Every Queen pregnancy is amazing and unique! The process of finding your Queen a mate, to making sure your Queen is happy and healthy throughout their pregnancy, to finally delivering kittens is never alike and the growth us breeders go through each time never stops being nerve-wracking and exciting.
In this instance, our Sire, Ken, and Queen, Touka, did some secret ninja mating that ended with Touka becoming pregnant back in March of 2024. I had a suspicion that she was pregnant again, but there's no pee stick for kittens! You have to put your "are you pregnant" detective glasses on and search for the signs; the earliest of which is the pinking of the Queen's nipples at about 18 days to eventually a noticeable size difference of their bellies at about 35 days. There is a lot of tracking, math and preparation for birth (similar to humans!) to ensure that we have everything needed on-hand from the birth of the kittens to when they finally go to their "furever" homes, except the timeframe for preparation is significantly less! Pregnancy in female cats is only about 61-67 days! Imagine if humans only had a gestation period of 2-3 months...How's that for 3am intrusive thoughts!
There are ways to try and figure out how many kittens your Queen may have through ultrasounds and, even more exact (but still not always accurate), x-rays. They are not necessary, of course, but if you're like me and are semi-lacking in the patience department, I just had to know with Touka! The ultrasound she had shown approximately 8 kittens. Unfortunately, there is a 10-20% likelihood that you will lose a kitten or two no matter how well your Queen is cared for and, with this litter, we sadly did lose one. Deep breaths and lots of crying later, there were 7 beautiful kittens to care and nurture. This second litter we had: 2 Female Torties, 2 Black Smoke Males, 2 Solid Black Males and 1 Blue Male! Males dominated again for round 2!
What's to come: We are hoping for a successful mating between our Queen, Ayah, and our Sire, Ken! Ken's appetite is insatiable (as is normal for intact male cats, but still makes me chuckle)! If my calculations are correct, we will know if Ayah is showing those first signs of pregnancy around 22 July 2024! Cross your fingers with me!
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