To find out what to do, we consulted with Bernadette Kazmarski, a pet blogger and artist who has written an award-winning article on found kittens.

Bernadette writes a blog entitled The Creative Cat and sells her art through her website Portraits of Animals. Bernadette tells us, "The universal response to finding kittens is to presume they are abandoned and unable to care for themselves and to take them home, but not only is that rarely the right response, it’s not even the right presumption and can often be harmful to the kittens... The kitten decision game involves the approximate age of the kittens and the presence, or lack, of a mother cat, and the knowledge that kittens younger than eight weeks belong with their mother, even if she is feral."

Mother cats leave their kittens to go hunting for food, and sometimes to move them one by one to a safer place. The first thing to do when you find kittens in the wild is to observe from a distance to see if mom is coming back.  

It's also important to understand what is meant by "feral" in the rescue world - feral cats are not just strays, or cats born in the wild - true feral cats are ones that are undomesticated, not habituated to humans, and in general not able to adapt to living with people as a pet. Wild born kittens can be socialized if they are habituated to humans early enough, yet this is difficult if the mom is feral, since as Bernadette correctly points out, kittens are healthiest if they remain with mom for at least 8 weeks.  

If the time for socialization is past, and mom and kittens all seem feral, then TNR - trap, neuter, return to a managed colony - is their best option.