'It was the worst sound': Sydney woman's horror over contents of plastic shopping bag

Two tiny kittens are lucky to be alive after being discovered dumped in a tied-up plastic bag in Sydney's west.

Sydney local Jade was out for an afternoon walk on Park Road in Riverstone, NSW, when she heard screeching noises coming from a distance.

"There are no houses on the other side of the road, it's just bush. I just heard these crying sounds," she told nine.com.au.

"At first it was soft and I thought maybe it was an injured bird. Then I kept walking and the cries were getting louder and louder. Honestly, it was the worst sound."

Watch the video above.

Jade proceeded with caution, looking through the bush trying to find the source of the awful sound. It was then she spotted a black plastic bag that had been tied up securely.

"I thought, 'Surely there's nothing inside that bag.' Then I got a stick and moved the bag. The entire bag started to move."

Then, the cries got louder.

Jade carefully opened up the bag and saw what appeared to be "a small animal inside". She wasn't sure what it was at first.

"I saw that it was some sort of baby animal, either a kitten or a puppy."

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Jade grabbed the bag and ran home with it and when she opened it, she saw not one, but two tiny neonatal kittens.

"They were still wet, and they were freezing cold," she said. "Their eyes weren't open yet. I knew that they were very, very young."

Jade knew they needed urgent help. She grabbed a cardboard box, and quickly Googled instructions to find out what to do.

"It said that they can't regulate their own temperature, so the first thing you have to do is make sure they're warm. I heated up a water bottle and wrapped it in some blankets and put them in a laundry basket."

Once warm, they needed to be fed.

"I was just going to give them milk from my fridge, but it said not to give them any cow's milk so I went down to my local IGA and got kitten milk.

"Luckily I had a little medicine syringe and I heated the milk up and just tried to syringe it into their mouths."

One kitten immediately gulped the milk up, but the other spat most of it out.

Jade also read that they would need to be fed every two to three hours, so she set them up in the laundry and did just that.

"When I came into the laundry in the morning and I heard them crying, it was such a sense of relief that they were still alive. Now I had to figure out what to do with them."

Jade rang multiple animal organisations, but it was Sunday and she wasn't having much luck. That was until the seventh call, when she was put in touch with Hills Cat Rescue.

They agreed to help the kittens, and put Jade's mind at ease that they'd be safe.

Jade said she's happy the kittens "had each other" through such a horrific time.

"They are such fighters. I'm glad they had each other. Even when I was feeding them, as soon as I would take one away from they other they would cry.

"Once I put them down they would cuddle up together like that and fall asleep instantly."

Cindy Easterbrook from Hills Cat Rescue has told nine.com.au a total of seven new kittens came into the rescue organisation's care on Sunday – including the two neonatal kittens from Riverstone, and five from Blacktown Animal Rehoming Centre (BARC).

She estimates the neonatal kittens from Riverstone are just days old, and she wasn't surprised they made themselves known to Jade.

"Neonatals can get very loud," she said.

The fluffy duo are now safely in her care enjoying the warmth of an incubator.

In a message to others who might find themselves in a similar situation, Easterbrook said there are three things kittens need when they are this young: heat, glucose, and fluids.

"The first thing is you must get them warm, and luckily Jade had gone online and Googled what to do and she got it all right," Easterbrook said.

Once warm, you can rub some glucose onto the kittens' gums to "get some energy into them".

This can be made by dissolving sugar in water.

Next, they need fluids. Any kitten milk from a supermarket will do at first, but as soon as possible they will need proper kitten formula from a pet store.

Hills Cat Rescue works with a dedicated team of volunteer foster carers who have been trained in neonatal care.

The two Riverstone kittens will be placed with a foster carer, as will the five additional kittens from BARC, however the latter are at least six weeks old and ready for weaning.

In the case of the kittens Jade found, they had clearly been removed from their mother and dumped. But if you stumble upon a very young litter of kittens, it is best to leave them in the care of their mother until they are six weeks old.

"You leave them and you let her raise them," Easterbrook said.

"And then when they get to about the right age, about six weeks, when you're just starting to be able to interact with them, and they're just weaned, then you bring them into care and mum into care and you desex the mum and the kittens."

At this stage kittens need plenty of human love and affection and play to prepare them to meet potential families.

The mum will typically be released back into the area she lives, and the kittens will eventually be rehomed.

Hills Cat Rescue has set up a donation page to help pay for the care of the kittens, with all contributions tax deductible.

All kittens and cats ready for rehoming are featured on their Facebook page and on their website Hills Cat Rescue.

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