The dog that's feline fine

WHEN Lesley Davies took on the role of fostering abandoned kittens she never expected to end up sharing the duty of care with her two pet dogs.

The 50-year-old knew by introducing the tiny bundles to Shih Tzus Billie and Bobbie it would help to socialise them.

But the last thing she expected was for the dogs, who have never had puppies, to take on the joint role of mother.

Thanks to their strong maternal instinct, however, they have so far helped to raise more than 20 kittens.

Mrs Davies, of Oldmeldrum, Aberdeenshire, said: “They wash them, play with them, curl up with them and keep them cosy.

“It’s quite sweet. The dogs love cats and the kittens just seem to latch on to them.”

The three-year-old bitches even allow the kittens, many of which are feral, to suckle milk from them.

Their charges at the moment are three older kittens, named Oliver, Freddie and Frankie, which Mrs

Davies, a volunteer with the Inverurie and Alford branch of Cats Protection, has decided to keep.

She took each of them in when they were just days old and there was an instant bond between them and the dogs.

Bobbie, who is still trying to wean them off her milk, even taught Frankie, now seven-months-old, how to wash himself.

Mrs Davies, a retired police officer, who has been fostering cats and kittens since 2002, said: “It’s better than telly, watching the animals interact.

“I couldn’t believe it the first time they did it. I thought: ‘where does the milk come from?’

“It’s quite bizarre because they have never had puppies. It must just be their maternal instinct.”

The dogs’ interest in the kittens started when Mrs Davies was bottle-feeding a day-old kitten, abandoned by its mother on a building site.

She said: “It was only 80 grams and I had to feed it every two hours and the dogs just wouldn’t leave me alone.

“And every kitten that has come into the house they have been exactly the same.

“They just mother them and calm them down. It really helps to tame them up because some of the kittens are feral.”

Her job is to hand-rear the tiny felines and prepare them for rehoming. But she said the kittens, often from different litters, all seem to think that the dogs, and in particular Bobbie, is their mother.

Mrs Davies said: “One kitten even climbed out of its pen and went straight for Bobbie.

It’s very amusing.

“I don’t know what it is but they must know that the dogs are going to be good to them.

“They look after all the kittens that come about. It must be more than 20 in the last three years,” she added.