and he adored kittens. Gimpy would let kittens crawl all over him and allowed them to try nursing on him and my Jack (neutered) would allow it as well and the poor guy tried to raise an abandoned litter himself. It isn't as unusual as one would think - in an established colony, even a small one, mothers will often foist babies off to a tom they trust after said babies are well mobile. Another neighbour has a pretty good number of cats, and you see the toms and older kittens together in their yard. I have also had toms (neutered or not) drag kittens here, completely unharmed.

 

[gailc]

All the cats get along really well each other but they have attached (haha) themselves to Bender-again in the wee hours of the morning-not any other time. I will have to keep track of how long this keeps up.

 

[catsallaround]

I have run into this while bottle raising kittens. As long as the adult is happy I would let it be. Keep eye on area for any sign of irratation. Only issue I ran into was a kitten nursing its brother(to young to know any better) and that kitten ended up with a sore there, they were days old though.

 

[my4llma]

Luna used to try to do that to

Lynxx

when she 1st came here. He'd get up and run away.