IT's enough to make Looney Tunes' famous animated cat, Sylvester, weep.

A feline has shown that maternal instincts can overcome predatory ones by adopting seven chicken chicks to bring up with its own kittens.

Nimra, a one-year-old cat in the city of Madaba which lies just south of Amman in Jordan, has been looking after the chicks since their mother hen died a month ago.

After recently giving birth to four kittens Nimra keeps them and her unlikely extra brood together in a cardboard box.

If the chicks wander too far onlookers say Nimra will gently pick them up in her mouth and take them back to the box.

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