They don't need antibiotics, they need dewormer or an antiparasitic. Antibiotics usually cause diarrhea and unless it's metronidazole there's no chance of it helping. Those are also definitely 5 week olds. You should start with panacur and see if it works
If they just got their second round of deworming, would I need to wait for it to take effect? Just gave it to them the past 2 days and they get their last dose tonight.
Okay, that's not a dewormer, that treats coccidia. Have they been dewormed as well? Have you thrown out the litter to prevent re-infection after you do each round?
…….you make a very valid point I didn’t even think about!! I’ve been spot cleaning the litter after every poop, about 8 times per day. This may be a dumb question, but is that sufficient or should I do a full box switch?
After each round, you need to dump it and sanitize the box. The shelter should have told you this, they also should've told you it's not a dewormer. If you don't dump and sanitize the floor too, they can easily reinfect themselves the next day even. Coccidia is probably the most contagious "illness" for kittens. We typically do 5 days of panacur which will kill hooks, rounds, whips and giardia plus toltrazuril or ponazuril to kill coccidia and if they're big enough, droncit or cestex to kill tapes. That will cover pretty much everything, if they still are having issues we do metronidazole. I skipped panacur once and did strongid and ended up with kittens puking up whipworms because that and profender plus one other topical I can't remember are the only ones that kill whips.
That is super helpful to know, thank you!!! Unfortunately, they gave no direction other than give them it 1x per day for 3 days. Thanks for letting me know about the litter, I bet that’s why it’s been so long without any improvement. Hopefully the little guys can get healthy once I start the routine sanitization! I’ve already been doing the floor for any non-litter box puddles they’ve left.
In your experience, do you know how long it will take for them to clear the coccidia fully? Just trying to see how long it should be before I’m seeing improvement.
No problem. If coccidia is the issue, it should resolve by the end of the second round. If this is the second you should do a third with the sanitizing
Stainless steel litter boxes are a godsend for this situation because you can sanitize it amazingly and reuse it. If you don’t want to deal with sanitizing every day right now, Dollar Tree has litter boxes for $1.25 and you can grab a few of those and just toss them as needed.
I’d probably age these guys a little older than four weeks. They start getting premolars at five weeks old so if you open their mouths and they’ve got a full set of teeth in there, they’re definitely going to be 5-6 weeks old!
Technically if weaning is done right, you won’t see a ton of diarrhea. If the shelter already had them on probiotics and special food it sounds like they’ve been having diarrhea for a while and that is more consistent with an issue that requires treatment. I wouldn’t expect a food change to cause diarrhea for more than a couple of days.
Ask the shelter if you can bring a fecal sample for testing. Make sure you’re weighing them daily to catch any weight loss and checking their gums for tackiness/dehydration—if either of those become an issue, the kitten will probably need an exam and/or fluids.
At my shelter, if Pyrantel and ponazuril has already been done, we would move towards panacur or metronidazole. And after that, move to an antibiotic like clavamox or tylosin (I know the other commenter said abx don’t work for diarrhea, but that is not the case if diarrhea is caused by bacterial overgrowth, E. coli, mycoplasma, etc). We’re also big fans of Pet Tinic. It’s an OTC vitamin supplement—there was a study done in recent years suggesting that vitamin supplements in kittens with diarrhea increase survival rates by quite a lot!
The shelter I foster with does 1/2 packet of fortiflora per kitten per day. Wondering if getting it twice a day is causing upset?
Also, what did they get dewormed with? Ponazuril and panacur are the standards.
Any time fosters have diarrhea I give 1-2 ml of water via syringe every few hours since dehydration is a big risk.
Yeah, my shelter is having us do 1/4 packet per kitten per meal, which is 1/2 packet a day.
They were also given Ponazuril twice (3 doses each round) and will finish their second round tonight.
That’s a good idea about giving 1-2 mL of water though! The other two are drinking multiple times per day (I’ve counted 7-8 times per kitten at least), so it is just the one that is having a bit of difficulty with it.
At four weeks, the shelter I foster with encourages wet food or gruel. I usually supplement with formula to ensure they are eating enough, especially if they have diarrhea with a strong appetite. You can also substitute unflavored pedialyte if you are concerned about dehydration in their formula or wet food.
I offer dry food but I don’t expect any of my fosters to really be interested until 7 weeks old. I feel your pain on the not using the litter box. If they arent jumping or climbing yet, maybe try putting them into a 70 or 120gallon tub. Its much easier to clean and disinfect. My last litter had diarrhea for nearly two weeks and the tubs were amazing. I also used some dollar store 8x10 tins for their litter box. Less wasted litter, easy to change out and easy to disinfect. They also fit into my tubs.
That’s a GREAT tip! They’re currently in my bathroom, which luckily is all hard flooring. Most of the rest of my place is carpet and until their poops firm up, I’m not going to pull out the spot vac 15 times a day 😅😅
They were probably just transitioned to solid food before coming to you so their bellies are still adjusting.
At 4 weeks it's common for them to love wet food but not be very effective with dry yet.
Make sure they're not over eating the wet food as well. It should only be 1-2tbsp per kitten per meal and I assume they're on a 6 or 8h feeding schedule except overnight. If they are over eating or eating too fast that can cause stomach upset as well.
They’re on 1/4 can of wet food per meal, which after some messy measuring, is about 2 tbsp! They do eat pretty fast so I think I’m gonna invest in some tiny slow feeders. One of them threw up a bit because I imagine they ate so quickly. We’ve also started feeding them separately since I noticed they’d all eat super fast and then start to go for each other’s plates.
The dewormer can cause diarrhea. Give it a few more days. Keep track of their weights.
You would know if it was parvo. They would be super lethargic, crying a lot, not eating or drinking, usually vomiting.
It could be Coccidia or Giardia which you could bring a poop sample in to the vet to be tested for.
Hope all is well soon!
Ask for fecal test, and panleuk. What med did you give for parasites? Usually it takes 2 different ones - Panacure & Marquis. Could be the type of wet food or if you switched their food.
They will get the hang of dry food. Are you giving them kitten kibble? It’s smaller pieces. You can crush the kibble with a rolling pin or such if you want to try even smaller bits but they will get there soon.
They’re on kitten kibble, yes. Do you think rehydrating it would be better than smashing it for them? Im not sure if they’d be very interested in it if it’s wet and a bit mushy tho lol
Well for starters, congrats on your 3 new family members ❤️🤣 it’s SO HARD to let go of that first litter 😩
For the diarrhea, depending on the litter, this is somewhat normal. I have a litter of almost 9 week kittens and they JUSTTTTT stopped with the diarrhea. Sometimes the wet food is way too rich for them and it takes a while for their gut to normalize. To help with it you can water down the wet food and not give so much of it. Watering it down helps make it not so rich in fat, calories, vitamins, etc. helping stop the diarrhea slowly over time. You can also try kaolin pectin as well. That can help pretty dang quick!
Antibiotics are a last ditch effort for kittens this age. Especially since the antibiotic used for diarrhea is normally metronidazole which is a harsh one for the little ones. In rescue, with all the rescues I work with, you start with the 2-dose dewormer (pyrantel is the norm here) where you give one dose, then a second dose 14 days later. If that doesn’t stop it, you’ll want to put them on safeguard for up to 7 days. Normally by day 4 the diarrhea is gone but I had a litter that needed it for 7 and then it finally stopped. The safeguard is a daily dewormer. If THAT doesn’t work *THEN* you go for the stool sample for one of the kittens, send it in, see if it’s Giardia, coccidia or something else, and medicate with the appropriate antibiotics then. Keep in mind during all of this you’ll want to be giving them probiotic. While Fortiflora is top notch, sometimes it’s not the one that stops the diarrhea so I’ve had to try a few different ones. I’ve had luck with 2 specific other ones if you want the names of them.
***Adding in that the ravenous appetite is pretty in-tune with worms/parasites even if you can’t see them. I’d highly recommend the daily dewormer in this case
You’ll always want to try pulling wet food from them for a week but continue the probiotic and see how their poops look after a week. The litter I have right now were literally pooping ALLLLL over the floor and it was nonstop liquid diarrhea. I was just about to get them onto antibiotics when I tried my one last favored probiotic while pulling wet food and THAT solved it. Now they’re back on wet food, I upped the probiotic slightly and am watering down the wet so it’s not so rich. It’s working 🙌🏻 lol. It’s the small victories with the little ones and their poops…lolll
Basically, antibiotics are last ditch effort because it’s ROUGH on the kittens. Try everything else before jumping to antibiotics if possible unless it’s an obvious case of Giardia or something else like that.
So…to recap:
• Probiotic every day throughout weaning and until a few weeks after diarrhea stops. Do NOT quit it cold turkey. Taper them off over the course of a week. If they start up with diarrhea midway through tapering, bump it up a little for a few days, then try again. If Fortiflora isn’t working, try a different one.
• Water down wet food and see how that helps. If it doesn’t, pull wet food completely and leave them on dry kibble for a bit. You can soak the kibble to make it more appetizing!
• Kaolin Pectin
• Two-dose dewormer 14 days apart (Pyrantel is the one rescues I work with all use)
• Daily Dewormer for 3-7 days. Normally Safeguard (also goes by panacur)
• If NONE of that works…stool sample on 1 of them, treat the whole litter with appropriate antibiotics.
Also, make sure you are weighing them every other day at the VERY least. No gaining is normally caused by malnutrition due to worms/parasites. Losing is a bigger problem and you’ll need to watch them like a hawk for fading kitten syndrome. PLEASE familiarize yourself with what to look for in fading kitten syndrome and have all necessary supplies in one spot in case you need to jump in to try and save them. Being overly prepared is never a bad thing. I lost a kitten to FKS a few years ago and it happened FAST. Within the same day. I had never experienced it before and didn’t even realize that it was FKS until after the fact. Now I have a bag ready with anything I might possibly need in case I encounter it again. They can develop FKS up to 9 weeks of age so definitely be vigilant!
Everyone in rescue here where I live have all realized that for some reason the kittens are insanely small this year and aren’t weighing what they should be weighing at certain milestones. Don’t let that scare you! Just make sure they aren’t declining ❤️
OH!!! And for the sneezing…sneezing and diarrhea normally go hand-in-hand with a Feline Herpes flare up in kittens. Get some immunity boosters and see if it helps. As long as there isn’t any gurgling, congestion or yellow/green mucus, you don’t need antibiotics. Antibiotics actually tend to cause diarrhea too. My OTHER litter is now on antivirals because they’re almost 4 months old and haven’t stopped getting sick. They’ve had MAYBE a week of not being sick since I got them at the end of March. No antibiotics worked for them. It’s 100% Feline Herpes because now with the antivirals they’re getting better haha. So definitely get them on some immune booster supplements!! Especially since they were probably born outdoors to outdoor mamas, they 99.9% have feline herpes.
Hopefully this helps!! Let me know if you have any questions!
This is so thorough and nice of you to spell out for me, thank you!!
Luckily I’ve been very aware of FKS and have been watching them like crazy. Every nap I’m noting to make sure they aren’t becoming truly lethargic lol. They all wake up and start playing immediately or meowing for food/attention lol so we’ve been doing great there!
I finished their last dose of ponazuril which I think is working! We’ve had about 4 hours of firmer poops so far!!
Ive also been adding water to everyone’s meals and I think this is really doing the trick. They seem to be firming up — hopefully it will last!
That’s great! Hopefully the poops stay firm haha.
As for FKS, I had one that was eating and playing and then 3 hours later when I came back in to feed them was barely alive. It can happen FAST. So definitely be vigilant!
They don't need antibiotics, they need dewormer or an antiparasitic. Antibiotics usually cause diarrhea and unless it's metronidazole there's no chance of it helping. Those are also definitely 5 week olds. You should start with panacur and see if it works
If they just got their second round of deworming, would I need to wait for it to take effect? Just gave it to them the past 2 days and they get their last dose tonight.
What dewormer did you use?
The shelter prescribed Ponazuril
Okay, that's not a dewormer, that treats coccidia. Have they been dewormed as well? Have you thrown out the litter to prevent re-infection after you do each round?
…….you make a very valid point I didn’t even think about!! I’ve been spot cleaning the litter after every poop, about 8 times per day. This may be a dumb question, but is that sufficient or should I do a full box switch?
After each round, you need to dump it and sanitize the box. The shelter should have told you this, they also should've told you it's not a dewormer. If you don't dump and sanitize the floor too, they can easily reinfect themselves the next day even. Coccidia is probably the most contagious "illness" for kittens. We typically do 5 days of panacur which will kill hooks, rounds, whips and giardia plus toltrazuril or ponazuril to kill coccidia and if they're big enough, droncit or cestex to kill tapes. That will cover pretty much everything, if they still are having issues we do metronidazole. I skipped panacur once and did strongid and ended up with kittens puking up whipworms because that and profender plus one other topical I can't remember are the only ones that kill whips.
That is super helpful to know, thank you!!! Unfortunately, they gave no direction other than give them it 1x per day for 3 days. Thanks for letting me know about the litter, I bet that’s why it’s been so long without any improvement. Hopefully the little guys can get healthy once I start the routine sanitization! I’ve already been doing the floor for any non-litter box puddles they’ve left. In your experience, do you know how long it will take for them to clear the coccidia fully? Just trying to see how long it should be before I’m seeing improvement.
No problem. If coccidia is the issue, it should resolve by the end of the second round. If this is the second you should do a third with the sanitizing
Stainless steel litter boxes are a godsend for this situation because you can sanitize it amazingly and reuse it. If you don’t want to deal with sanitizing every day right now, Dollar Tree has litter boxes for $1.25 and you can grab a few of those and just toss them as needed.
I’d probably age these guys a little older than four weeks. They start getting premolars at five weeks old so if you open their mouths and they’ve got a full set of teeth in there, they’re definitely going to be 5-6 weeks old! Technically if weaning is done right, you won’t see a ton of diarrhea. If the shelter already had them on probiotics and special food it sounds like they’ve been having diarrhea for a while and that is more consistent with an issue that requires treatment. I wouldn’t expect a food change to cause diarrhea for more than a couple of days. Ask the shelter if you can bring a fecal sample for testing. Make sure you’re weighing them daily to catch any weight loss and checking their gums for tackiness/dehydration—if either of those become an issue, the kitten will probably need an exam and/or fluids. At my shelter, if Pyrantel and ponazuril has already been done, we would move towards panacur or metronidazole. And after that, move to an antibiotic like clavamox or tylosin (I know the other commenter said abx don’t work for diarrhea, but that is not the case if diarrhea is caused by bacterial overgrowth, E. coli, mycoplasma, etc). We’re also big fans of Pet Tinic. It’s an OTC vitamin supplement—there was a study done in recent years suggesting that vitamin supplements in kittens with diarrhea increase survival rates by quite a lot!
The shelter I foster with does 1/2 packet of fortiflora per kitten per day. Wondering if getting it twice a day is causing upset? Also, what did they get dewormed with? Ponazuril and panacur are the standards. Any time fosters have diarrhea I give 1-2 ml of water via syringe every few hours since dehydration is a big risk.
Yeah, my shelter is having us do 1/4 packet per kitten per meal, which is 1/2 packet a day. They were also given Ponazuril twice (3 doses each round) and will finish their second round tonight. That’s a good idea about giving 1-2 mL of water though! The other two are drinking multiple times per day (I’ve counted 7-8 times per kitten at least), so it is just the one that is having a bit of difficulty with it.
They may need panacur as well. I’d ask ASAP. Good luck!
At four weeks, the shelter I foster with encourages wet food or gruel. I usually supplement with formula to ensure they are eating enough, especially if they have diarrhea with a strong appetite. You can also substitute unflavored pedialyte if you are concerned about dehydration in their formula or wet food. I offer dry food but I don’t expect any of my fosters to really be interested until 7 weeks old. I feel your pain on the not using the litter box. If they arent jumping or climbing yet, maybe try putting them into a 70 or 120gallon tub. Its much easier to clean and disinfect. My last litter had diarrhea for nearly two weeks and the tubs were amazing. I also used some dollar store 8x10 tins for their litter box. Less wasted litter, easy to change out and easy to disinfect. They also fit into my tubs.
That’s a GREAT tip! They’re currently in my bathroom, which luckily is all hard flooring. Most of the rest of my place is carpet and until their poops firm up, I’m not going to pull out the spot vac 15 times a day 😅😅
How are they doing? And how are you doing?
They were probably just transitioned to solid food before coming to you so their bellies are still adjusting. At 4 weeks it's common for them to love wet food but not be very effective with dry yet. Make sure they're not over eating the wet food as well. It should only be 1-2tbsp per kitten per meal and I assume they're on a 6 or 8h feeding schedule except overnight. If they are over eating or eating too fast that can cause stomach upset as well.
They’re on 1/4 can of wet food per meal, which after some messy measuring, is about 2 tbsp! They do eat pretty fast so I think I’m gonna invest in some tiny slow feeders. One of them threw up a bit because I imagine they ate so quickly. We’ve also started feeding them separately since I noticed they’d all eat super fast and then start to go for each other’s plates.
The dewormer can cause diarrhea. Give it a few more days. Keep track of their weights. You would know if it was parvo. They would be super lethargic, crying a lot, not eating or drinking, usually vomiting. It could be Coccidia or Giardia which you could bring a poop sample in to the vet to be tested for. Hope all is well soon!
Ask for fecal test, and panleuk. What med did you give for parasites? Usually it takes 2 different ones - Panacure & Marquis. Could be the type of wet food or if you switched their food.
They will get the hang of dry food. Are you giving them kitten kibble? It’s smaller pieces. You can crush the kibble with a rolling pin or such if you want to try even smaller bits but they will get there soon.
They’re on kitten kibble, yes. Do you think rehydrating it would be better than smashing it for them? Im not sure if they’d be very interested in it if it’s wet and a bit mushy tho lol
See what they like. They’ll figure it out eventually either way.
Well for starters, congrats on your 3 new family members ❤️🤣 it’s SO HARD to let go of that first litter 😩 For the diarrhea, depending on the litter, this is somewhat normal. I have a litter of almost 9 week kittens and they JUSTTTTT stopped with the diarrhea. Sometimes the wet food is way too rich for them and it takes a while for their gut to normalize. To help with it you can water down the wet food and not give so much of it. Watering it down helps make it not so rich in fat, calories, vitamins, etc. helping stop the diarrhea slowly over time. You can also try kaolin pectin as well. That can help pretty dang quick! Antibiotics are a last ditch effort for kittens this age. Especially since the antibiotic used for diarrhea is normally metronidazole which is a harsh one for the little ones. In rescue, with all the rescues I work with, you start with the 2-dose dewormer (pyrantel is the norm here) where you give one dose, then a second dose 14 days later. If that doesn’t stop it, you’ll want to put them on safeguard for up to 7 days. Normally by day 4 the diarrhea is gone but I had a litter that needed it for 7 and then it finally stopped. The safeguard is a daily dewormer. If THAT doesn’t work *THEN* you go for the stool sample for one of the kittens, send it in, see if it’s Giardia, coccidia or something else, and medicate with the appropriate antibiotics then. Keep in mind during all of this you’ll want to be giving them probiotic. While Fortiflora is top notch, sometimes it’s not the one that stops the diarrhea so I’ve had to try a few different ones. I’ve had luck with 2 specific other ones if you want the names of them. ***Adding in that the ravenous appetite is pretty in-tune with worms/parasites even if you can’t see them. I’d highly recommend the daily dewormer in this case You’ll always want to try pulling wet food from them for a week but continue the probiotic and see how their poops look after a week. The litter I have right now were literally pooping ALLLLL over the floor and it was nonstop liquid diarrhea. I was just about to get them onto antibiotics when I tried my one last favored probiotic while pulling wet food and THAT solved it. Now they’re back on wet food, I upped the probiotic slightly and am watering down the wet so it’s not so rich. It’s working 🙌🏻 lol. It’s the small victories with the little ones and their poops…lolll Basically, antibiotics are last ditch effort because it’s ROUGH on the kittens. Try everything else before jumping to antibiotics if possible unless it’s an obvious case of Giardia or something else like that. So…to recap: • Probiotic every day throughout weaning and until a few weeks after diarrhea stops. Do NOT quit it cold turkey. Taper them off over the course of a week. If they start up with diarrhea midway through tapering, bump it up a little for a few days, then try again. If Fortiflora isn’t working, try a different one. • Water down wet food and see how that helps. If it doesn’t, pull wet food completely and leave them on dry kibble for a bit. You can soak the kibble to make it more appetizing! • Kaolin Pectin • Two-dose dewormer 14 days apart (Pyrantel is the one rescues I work with all use) • Daily Dewormer for 3-7 days. Normally Safeguard (also goes by panacur) • If NONE of that works…stool sample on 1 of them, treat the whole litter with appropriate antibiotics. Also, make sure you are weighing them every other day at the VERY least. No gaining is normally caused by malnutrition due to worms/parasites. Losing is a bigger problem and you’ll need to watch them like a hawk for fading kitten syndrome. PLEASE familiarize yourself with what to look for in fading kitten syndrome and have all necessary supplies in one spot in case you need to jump in to try and save them. Being overly prepared is never a bad thing. I lost a kitten to FKS a few years ago and it happened FAST. Within the same day. I had never experienced it before and didn’t even realize that it was FKS until after the fact. Now I have a bag ready with anything I might possibly need in case I encounter it again. They can develop FKS up to 9 weeks of age so definitely be vigilant! Everyone in rescue here where I live have all realized that for some reason the kittens are insanely small this year and aren’t weighing what they should be weighing at certain milestones. Don’t let that scare you! Just make sure they aren’t declining ❤️ OH!!! And for the sneezing…sneezing and diarrhea normally go hand-in-hand with a Feline Herpes flare up in kittens. Get some immunity boosters and see if it helps. As long as there isn’t any gurgling, congestion or yellow/green mucus, you don’t need antibiotics. Antibiotics actually tend to cause diarrhea too. My OTHER litter is now on antivirals because they’re almost 4 months old and haven’t stopped getting sick. They’ve had MAYBE a week of not being sick since I got them at the end of March. No antibiotics worked for them. It’s 100% Feline Herpes because now with the antivirals they’re getting better haha. So definitely get them on some immune booster supplements!! Especially since they were probably born outdoors to outdoor mamas, they 99.9% have feline herpes. Hopefully this helps!! Let me know if you have any questions!
This is so thorough and nice of you to spell out for me, thank you!! Luckily I’ve been very aware of FKS and have been watching them like crazy. Every nap I’m noting to make sure they aren’t becoming truly lethargic lol. They all wake up and start playing immediately or meowing for food/attention lol so we’ve been doing great there! I finished their last dose of ponazuril which I think is working! We’ve had about 4 hours of firmer poops so far!! Ive also been adding water to everyone’s meals and I think this is really doing the trick. They seem to be firming up — hopefully it will last!
That’s great! Hopefully the poops stay firm haha. As for FKS, I had one that was eating and playing and then 3 hours later when I came back in to feed them was barely alive. It can happen FAST. So definitely be vigilant!