In a message dated 97-09-25 14:19:32 EDT, you write:

<<
 Date:    Thu, 25 Sep 1997 07:40:07 -1000
 From:    Gloria Buoncristiano-Thai <[log in to unmask]>
 Subject: Adopted Kitten
  We've just adopted an abandoned kitten.  I am more stressed over this
 than the birth of my first child.  I have been feeding it EBM in an
 eyedropper.

 I've checked with people about caring for a kitten.  I was given a recipe
 for kitten formula---sweetened condensed milk, water and raw egg yolks.
 This sounds familiar.  My husband said to just give it my milk as that
 "formula" is for people who don't have ready access to milk.

Dear Gloria,
The age of this kitten is important, but if it is under 5 or 6 weeks old,
please go to your local veterinarian and buy some kitten replacer milk.  Your
milk -- human milk -- has only 4.1% fat, but cat milk has 10.8%.  Your milk
has .8 % protein but cat milk has 10.6% protein.    The sugar, casein and
whey are also way out of proportion and will not be providing what this
kitten needs.  Just as commercial formulas are superior to the old evaporated
milk, karo syrup and water formula that I was given as a baby, so the
commercial kitten and puppy replacer milks are probably a better substitute
for this kitten's own mother's milk since her milk is not available.  You
milk is suited for your babies, but not the mother cat's baby.

I had not intended mention this but since the situation has arisen, last
month I went into my husbands veterinary hospital at the end of the day.  The
technician was holding a pitiful kitten and trying to feed it kitten replacer
milk with a TB syringe.  The kitten was so weak it couldn't even swallow and
the milk was just dribbling out of it's mouth.  She told me the mother cat
had died and the people who brought it in had been feeding it Similac for the
past 3 weeks.  Evidently the volume they fed it was good, but it lacked the
proper nutrients for a kitten's growth and it got weaker and weaker.  It was
only 5 weeks old.  Even though my husband tube fed it and they tried
valiantly, it died that night.  I took a picture of it and hope it comes out.
 It would be useful to make the point about the species specificity of all
mammals milk.

Human milk is for human babies and unless you found the right information so
you could correctly alter you milk to give the kitten a closer approximation
of it's nutritional needs, you are better off getting the commercial AKM
(Artificial Kitten Milk??).

Also I know another person that recently confided she had fed an orphaned
bunny her milk (many years ago before she knew better)  thinking she was
doing the best possible thing for it.  It didn't live either.  Of course
orphaned bunnies are very delicate and difficult to hand raise under any
circumstances.

Jane Bradshaw, speaking as a vet's wife now
Lynchburg, VA