CatFilter, teach this dog person how to play with a cat!
June 24, 2015 10:55 AM
My partner moved in with me and my dog Tribble a few weeks ago, bringing along their three-year-old cat Peter. Peter is not used to being an only cat and is being obnoxious out of apparent boredom. Help me figure out how to reliably tire him out!
Before my partner and Peter moved in, Peter had never lived in a single-cat household in his life. He's used to being able to play with another cat pretty much whenever he wants. Now Peter is bored and driving us nuts. We are at our lease's two-pet limit and cannot get a second cat right now, or we'd already be out looking for an auxiliary cat. I'm a little stumped.
Mostly, the irritating "come PLAY with me, dammit" behavior has taken the form of scratching at/destroying the box spring to my mattress, usually in the early morning or in the evening. We're getting rid of that anyway--bought an IKEA platform bed for other reasons, so the box spring goes out to the curb tonight--but I don't think that will fix his general desire for attention and play right when I want to be asleep or lazy, and I'm a little worried that he will just find something else that is annoying to do to get attention. I find it hard to sleep when I'm worrying he's going to break into something and destroy it for funsies, and I think I've been rewarding his desire for attention by removing him from the box spring or catching him and kicking him out of the bedroom when he wakes me up. (He usually wails at the door for quite a while after that but eventually gives up.)
Because his current form of annoying behavior is to scratch things that will get human attention, we've set up a bunch of scratchers around the house: a large sisal rope wrapped post about three feet tall, covered the box spring in a bit of sisal rug in the spot he was scratching most, plus four corrugated cardboard scratchers in various places around the apartment. We also have a long piece of sisal rug for him to scratch at/climb on his cat tree. There's also cat grass available and we screened off the patio with deer netting and installed a cat flap in our sliding glass door so that he and the dog can go out there and look off the balcony whenever they want.
He has a lot of cat toys and in particular a Da Bird and a Cat Catcher wand, and we're both stepping up our playing with the cat as much as we can, especially in the evening before bed. Promisingly, he also appears to be beginning to attempt to play with the dog, mostly by trying to get her to chase him. (She's still checking to make sure this is an allowable activity and he stops and glares at her if she doesn't chase him after he darts out in front of her, so we've been writing this off as play and not intervening.) He will also walk on a leash and my partner has taken him for a couple of walks... so now every time the dog needs to go out for a quick potty break or a walk, he presents himself at the door insistently and tries to come out on a walk too, which is new behavior for him and a little obnoxious in its own right.
The thing that is getting me about playing with him is that his attention span is so short given what I am used to. He plays for like five minutes and then he's bored and doesn't care about the cat wand or chasing the crunchy tinfoil toys I throw for him any more... but if I give up and wander off, he pulls the same "hey pay attention to me, hey, HEY" stuff and acts like he hasn't had enough playtime. How do I tire this cat out if he won't play when I actually offer to play with him, even if he was bouncing around being an asshole for attention five minutes before? I've never had a cat before--only dogs--and while I know exactly how to wind a dog up into a play session and wear a dog out, I confess I'm feeling kind of stumped on this one.
Before my partner and Peter moved in, Peter had never lived in a single-cat household in his life. He's used to being able to play with another cat pretty much whenever he wants. Now Peter is bored and driving us nuts. We are at our lease's two-pet limit and cannot get a second cat right now, or we'd already be out looking for an auxiliary cat. I'm a little stumped.
Mostly, the irritating "come PLAY with me, dammit" behavior has taken the form of scratching at/destroying the box spring to my mattress, usually in the early morning or in the evening. We're getting rid of that anyway--bought an IKEA platform bed for other reasons, so the box spring goes out to the curb tonight--but I don't think that will fix his general desire for attention and play right when I want to be asleep or lazy, and I'm a little worried that he will just find something else that is annoying to do to get attention. I find it hard to sleep when I'm worrying he's going to break into something and destroy it for funsies, and I think I've been rewarding his desire for attention by removing him from the box spring or catching him and kicking him out of the bedroom when he wakes me up. (He usually wails at the door for quite a while after that but eventually gives up.)
Because his current form of annoying behavior is to scratch things that will get human attention, we've set up a bunch of scratchers around the house: a large sisal rope wrapped post about three feet tall, covered the box spring in a bit of sisal rug in the spot he was scratching most, plus four corrugated cardboard scratchers in various places around the apartment. We also have a long piece of sisal rug for him to scratch at/climb on his cat tree. There's also cat grass available and we screened off the patio with deer netting and installed a cat flap in our sliding glass door so that he and the dog can go out there and look off the balcony whenever they want.
He has a lot of cat toys and in particular a Da Bird and a Cat Catcher wand, and we're both stepping up our playing with the cat as much as we can, especially in the evening before bed. Promisingly, he also appears to be beginning to attempt to play with the dog, mostly by trying to get her to chase him. (She's still checking to make sure this is an allowable activity and he stops and glares at her if she doesn't chase him after he darts out in front of her, so we've been writing this off as play and not intervening.) He will also walk on a leash and my partner has taken him for a couple of walks... so now every time the dog needs to go out for a quick potty break or a walk, he presents himself at the door insistently and tries to come out on a walk too, which is new behavior for him and a little obnoxious in its own right.
The thing that is getting me about playing with him is that his attention span is so short given what I am used to. He plays for like five minutes and then he's bored and doesn't care about the cat wand or chasing the crunchy tinfoil toys I throw for him any more... but if I give up and wander off, he pulls the same "hey pay attention to me, hey, HEY" stuff and acts like he hasn't had enough playtime. How do I tire this cat out if he won't play when I actually offer to play with him, even if he was bouncing around being an asshole for attention five minutes before? I've never had a cat before--only dogs--and while I know exactly how to wind a dog up into a play session and wear a dog out, I confess I'm feeling kind of stumped on this one.
This post was deleted for the following reason: poster's request -- cortex
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