For more information about trapping you can see part 1.
Throughout the post I will link to specific things on the Alley Cat Allies Website.
How to Use Kittens to Trap a Mother Cat, and Vice Versa.
Use this baseline information to inform the more complex process of trapping a mom and kittens.
On your first attempt at trapping a cat family, always set out at least one baited trap for every cat and kitten in the family. These instructions are for moms with kittens who are old enough to walk. Younger kittens can be scooped up and used to attract mom, but not the other way around.
A trap
If you don’t trap the mother first, but trap the kittens instead (or you have used the kittens are ‘bait’), she will soon hear, see, and smell her kittens in the trap and want to get close to them, providing the perfect time for her to enter a trap herself.
Once you have a kitten trapped, set up a second trap of similar size right away end-to-end against the one holding the kitten, so that mother cat will have to walk into the open trap to reach her baby. But do not open the trap holding the kitten, the short ends of the traps should be touching and the two traps together should form a long rectangle.
To make sure mom goes inside the trap and not around the back or sides, cover the trap holding the kitten on three sides so that the kitten(s) is/are only visible from the entrance of the open trap. Cover the area where the traps meet, so the mother cat can’t see the seperation as easily. So it will appear to her as though the kittens are inside the tunnel.
Becareful
If you trap the mother cat first or if you are trapping other cats by accident, keep her in the trap and set out a second trap, following the same instructions mentioned above with the traps used end-to-end, with one important note: once you have trapped one kitten, you will have to set up a new trap for the next kitten. Kittens can also be used to trap their siblings with using the same instructions.
Resources
Alley Cat Allies
Pictures by ecojoes.com and extension.org.
Glad to see we are not living in the dark ages here (sometimes we do). The traps we use are identical – yipee, we’re out there with the modern world.
Good!
Exactly what people need to know! Sometimes when presented with trap people lose confidence thinking it will never work. these instructions are spoton – it really does work.
That is good! I never got to trap a cat, but it sounds like a tough job!
Depends on how hungry they are!
Of course!
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