As we all know, there are no strangers' children. Mother Nature is unpredictable, and there are times when some animals take in others, the weaker or the injured, under their care. The feline world also sees amazing cases of foster adoption. But what kind of adoptions!
The cat raised squirrels
This amazing story took place in April 2019 in Crimea, in the city of Bakhchisaray.
Local residents brought a box of baby squirrels to the miniature park, which houses a petting zoo.
The park is home to a Russian Blue cat named Musya, who had just given birth to kittens herself. The park's staff decided to try introducing her to some squirrels, and to everyone's surprise, the cat accepted them as her own.
The orphaned squirrels were initially frightened, but eventually they warmed to their new mother. The mother became equally patient with her adopted babies. She began feeding and grooming the squirrels just like her own kittens, and the kittens, in turn, accepted them as their own.
The squirrels gradually adapted and took an active part in playing with the kittens and even "fighting" for milk. Park staff began assisting this unusual family with bottle feeding. Musya, the cat, nursed the squirrels back to health and rightfully earned the title of mother of many.
The cat became a mother to the puppies
Another heart-warming story of maternal love took place in the city of Langebaan, South Africa.
Catherine, a cat abandoned by her owners, was found in an empty apartment, but her newborn kittens, unfortunately, could not be saved. Then, an animal rescue worker took Catherine in for temporary care.
The kitten loved her new home with all her heart, but the tragedy she had experienced left a mark on her soul. Her new owner often heard Katherine searching for her kittens, calling for them.
But later, Katherine's life changed dramatically when the same rescue center employee took in four puppies that had nearly died in a fire. The cat immediately began licking them and showing maternal care. She comforted the puppies when they cried and fed them her milk when they were hungry.
After some time, the cat stopped pitifully searching for her kittens, the foster babies brought Katherine back to life, and the story of her devotion and responsibility spread throughout the world.
Hedgehog's mother cat
Another case of interspecies adoption occurred in Vladivostok, where a cat named Musya became the real mother for eight hedgehogs.
The hedgehogs' biological mother died, and caring residents brought the kittens to the Sadgorod Zoo. Musya had been nursing the kittens before the new arrivals, but they had already been given away by the time the kittens were brought.
So the staff thought the cat might show her maternal instincts and help the spiky cubs. And that's exactly what happened!
Musya took the news about the adopted children calmly and took up the task with dignity. She not only fed the spiky foster children, but also kept them warm and cleaned them—as it turned out, the baby hedgehogs' quills weren't sharp. What a caring Musya—a hedgehog mom!
A domestic cat has become a mother to feral kittens.
At the Krasnoyarsk Zoo "Royev Ruchey", the mother of five newborn Far Eastern kittens died.
Zoo staff tried to bottle-feed the kittens, but they refused to drink from a bottle, having already tasted their mother's milk.
To save them, the decision was made to foster them with a regular cat, who had recently become a mother of three kittens herself. Cloudy the cat eagerly took on the responsibilities assigned to her and accepted the kittens as her own, and her own kittens didn't even notice the sudden addition to their feline family.
This event took place in 2014. The cat Tuchka nursed her kittens until a certain age, and as soon as the kittens grew stronger and their teeth began to emerge, they began to be fed meat from a spoon, and then they were transported back to the zoo.
Since then, the kittens have grown up and been distributed to other zoos, and the cat Tuchka has made a huge contribution to the conservation of this Far Eastern species, which is listed in the Red Book.
Mother for little monkeys
This amazing story happened in Tyumen when baby squirrel monkeys (a species of monkey native to South America) were born at the zoo.
One of the females that gave birth that day abandoned her baby, and then the little monkey was literally attached to the cat Rosinka.
The fact is that the babies of these monkeys spend the first months of their lives constantly on their mother, and it is not easy to nurse them back to health; it is necessary to maintain their temperature.
However, the cat liked this burden, although she is no longer so young, after all, she is 16 years old, but she accepted the monkey baby Fedor as her own.
The mother cat performed her maternal duties brilliantly, even though it was her first time. This story spread far beyond Tyumen and even Russia; even the BBC became interested in this amazing adoption, and a YouTube video featuring Rosinka the cat and Fedya the monkey received a huge number of views.
