This is a brilliant video on how to socialise feral kittens. I guess kittens are easier to socialise than adult cats but it takes patience nonetheless. I take away five thoughts from the video:
- Patience;
- use food as a reward to overcome fear of people – socialising is done before and during feeding time;
- use play as a way of engaging with feral kittens to create trust;
- be prepared to say goodbye to your socialized kittens – the hardest part;
- foster carers are angels as their work is entirely selfless; they do it for others, the cats and the adopters.
The man who is behind Flatbush Cats is a sort of angel himself. It is all about giving which is an enormous talent. Few people have this degree of altruism in them.
I love the precision of the trapping process. It was carried out with great competence. But perhaps the outstanding aspect of this video comes from the words at the end when he says that the hardest part is to say goodbye to the kittens that have been so carefully and patiently socialised. This inevitably results in a close bond between human and kitten. I don’t know how he does it. My single effort of socialising one feral cat as a foster carer resulted in me adopting the cat because I simply could not say goodbye.
Perhaps the greatest admiration goes to foster carers who are so selfless was so impressive. And this guy is impressive too. It isn’t just the socialisation of the kittens which is done with such care and intelligence, it is the filming of the process as well. A lot of effort has clearly gone into how to film the process. That doubles up the workload. I guess he makes the videos for a source of income because he runs a non-profit cat rescue organisation. YouTube can be a good source of advertising income. It is more productive in terms of advertising revenue than the written word.
SOME MORE ON SOCIALISATION OF CATS:
Do cats need to socialize with other cats in order to be happy and healthy?
Test that your cat is fully domesticated when interacting with you
Presence of mother during socialisation of kittens can be a positive or negative influence
Example of using positive reinforcement to socialise a cat (video)
Awesome FIV senior TNR cat story. She socialized him with a wooden spoon!
Woman’s Lifelong Project. Socializing a Blind Feral Cat
What does raised underfoot mean?
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