Cats well-being

Purring with pleasure
Having a very good sleep
Keeping naturally clean
Scratching for pleasure
Being well brought-up
Eating cat-mint
Playing at hunting

Well-fed, properly wormed, regularly treated against parasites and fully vaccinated, your kitten is developing harmoniously. You love it and want it to keep happy and healthy. Then read the following pieces of advice.

Purring with pleasure

Would you like to hear a very pleasing little piece of music, a purr? Speak softly to your cat as you stroke it. If its mother had been stroked when it was in her womb and if it was itself stroked by the time it was seven weeks old, then it will be delighted. Otherwise, you will need to be patient.

From the very first weeks, use a brush with soft metal bristles and a rubber base, or else a silk brush. Groom your kitten every day if it is long-haired, and two or three times a week otherwise. It will love it, and feel much better for it!

Having a very good sleep

A good lie-in in the morning prepares the way for a whole afternoon´s siesta. The cat-basket, raised up on a chair or other piece of furniture, out of the way of the agitation of the household, is a cosy shelter and personal territory. Let sleeping kittens lie. Like all members of the cat family, your kitten is most alert and active at dawn, and at sunset explore its territory, has a bite to eat, and plays.

Keeping naturally clean

Give your cat a box with 5 to 7 cm of dust-free cat-litter in it, at least 1 metre away from its eating place. It will go there of its own accord. Change the litter regularly: cats are very sensitive to that.

Scratching for pleasure

As a member of the cat family, your kitten needs to scratch as a way of staking out its territory with marks which are at once visible and smellable thanks to the pheromones secreted by glands between the claws. Equally, when it rubs itself up against you, it is marking you, by means of its facial glands, with the calm familiarity of its pheromones. Do not interfere.

Being well brought-up

To prepare the way for the future, from the very start get you kitten used to receiving a few bits of basic care:

• a compress soaked in special eye cleanser, and a cotton bud for the ears if they have black wax in them (otherwise, leave them alone)
• a little toothbrush or a finger-stool to reduce scaling on the teeth
• there are special nail-cutters for claws which get too long- your Vet will be able to let you know just how far to go
• for your own peace and quiet, and for your kitten´s figure, do not let it climb up on to the table during mealtimes and never feed it from your own plate

Eating cat-mint

Even with modern industrial cat-food, perfectly suited to its nutritional requirements, your cat needs to have a pot of cat-mint, which you can buy (for very little) in the market or from a florist´s, unless you grow it yourself.

Playing at hunting

A kitten playing is a sight for sore eyes.

Virtually anything will meet the bill: a ball of paper, a marble, a cork or a ping-pong ball. Watch: it is playing at hunting a mouse, or then a bird, or pretending to catch a fish ... Indefatigably.