You've just brought a little kitten home and now you're ready to embark on a journey of companionship together. Congratulations! Whether you got your cat from a private home or saved a life by adopting from a shelter, you are certain to have many joyful years ahead of you. Kittens have very specific requirements for staying healthy and growing up happy. Here are some of the basics.
-- If your kitten is 6-8 weeks old, then keep in mind that she has just left her mother's care and has been used to getting her nutrition by nursing. Since you are now her substitute "mommy" or "daddy" it is up to you to make sure she is being fed a nutritionally adequate diet.
Never feed her cat food meant for adults: its nutritional content (such as amount of protein and calcium), size, and texture are very different from food meant for kittens. As a rule, go with a more expensive brand instead of one of the cheapest: there are good nutritional reasons why it costs more.
Make sure to feed her kitten food for an entire year, even though she'll seem grown up before then. Although a spoonful of canned kitten food is fine for a treat every once in a while, give her dry cat food for her main diet. Just as eating raw carrots and apples helps to strengthen our teeth, dry food will help to keep kitty's teeth stronger, healthier, and freer of plaque. Cats that are fed exclusively canned food diets often suffer from tooth decay and even tooth loss at a relatively early age.
-- Handle your kitten often and make sure she gets plenty of exercise. A cat's life projected life expectancy is markedly shortened if you allow her to go outside: for safety's sake, keep her indoors throughout her life. It is up to you to give her the exercise she needs by providing her with toys and playing with her yourself.
Give her a chance to let off plenty of energy by dragging a homemade string/paper toy around the house: the best toys don't cost a lot of money. The more you pet her and play with her, the better socialized to people she'll become and your relationship and closeness will deepen.
-- Encourage her to sharpen her claws in the right place. All kittens and adult cats need to use their claws to stretch: the problems come when they don't do it where they are "supposed" to. Declawing your kitten is usually not necessary, and it's a painful procedure to boot.
Get a scratching post from a pet supply store and rub it with her favorite blanket so that it will have her scent on it. If it smells like her, she will adopt it as her own. If she's scratching where she shouldn't, you may have to put the scratching post near that spot and then put her by the post when she begins to scratch.
