Tuesday 28th October 2008 - Jorja's kittens are doing really well now and are almost as big as Foxy from Keira's litter.

Last night a couple of them got in Keira's room and we didn't notice they were there for a while as they blend in so well with Keira's three!

The crafty so and so's were after more dinner :)

Monday 20th October 2008 - At last we feel as though we're getting somewhere.

Jorja's kittens were really sick with diarrhoea last week.  Over the weekend we thought we may have lost one little boy.  However this time we were ready with the Septrin straight away and they recovered really quickly once we started with that...what a relief!

One of the little boys ate so much tonight he looked like a barrel on legs :)

We've decided to keep Freddy as we've fallen in love with him....we're really not cut out for breeding.

Saturday 20th September 2008 - Harry was rehomed with Charlotte. Charlotte already has an older Bengal so Harry should be happy with her. Freddy seems to be over the loss of his brother and is snuggling with Uncle Neelix.

Friday 12th September 2008 - The other silver girl has died. There won't be any updates for a while as we're devastated and need to think about things.

Thursday 11th September 2008 - Our dark silver spotted girl dies.

Monday 8th September 2008 - Tracy took the kittens to see the Head vet in the practice and he was very concerned at the condition of some of them, one boy seems unaffected but some are wasting away.

He has given all of the kittens a fluid injection and kept them in overnight.

Sunday 7th September 2008 - One of Keira's silver boys died, we found him at around 10:30 and he'd be OK an hour before.

We had been increasingly disturbed by the ongoing diarrhoea problems that Keira's babies have had so we took them all to the emergency vets. She had a look at them and advised us to give them chicken and plenty of fluids especially Cimicat and advised that she couldn't do anything further until the missing results were in.

We took them home boiled some chicken, made up some Cimicat and fed and watered them. Then we gave them a bath and put them in their room where they all cuddled up together.

We both feel like giving up breeding.

Friday 5th September 2008 - Two of the tests are back from the faeces tests and there is no bacterial infection and no salmonella? So we're still non the wiser!

Monday 2nd September 2008 - We took faeces samples to the vets and are hoping that there is an answer to this problem.

Saturday 31st August 2008 - Keira's kittens, along with Keira and Jorja, have chronic diarrhoea so we took one of them to the vets, Jorja has had hers since we got her but we thought it was stress.

We have been advised to give them all Panacur worming treatment for three consecutive days and collect faecal samples to take to the vets for testing to make sure that it's nothing more serious.

Saturday 30th August 2008 - The second little girl dies at around 5am despite our best efforts to save her, this is all very upsetting.

Jorja and her remaining four kittens appear to be doing well.

Friday 29th August 2008 - One of Jorja's girls is dead when we get up and we notice that another one doesn't appear to be thriving. We give the surviving girl some formula which she takes.

In the evening the little girl is still not sucking from mum so we take her out of the box and try to feed her ourselves but it's not looking good.

Tuesday 26th August 2008 - Jorja went into labour at around 10:30pm on Monday, just as we were getting ready to go to bed for work the next day. She finally gave birth to the first one at around 12:30am and then had five more which kept us up most of the night. She has three boys and three girls, all silver spotted.

No work today!

Saturday 23rd August 2008 - Bruiser and Risa are rehomed with Gary. It was a late decision to let Risa go with her brother as they had become close and we felt that Gary could would be able to give her more time and attention than us. We wish them all well.

Friday 15th August 2008 - Sisko's cat run is built and he is really enjoying it, see picture on home page.

Tuesday 12th August 2008 - Lursa's babies have now had their second injections and are ready for rehoming.

Sunday 10th August 2008 - Our big cat run is built.

Sunday 27th July 2008 - We've had some knocks lately and have found things quite tough but we've decided not to sacrifice quality so we'll be scaling down a bit and biding our time.

After Jorja has had her babies we'll be waiting a while before letting one of the girls go with Sisko, however much they and he complain!  Perhaps he'll be lucky in the Autumn.

Wednesday 23rd July 2008 - We barred Lursa's babies from their bedroom and moved Jorja in so she can get some peace now that she's pregnant. She'll stay in there until the babies are weaned.

Tuesday 22nd July 2008 - Lursa and her babies all had their vaccinations this evening, the first for the kittens. I think the people in the vets hate us as the place is never quiet when we're there :)

Monday 21st July 2008 - Keira's babies continue to thrive although the biggest boy didn't put any weight on today. We've decided that we're unable to let Lursa's girl, Risa, go as we've become to close to her. Having to hand feed her from young as meant that we've become too attached and she'll stay with us as a pet. She'll be spayed as soon as she's old enough.

Jorja is definitely pregnant, I'd say 2-3 weeks.  We'll be moving her out of the cattery and into her own room as soon as we can find somewhere else for Lursa's little ones.

Friday 18th July 2008 - We were devastated when Anara's second and final baby died tonight. It seems as though it just wasn't meant to be as Keira had certainly accepted the poor little thing and we tried to force feed her but she just wouldn't suckle.

Thursday 17th July 2008 - Unfortunately when we got home from work today Anara's little kitten had died. I guess the first 24 hours was crucial and she wasn't big or strong enough to make it. Maybe if we'd been home today......but who knows.

Her bigger sister seems to be doing OK but we'll have to keep a watching brief and we need to buy some electronic scales so that we can keep an eye on all the kittens weight.

We took Anara to the vet and he is sure there is nothing wrong with her so he just gave her a long lasting antibiotic injection. He asked if we were going to try and reintroduce the kitten in which case he would have tried to stimulate the milk but Anara can be difficult so we decided that the kitten was better off with Supermum Keira.

Hopefully between us we can make sure that Keira's 6 and Anara's 1 remaining kitten survive.

Wednesday 16th July 2008 - We almost had a disaster.

Unfortunately while doing this we noticed that one of the babies, the smallest one, was very floppy. We tried to get it to suckle but it just wasn't interested and the other, bigger, one didn't seem interested either! On further checking it seemed that Anara did not have any milk and the area under her nipples are lumpy.

Panic set it but then we decided to try and put the babies in with Keira's six babies that were born the day before. We called Keira out of the room and smuggled the two 'aliens' in amongst the others, the size difference was very evident for the little one although the bigger one was a similar size. When Keira came in she had a sniff and a little grizzle but then lay down and we tried to attach the newcomers. Unfortunately the little one still wasn't suckling so we decided to give her some formula which she took. Later we managed to get both kittens to attach to Keira and we're now hoping that they will start to feed and grow as normal. We'll also be ready with the formula, when we can, just in case.

Keira is such an angel but what a nightmare kittens are!

Anara will be going to the vets.

Tuesday 15th July 2008 - Got home from work today and Anara was in hiding. When we eventually found her tucked away in the dirtiest part of the garage it was obvious that she was about to give birth very soon.

We managed to get her into a box and around 2 hours later she'd had two spotted kittens, the first one was huge.

She was very unsure with the first one and looked like she wanted to eat it but she soon settled down once it started crying and the mothering instinct appears to have kicked in.

We were sure she had more babies to come but in the end it was obvious that there were no more coming.

Monday 14th July 2008 - Keira has given birth to SIX babies. There was quite a big gap between them, the poor thing was giving birth for more than 6 hours. All babies seem healthy and all are spotted.

Wednesday 10th July 2008 - We had to take Lursa's little girl to the vets as she was not eating and Lursa is no longer feeding them. The vet gave her some fluids as she was very de-hydrated. We now need to give her regular formula mixtures. The boys are all thriving.

Monday 30th June 2008 - Lursa's kittens, now six weeks old, have started eating solid food.

Saturday 21st June 2008 - We're informed that Whisper has settled really well in her new home and has taken over the household. Tracy noticed that both Anara and Keira are pregnant so sexy Sisko has struck again.

Saturday 7th June 2008 - Our two new Queen's, Jorja and Vash, arrived today from Emma Hall.

Monday 2nd June 2008 - Benji was rehomed today with Sarah. We know he'll be very happy but this has made us particularly sad as he is a great character and loves to snuggle. Good luck Benji.

Sunday 1st June 2008 - Whisper was rehomed today. This was a sad decision for us as she is so lovely but she wasn't going to make a Queen and will be better off with no other cats around. She needs to be pampered.

Thursday 29th May 2008 - We see the senior vet who confirms Benji's heart murmur and says that if we were keeping him as a pet he'd advise us not to worry.  The problem is someone is supposed to be having him on Monday.

Lursa and the babies are doing fine, we think there are at least two silver boys, another boy we're not quite sure of the colour and one brown girl.  They seem to be changing all the time though.  It's amazing how good a mum Lursa is for such a young cat.

I think Keira may be pregnant again, it's probably too soon after the last litter but she does seem to enjoy the whole process

Wednesday 28th May 2008 - We found out today that Benji has a heart murmur.

Sunday 18th May 2008 - Up at 9am and straight into the room where Lursa gave birth but...no Lursa and no kittens!

Then we hear a cry, she's moved them to a box full of bits and pieces which really isn't appropriate and is quite dangerous.  However, fortunately, they all still look fine.

The hunt is now on to try and find somewhere that is secure and that Lursa will accept. Once again we try the box and blanket we had prepared for her but she wasn't having that at all. Eventually we decide to evict Keira and the boys, well they're 11 weeks old today, from their bedroom upstairs and put Lursa and the babies in there....in the box she rejected downstairs. Fortunately it seems she feels more secure in this room and she settles down and lets us attach the babies for feeding!

Lursa is continuing to feed and now seems settled in 'her' new room.

Saturday 17th May 2008 - 10:15am and Lursa has had her first kitten, in our unused downstairs dining room and in an igloo bed that Keira also chose for birthing.  Unfortunately it's stillborn and Lursa shows no interest so we remove the dead baby.

At 11am the second one starts coming out, but it's breech and we have a difficult time getting the poor little thing out.  Lursa gets really stressed and is clearly in pain but we manage to deliver it after a struggle, this one seems OK and Lursa cleans it up.

Around 20 minutes later another comes out breech, this one is a much easier birth though. Another 20 minutes and we have a third kitten, this one born normally. After a big gap of around 2 hours Lursa gives birth to her fourth live kitten, also a normal birth, so in all she had five.   We had to cut the cords for all of the kittens other than the first breech one which broke off during delivery.

We try to move Lursa and the babies to a nice warm box with a blanket but she starts getting stressed and grabbing the kittens by any part of their body so we decide to leave her in the igloo which is very messy.

Tuesday 6th May 2008 - Benji had his first check up and injection today. Shinzon was unable to have his injection as he has conjunctivitis which needs to be cleared up first, the vet prescribed some antibiotic eye drops.

Saturday 12th April 2008 - Our spotty boy has found a new owner and his new name is Benji.

Friday 4th April 2008 - Disaster strikes, two days after we noticed that something was wrong with Circle of Life she slipped away at 7:15pm. It happened really quick and we can only assume that Keira or Neelix accidentally injured her in some way as she was fine before and seemed to be getting on well, even if she was petite. Rest in peace Lil' Angel you'll be missed.

Wednesday 2nd April 2008 - We took the marble girl to the vets today as her chest felt a bit strange. It seems that she may have been slightly squashed in the womb but her heart and lungs were checked and are fine and she is in good health. She's about half the size of the two boys.

Monday 24th March 2008 - For some reason Keira actually lets our neuteured Tom, Neelix, get in the box with the babies and lets him wash them....how cute!

Saturday 22nd March 2008 - Another look at the kittens has convinced us that the marble is a girl....it's certainly not easy telling the sex of such little beauties!

Sunday 16th March 2008 - Anara began calling today and Sisko was definitely after her, not sure if he was successful though. Come May we could have three litters.

Saturday 15th March 2008 - We've had a closer look at the kittens, much to mum's disapproval, and we now believe that all three are boys.

Friday 14th March 2008 - Sisko is now really getting into the swing of things as he introduces Lursa to his charms

Wednesday 12th March 2008 - Sisko manages to score with a reluctant Whisper...he is good! The kittens are doing well and Keira is very protective but we've managed to sex them as two males (marble and large spots) and one girl (small spots)

Sunday 2nd March 2008 - Keira gives birth to three brown kittens, one spotted, one marble and one rosetted.  We believe that the rosetted and marble ones are boys and the spotted one is a girl....TBC.

Friday 28th February 2008 - At last! After two unsuccessful matings with external studs our gorgeous silver boy, Sisko, did the business at his first attempt. Keira is now 8 weeks pregrant, she's quite big so we're hoping for a bumper parcel around the beginning of next week

Sunday 30th December 2007 - Keira and Sisko begin mating