Alas, no. It shouldn’t surprise us that they wouldn’t recognize their father, since he was nothing more than a sperm donor (and remember that
kittens in the same litter can have different fathers). But it does strike some people as odd that kittens, once grown and separated from their mothers, do not seem to recognize her if they meet her again.
This raises a question: would a male cat ever mate with his own mother? The answer is yes, though some experts say there is some “incest instinct” that prevents this from occurring often. In the interest of breeding for specific traits, humans will sometimes create an incest situation, a practice called backcrossing.
