I am really hoping someone can give me some advice or let me know if maybe this happened to someone else as well.
My Bengal cat Khan is four years old and she finally got pregnant by my other bengal cat Khalifa he's two years old... I bought him specifically to breed with Khan.

Finally Khan got pregnant and her due date was coming soon so we are watching her you know waiting for signs of labor but nothing happened she wasn't behaving differently so finally one day you know we noticed that her stomach dropped which means you know labors any day now and then another morning I noticed that she was spotting a little bit of blood. So I figured labor was gonna be that day so I didn't came home from work on my lunch break to check on her still no kittens so days go by we noticed that her stomach looks like it's getting smaller so I'm getting concerned and I'm like thinking I'm gonna take her to the vet if she doesn't have kittens with the next few days.

I've had cats in the past growing up who had litters of kittens at least five times I've been through cat birth and they were always an unassisted birth you know the mother cat would just give birth to her kittens and then one day she bring us to them By meowing and drawing attention to her and then having us follow her to the kittens where was she gave birth to them so I figured that's how this birth. was going to be I didn't think that I need to be in a present for it I was at work when it happened apparently and it's just I've never heard of something like this happening...

So here is a completely devastating part, so this is just last Sunday when this happened I'm sitting on the couch my cat is acting like normal you know by my side every moment and I noticed her stomach is just way too small so I just began to search the house because I just have a feeling in my gut that I'm going to find those kittens dead somewhere...

Soon enough I found five beautiful kittens dead in the closet I can't believe that they never made a sound, they were separated they weren't huddled together which is really weird because to me that means they didn't die from hypothermia from being abandoned because naturally they would be grouped together right?

She never went back to that closet, she never meowed or drew attention to the closet... the kittens had been dead for days at least 3-4 by the looks of them. It was just horrifying to see their little beautiful furry bodies there, and even more puzzling they were all cleaned off, placentas were all eaten and kittens were clean... what happened??

Did she kill them on accident not know what she was doing? Did she kill them on purpose? We're they all still born? Didn't look sick! Has anyone ever heard of this happening?? I just can't believe she could just walk away from the dead kittens and not cry and draw attention to them. She was by my side the whole time I was home.

I'm devistated :(

Should I stop them from breeding again? Bad gene mix or what?? I can't stop wondering what happened.

Welcome to our forum. I am so sorry you had to go through this experience. It is truly rare that an entire litter will pass away. First of all, while she was pregnant, I would have taken her to the vet for a sonar gram to make sure the kittens were healthy in the womb. Did you prepare her a spot to give birth?

It appears this was her first litter. Most females are instinctively able to be mothers. But, there may be some instances where they are not! Personally would I try again to breed her? Only after taking her to the vet, having her completely examined with every test to make sure she is 100% healthy. You might want to make sure the male is 100% healthy as well. However .... I would never breed a female. You know your girl better than anyone else. If I had a pregnant cat about to deliver kitten, I would make sure I just about follow her every move. I know they seem to want privacy, but you have no idea if you could have saved these kittens if you had found them immediately after she had them. So tragic for those babies.

Sometimes animals just don't have that "mothering" instinct. I've seen it in dogs and cats before. They'll have the babies and then want NOTHING to do with them. They just abandon them. If the kittens were all in the closet but spread out it's possible they were squirming around trying to find momma and that's how they got separated.

Personally I would not breed her again because chances are she still will not want to take care of the babies. Hand rearing kittens is very tough - much tougher than puppies - and does not always have a good outcome.

If you do decide to breed her again you're going to want to keep her isolated when she gets close to her due date. Either put her in a bedroom with everything she needs or at a minimum block off access to bedrooms & closets so she can't have the babies where you won't find them.

_________________
Dallas, TX USA
Diesel - snow Bengal born 09/01/2013 adopted Feb 2014
Tuck, Chloe, Buddy, Lewis & Tia - rescue kitties
Clyde, Bleu & Coal - Great Danes

Its always very important to be with mum when giving birth. May I ask if you have had your Bengals blood tested? It has come about that we have some B blood group Bengals and if paired with a blood group A this can cause problems if mum is B. This means babies would need to be hand reared for at least 24-48 hours so they do not receive any colostrum as this is what kills them.
My first port of call would be to blood test the parents before any other mating's occur, hope this helps.

http://www.langfordvets.co.uk/diagnosti ... blood-type Here is a useful link

I must have missed the fact that Abooksigun posted in this post. It is always nice to see when a breeder posts. We don't have any that post regularly and could answer questions better than the rest of us -- who just own bengals and cats and have no breeding experience. I do hope you will continue to come on and answer questions, especially in this topic.

Thank you Sherry :) I will certainly try my best to answer certain topics if I think I can be of help :) I originally joined in 2007 just after I purchased my first breeding queen. I have been totally lapse for a few years as life sometimes has a way of taking over huh! Anyways I hope the OP may have found what I advised and the link useful :)

Abooksigun, I have 32 of your kitties in my database, most without F generations (which is what my database is about). Also have unknown sexes of the kitties in some cases. I've now started adding SBT numbers and birthdates. I have 52,000 records and still work on it daily. Mind if I PM you some of the cats I need information for? If you'd rather not spend the time on it, that's fine, too. They will just continue to show UNK.

Most of the information was taken from your website. The database is just for my personal use in my helping new bengal owners determine the F generation for their kitties. I was fascinated to know what F gen my bengal was and spent 3 months in a database doing an entire pedigree. I was tired of spending weeks when someone sent me a pedigree for their cat and going back through the same cats I'd done for Raiden. Who can remember the F gen for a thousand cats? So, I decided I would do a database. I'm about to enter year 3 of working on it, but I have loved viewing all the gorgeous kitties and helping people determine the F generation for their kitty as well as the shortest link back to the ALC.

I do hope you will check in occasionally. Ontario Bengals was a regular once and I know so many others have been -- but are no longer active here.

Of course you can Sherry Wow, you have spent a loong time on that! I used to trace mine back, some of them I know, some not, however, not as dedicated as you even though I find it very interesting!

I will certainly try to pop on when I can and help as much as possible. I may be asking for help at some point myself as there is always something new that comes along. For me it is retiring studs and re-homing as the only retired stud of mine still lives with me. I have tried to work my lines for as long as I can to learn as much about them as I can because being able to give people that information is really useful too.

A PM will not allow me to insert an image and there is no email address on your website, so I will just post it here. This is a screenshot of the cats I have for you with the information that I have on them. I will PM you my email address if you want to respond that way.