You gotta love them
- So, she is small, I am big{er}. She walks on four.I walk on two.She won't disturb me when I sleep , but greets me with a lovely ""good morning "" in a form of enthusiastic miau miau miau miau... when I get off the bed .She turns her back when I'm about to leave the house, cant't watch it, it's too painful . She greets me with a big ""dance " around me ,and many lovely miau, miau.. when I'm coming back. She looks right into my eyes ,and I swear she can see all through me . Yes, she scratches , my shoulder where she usually climbs , can prove it . Yes, she bites sometimes, but hey..she is my little kitten..and she sure owns me !!!
- —Guest mariana
Interesting Behavior Problem Unsolved
- I just adopted a 1 year old cat and she was in a shelter that whole time. At first she was afraid of us and often hide. Now she comes out and is feeling more at home. Her name is Delilah and she has been with us for about 2 months now. She is sweet and we love her. We also have another cat that we've had since his birth. They get along well and have a lot of fun together. Recently, Delilah has found a way to open our daughters closet and brings her toys downstairs and puts them in the cat sleeper. She also has taken my daughters clothes and toys and lined them up leading towards our bedroom down the hall. Some of these items are a bit heavy and she is a little light fluffy kitty. We can't figure out why she is doing this.
- —Guest luvmyenergy
frightened cat
- i purchased a kitten that had been returned to the pet shop as not right for a toddler????? She was terrified of all human contact; with patience, care, and soft words she has now become a loving cat, but will let no one hold her. not even me. When she wants love she demands and gets it. I do not allow guests to make the first move towards her or try to pick her up. Slowly (it's taken a year), she has begun to trust humans. Cats are no different from us and [are] entitled to choose who they want as friends.
- —petalangela
He wouldn't listen
- I had a cat who was just antisocial. bite at anyone, except me, who touched her. We had a plumber who would insist on touching her after I told him what would happen. He would get excited when she clawed at or bit him at. I couldn't believe he did it again the second time he came. I was wondering why he couldn't understand plan English.
- —Guest Elftwitchell
fearful "kitty mill" kitten
- Last year my hubby bought me a siamese kitten, when we went to pick her up we saw that she and her mom and litter mates were all caged, had minimal human interacting, Sooo sad! Our kitty was terrified and hid in her carrier for 3 days, she was so stressed that she barely ate, thank goodness our 8yr old himilayan began to mother her and created a bond so she came to adopt our adult cats habits and actions, now we have a perfectly confident and out going jokester that we love dearly, she is a little bit loud and demanding but we attribute that to her breed!
- —Guest Annette
Shyness in cats
- Interesting to read your tips on overcoming shyness in cats. I have recently aquired 3 female adult Bengals, non of which were at all friendly, and would have not seen another human, except the woman that bred them. Each cat was quite differentto deal with. One was pregnant when she came,but gave birth prematurely, and was at that stage very friendly, so putting her in kitten at some stage soon, may be the answer to her.Her sister, had to go on antibiotics, which wasn't very easy to do, but being handled every day, her reward was to be patted on top of her sleeping box, no where else. So this has continued. The snow girl also neede antibiotics, but weed under herself every time I so much as touched her. After catching her, whch wasn't easy, I would sit her on the bench, and gently pat her, talking, and she needed to see my face. When cleaning the cage next door, she now comes out and watches everything I do without running away. So, it all takes time and repetition, repetition.
- —Guest Chris
Help for my beautiful, but biting cat
- I'd done ALL the behavior mod techniques; clicker training, going outside on a special figure 8 harness, the Tellington T- Touch and still, Tigre, who found me a little over a year ago persisted in nips that quickly escalted to OUCH bites!!! He's a neutered male, with testosterone tests that came back normal. Finally, my vet and I had decided on Prozac for him. I don't leave food out for him; so when I dissolve his tiny dose in a bit of water, then mix in his wet food. Gulp, and it's done. Beats fighting with a pill-shooter! The best news yet, his dangerous (to me) "play aggression" is 90% GONE!!! I still do all the behavior mod. things, along with the medication AND I watch his body language VERY carefully, tail, eyes, ears etc. But WHAT a difference. I was at my wits end. Other than the play aggression, this beautiful stray, who adopted me a little over a year ago, is a VERY sweet, loving kitty. Now we can even sleep together. Before, it was separate rooms!!!
- —liliana1111
Cat Training?
- Pay attention to your cat's behavior. Mine trained me without me knowing it. She saw the dog play fetch one day and decided it looked fun. She started soaking her toy mouse in water and dropping it on the bed when I was laying down. I'd throw it away quickly, but she kept bringing it back. One day, I threw the mouse when it was dry, and she brought it back. Then, my fiance left jugs of water he bought sitting on the floor where the cat could reach them. She pulled the rings off and brought them to us to throw. Now, we take rings off of bottles and give them to her. I've restructured things around the house around her behavior (such as putting a scratching post by the litter box) to eliminate problems. I don't know if I've trained my cat or my cat trained me.
- —anneree1984
My cat loves every guest
- My cat has different problem. He loves every guest who come to the house. He somehow knows who is not comfortable around cats or has alergies so he spend extra time with such a guest. Like saying: Look I am nice guy, pet me, I am so soft and purr heavenly, try, you will love it, woun't you ? One friend keep coming and play with him , even he has to take two pills two hours before in order not sneeze all the time. He was with mother and siblings and charming lady who owned the mother until he was 8 weeks old ... that is maybe the difference in behavior
- —Guest zaz
Fearful of feet
- My angel is my total companion. She is by my side all day (I work from home). And she's a pretty girl! She lived in my sis-in-law's garage before I adopted her (my sis-in-law has 4 kitties, 5 would have been too many). My little angel though is afraid of men (deep voices, feet). She always runs to me. I hate to say, I think she was abused by someone at some point, probably kicked or something. Although she wasn't visibly injured, I took her to the vet. But she's gotten alot more trusting (even can fall asleep on her back). I think things/trust takes time. They are smart animals.
- —Guest emmtqg
In speaking of smart cats...
- A few years ago, my fiancee and our two amazing cats (we now have 3!) moved into an apartment in the Fishtown section of Philadelphia. Now as everyone knows, cats are always interested in silly things over the expensive toys that their owners buy for them. My one cat Ender for example was obsessed with my fiancee's rubbery Lance Armstrong bracelet. He would smack it around and almost juggle it for hours. Around Halloween time we had pumpkins all over the house, and when I would come home from work during that month we had the pumpkins, I would notice that Ender's beloved Lance Armstrong bracelet was stuck around the stem part of the pumpkin. Every time I would see it, I would think how mean it was of my fiancee to do that to my Ender-man! I would never remember to say anything to him about it, and one Friday night, as we sat in our living room, we watched Ender play with his bracelet, proceed to put it in his mouth, walk over to the pumpkin stem, and put it around it with his paws
- —Guest EnderJadeRambo
Stopping the scratching
- My Siamese likes to grab my legs from behind, with his claws out, sometimes biting as well. I often end up with some long, ugly, painful scratches. I have found that a good way to discourage this behavior is to carry a squirt bottle with me when I think an attack is likely (he commonly does it when I am on my way to bed), and if he grabs at me, I squirt him with water and he runs away. Then he doesn't try it for a while. I just need to stay in the habit of carrying the bottle on a regular basis...
- —Guest purrrplej
Fearful Feral Cat
- I took in a 3 year old Feral Cat 4 years ago, after my Siamese suddenly died, and have never regretted it. I had seen her for three years, knew she had had 2 litters of kittens, knw she was living under the step on a nearby house and that no-one looked after her. She has become an angel - still fearful of people with loud voices but even that is coming along. I think the secret is to expect nothing, force nothing and just let love and caring make its mark and to be patient. After 4 years we are still having to make progress in her not being fearful of strangers or strange noises. As of now, she has given more to me than I have given to her. Love conquors all!
- —donald1948
tiger tiger, got a tiger
- Adopted my cat, Tiger, from the shelter when he was six months old, now he's about five, and we're soooo close it amazes me. It started rather rough, Tiger was, still is in some ways, a very...well...tigerish cat. I often tell my friends that we're bonded in blood- my blood. And yet, now Tiger sleeps with me, eat with me, walks with me outside, and even lets me know if I don't hear visitors knocking at the door. He still tends to play rough, but I don't really mind as long as he doesn't draw blood. How I got him to learn to not to bite/scratch so ahrd? Everytime he bit/scratched to draw blood, I tapped him on the nose with two fingers- not hard, but hard enough to annoy him, and told him he was a bad boy. After awhile, he got the message that everytime he attacked me with excessive force, his nose got tapped. Another problem I had with him was that he liked to lick the sticky sides of tapes- so one day, I unrolled a row of tape and sprinkled black pepper on it...he never did it again.
- —Guest privatetai
Snapping Made Training a Snap!
- attention. It's really easy: I snap my fingers. I've seen training "clickers" in stores, but I can't always keep track something so small, especially when I need to get Midnight's attention and it's not around me. Any time Midnight is doing something wrong (he likes to chew on cords - but I've noticed it's only when he's angry with you for something and he ALWAYS seems to know what cord belongs to what human.) Anyway, anytime I just want his attention, I just snap my fingers and he looks right at me. If he's doing something bad, he immediately stops. If he hears me snap from another room, he'll come running. I've found this the easiest way to "communicate" with him. It works when other people do it too, so he's trained to the snap, not to just me, which comes in handy since I live with my boyfriend. I've used the snap method with other animals too, out of habit, and most have caught on easily. Consistency is key I think. If you snap, make sure you "tell" them something. ;)
- —MommaMidnight
