Ice Storm Orphans

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Reddit user Bitchola is a vet tech at a high intake animal shelter, and an experienced foster caregiver who is going to school and plans on applying to veterinary school on the fall.

The Mississippi resident posted the photo above to Reddit/Imgur, saying: “A man drove these guys an hour and a half in an ice storm so I could tube feed them after they were orphaned. Aren’t they sweet?”

When someone asked if there were more pics, Bitchola posted an album and told the story:

“These guys were born Sunday, January 26th and were orphaned two days later. Their mom spotted a friendly dog nearby and was so stressed by his presence that she had a seizure and died. Unfortunately, that meant the kittens were motherless in the middle of an ice storm that left most roads impassable and all businesses closed.

“The man caring for them had no experience with orphans and no way to get supplies, so he called for help for hours before finally getting in touch with my shelter. A few staff had braved the weather to care for the shelter animals and man the phones. We knew there would be a lot of calls about missing pets and animals with no shelter. He was so relieved that someone finally answered the phone and offered to help that he drove an hour and a half to get the two day old babies to us. My roommate and I have been caring for them ever since.

“These photos are them at five days old during a feeding (and their first bath).”

Bitchola shared more of the story in conversation with Reddit commenters, including these excerpts from the comment thread:

[The guy who drove them an hour and a half in an ice storm] “is awesome. And he wants to adopt several of them once they are old enough to be fixed.”

“I prefer tube feeding babies this little, especially big litters. With bottles, by the time you get done feeding six kittens, it is time to start over. Also, everything was closed because of the storm.”

“Everyone in the south panics when there is a little ice (often for good reason since many of us don’t know how to deal with it) and there was absolutely nothing open. I was his absolutely only option after calling around for five hours. The kittens had already been without milk for ten hours by the time they got to me and were only two days old. Thankfully, they are all healthy for now and the man made it back home safely.”

“There are so many benefits [to tube feeding]! It is much faster and more efficient. Don’t get me wrong, I love bonding over feeding time, but tube feeding will help keep you sane when you’re feeding every two hours, even through the night. I plan to switch to a bottle when we are doing feedings about every five or six hours. Also, with tube feeding you know precisely how much formula each kitten is getting, which makes record keeping and weight gain much more manageable. Also, I hate cleaning bottles and reusing them, and with this method I can just use a new syringe each few feedings after they start to get icky. And the biggest benefit probably is that the kittens are much less likely to aspirate milk and develop respiratory issues. This method has made fostering orphaned kittens much more manageable since I as well as all of my roommates work full time and go to school full time. It cuts what could easily be an hour long affair down to about six or seven minutes. Which is amazing to me.”

“These kittens are at literally zero risk of being euthanized. I’m personally extremely grateful they are here and cozy with me instead of having died slowly of starvation.”

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For more animal related posts from Bitchola at Reddit click HERE.

The above photos are from the slideshow/Imgur album seen below.  The sideshow includes a few additional photos.

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Karen Harrison Binette

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