Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with cats

Help me mediate this age old rivalry

pilibeen — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 16:09:32 -0800

Is it possible for a dog with a strong prey drive be trained to not kill my cat? I'm moving into a small guesthouse which is situated on another property where a large dog has the run of the place. I have an overweight, outdoor cat who I'm worried might not be able to escape if she has a run-in with the dog. The dog is amazingly well-trained and well socialized when it comes to other people, but when he sees small animals he completely loses it.

Is it possible to train out this instinct - I'm guessing not? Is it at least possible to let the dog know that this specific cat is part of the family, and not food?

Right now my only idea is to have some controlled encounters with the dog on a leash. Any other suggestions or experiences would be appreciated...

thanks!

Oh, and this afternoon he ate half a roll of toilet paper.

liketitanic — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 23:23:43 -0800

The cat just tried to break into a ziplock bag of Swedish butter cookies. He is obsessed with food. What do you do for a cat with an eating problem? He's worse than the dog! We have a vet appointment coming up fairly soon, but in the meantime I'm hoping you might have some ideas. The cat, named Dizzy, is a neutered little dude, about 11 months old. He is one of 4 cats (and 1 dog) in our household. When I got him, 3 months old, he weighed 3 pounds. He now weighs FIFTEEN. He definitely has a belly but isn't fat all over. And yes, he also gets plenty of exercise. He runs around like a nut pretty often.

The problem? He will eat ANYTHING. He has climbed into greased skillets to lick the fat out. He digs wrappers out of the trash. He gets into the sink to lick out dishes. He breaks into bags of pet food. He just ripped into a sealed bag of cookies.

We do not free-feed ANY of the animals (though before Dizzy the Lardass arrived, we did. We cut that shit out when it was clear he'd eat all day.) All of the animals have dropped weight since we stopped free-feeding. Except him. I don't know what to do with the little monster, other than keeping anything resembling food completely secured. Have you ever seen this problem with a cat? What did you do?

Do I have a little furry Pavarotti?

larkspur — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 07:47:01 -0800

One of my cats has taken up singing with me. Only I'm having a hard time telling--is he enjoying it, or is he shrieking 'shut up already' at the top of his lungs? I sing along with my mp3s when I'm home alone. Recently, one of the cats has started, even if he's not in the same room I am, going 'yowwowwww' loudly and repeatedly while I'm singing, and sometimes shortly afterwards. Usually even if he starts in another room, he'll eventually come where I am and look up at me while he does it.

Usually I'm pretty good at telling whether my cats are happy or unhappy, but... how do I tell if my fat little tabby boy is just a huge fan of my vocal artistry, or thinks I need to shut my trap?

tall, cat-safe indoor plants?

sentient — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 14:40:34 -0800

Wanted: recommendations for tall, indoor, cat-safe plants/trees. Superior, NASA-approved air-filtering and oxygen-producing properties are a plus. I've looked the previous askme and have seen the ASPCA list of cat-safe plants, as well as a helpful post on Apartment Therapy (last comment the page), which has some good prospects. But perhaps there are some others.

I'm looking for an indoor floor plant that's more tree-like than bush/shrub like -- maybe five feet tall, or so. It can't be toxic to cats, and being exceptional in the air-filtering department would be nice. Any recommendations?

Night Meows

jrchaplin — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 06:55:32 -0800

New cat meows all night. Sleep much disturbed ... I adopted a cat this past Friday. Filbert is about 16-18 months old. He was a stray, fed for 3 months or so by a very nice couple who wanted to bring him indoors and adopt him, but couldn't do so or reasons that will become obvious.
Last week, they captured him & brought him to the vet, got him neutered, brought him up-to-date on his shots, de-worming, etc. But the vet discovered Filbert was FIV/FL positive, which precluded this couple from adopting him (they have 3 other cats without FIV).
Long story short: I decided to adopt Filbert.
Since Friday, he's been more or less hiding, which is fine; gotta give him time to get accustomed to his new digs. But he is eating, using the litter box, and occasionally, gracing me with his presence, even spending some time curled up with me on the bed last night.
But every night, starting at around 11 or midnight, he wanders the house, meowing loudly, jumping up on windowsills as if he wants out. Given he was a stray, I suppose this is quite normal, as he's lived most of his recent life outdoors.
I loathe the idea of letting him out. One, his feline leukemia is contagious to other cats (and there are several other outdoor cats in my neighborhood). Two, I live on a very busy road and lost a cat 4 years ago to its traffic.
So ... any way to reduce his night meows, short of letting him out?

Does Shakeaway cat repellent also repel dogs?

ishotjr — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 12:49:27 -0800

Will Shakeaway cat repellent have the unwanted effect of repelling my dog, too? My neighbors (one of whom owns the house I rent) feed two stray cats, including an unaltered male (they have tried to trap him to have him fixed, but haven't been able to, so that's not relevant to this discussion)The neighbor who feeds the cats has big dogs (one is part wolf, even) that spend most of their time in their fenced yard, so the cats don't hang out there. Instead, they hang out in my yard. The tomcat sprays on the bushes, and they both poop in our yard.

The problem is that I have a little indoor dog and a dog door that I would like for him to use. I would really like for my dog to be able to go out and use the bathroom at his own discretion between his nightly walks/when I'm not home. However, he started finding cat poop and rolling around in it, which is baaad news. He can no longer go in the yard unattended. When I take him out and supervise him, he takes forever to pee, because he is obsessed with trying to find the cats in the bushes (who are never there when he comes outside) and sniffing where the tomcat has sprayed.

Talking to the neighbor about dealing with the cats is not an option. She's a nice old lady who loves those cats and I don't want to bother her about it since it's really just a convenience issue for me.

However, I do want to use some Shakeaway, which is dried predator (coyote) urine, to keep the cats from wanting to hang out in my yard (they don't spend most of their time there, so it's not like their habitat or anything).

After that unnecessarily long introduction, I basically just want to know whether the Shakeaway would also end up repelling my dog. The website doesn't list dogs as one of the "pests" that it repels, but before I cover my yard in coyote pee, I'd like to make sure that my dog will not be afraid to go out there, and also whether my dog will decide he needs to roll around in it. This would defeat my purpose of having a dog that can go outside alone without coming in smelling horrible and needing a bath.

Is hibiscus really toxic to cats?

amtho — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 19:07:15 -0800

Is hibiscus really toxic to cats (not dogs)? I need to bring in our two big tree-like hibiscus tonight -- it's going to freeze soon -- but we have nowhere really good to store them, and we have kittens here. I know that hibiscus is toxic to dogs. I know that some plants, e.g. lilies, are deadly to cats. I know where there are big lists of plants that are toxic and non-toxic to cats, and that some don't list hibiscus, though at least one does -- although that list might include it just because it's toxic to dogs/pets in order to be extra safe.

Does anybody know for sure whether hibiscus is poisonous to cats? Just pointing me to a non-qualified "list of plants toxic to cats" won't help much -- I need something authoritative, or at least a personal anecdote one way the other. Please?

Of course it's safest to just keep them away, which we'll do by default, and the plants might be vulnerable to the kittens -- but we'd end up having to keep the kittens out of a fun room in the house, and it would be nice to have the "temptation" of the fun-looking tree-like plants available so we could carefully train the kittens to respect house plants (if such a thing is possible).

Black cats and blue icing

Mutant — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 08:33:51 -0800

Black cats and blue food dye - oh no!! I made a cake for a party this evening, and whipped up this awesome butter and creame cheese flavoured blue coloured icing.

After decorating the cake and putting it safely away, I was distracted by a phone call before I could wash the icing bowl. During the next twenty minutes or so both of our two cats helped themselves, licking wide swathes of the bowl clean.

I came back into the kitchen and caught both at it. They promptly scattered, so I'm not sure if one pigged out but definitely both were enjoying the icing, and about one third of the bowl had been licked at.

Blue food colouring, ok for us, should be ok for cats, yes? Cats don't seem too bothered, and in fact were begging for more when I put the bowl away.

Now seem to be sleeping it off, but should we be concerned?

Literary paeans to cats?

laumry — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 06:50:48 -0800

Can anyone recommend any literary essays on, or short stories about, cats? Hello all.

I'm making a Christmas present for someone -- I'd like it to be a book of essays or extracts from literature describing cats.

Anyone got any recommendations? I already have:

Doris Lessing's "On Cats"
Robert E Howard's "The Beast from the Abyss", as recommended by Artw in this post
Charles Baudelaire's "Les Chats"

(I'm drawing a blank on short stories about cats.)

Shalom, kitties!

pointystick — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 06:48:47 -0800

Asking for a friend: Does anyone know where to find authoritative information on requirments for pets moving to the USA from Israel? Asking for a friend: A US citizen & her Israeli spouse are moving back to the USA from Israel. They have 2 indoor cats who have had regular vet visits & certificates of good health. They have not had rabies shots as that is not required locally as they are indoor only.
Cat mom is panicking that she is not getting consistent information about what documents are required. The US embassy is saying rabies shots not required which seems odd. They don't have any info on quarantine. Who should they (the humans) call? What should they (humans again) read?

They are flying into Orlando next week.

Friend thanks the hivemind in advance!

Stay Away from the Banana Plant

billysumday — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 05:13:19 -0800

My cat is slowly killing my indoor banana tree by scratching the hell out of it. Now what? I live in Central Pennsylvania and in the spring of this year purchased a dwarf plantain plant/tree. It grew very well outside in the summer but now that the weather has taken a turn for the cold, I've brought the plant indoors and have placed it on a small table in front of our large south-facing window. It's continued to thrive and is still sprouting new leaves, but my cat is intent on killing it. He loves to scratch at its trunk and tear at the leaves. He doesn't dig at the soil or eat the plant, so I don't need advice regarding that. Just: how to keep the cat away from the plant? I'd prefer to find a solution that saves the tree while keeping it aesthetically pleasing - i.e., I'd rather not wrap the tree in aluminum foil. My strategy thus far has been to shoot him with water from a water bottle when he gets up in/on the plant, but now it's like he just jumps up there and looks at me for attention. If I don't shoot him, he'll cry and then scratch at the tree until I do shoot him, at which point he runs away. He's a bit challenged in the brain department.

Are there any sprays or anything I can use that would cover the plant in some sort of anti-cat repellent? I did some Googling but came up empty.

Thanks, mefi.

How should I stay warm this winter?

apricot — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 20:40:53 -0800

Which is more efficient/economical to run: a baseboard heater or an oil-filled radiator-type space heater? I'm a Californian getting ready for my first winter in Massachusetts. My apartment has electric baseboard heaters. I have never had those before, and I'm worried my bill is going to be HUGE once it gets cold. It doesn't help that whenever I tell someone those are the heaters I have they dramatically wince and hiss through their teeth. Also, one of my neighbors said her bill was several hundred dollars a month last winter. I'm thinking an oil-filled radiator might be sufficient and a lot less expensive to run.

Bonus question: I have two cats, and would love to have a safer heating source to leave on if I'm going to be out for several hours or overnight. A different neighbor, who also has cats, says she leaves her heaters on when she's not home, but that seems really unsafe to me. Are baseboard heaters safe, or are the other ones safer?

Here are the details:
My living room is basically one big room with a doorway to the kitchen on one end. The living room and kitchen each have drafty old windows (both of which I have covered with that lovely plastic sheeting stuff, which has already helped a lot). There is a front door and a back door that both open up to unheated stairwells. I bought weatherstripping for the doors but haven't installed it yet. My apartment is on the top/second floor, with apartments below and on either side. The building was built in the 70s. The windows and heaters seem to date from then too.

There is one long baseboard heater underneath the window. It's controlled by a dial thermostat on the opposite wall near the kitchen and front door. I spend most of my time at my desk or on the couch, which are near one end of the heater, in the opposite corner from the thermostat. It seems like I could get a space heater to warm the corner where the cats and I spend the most time, and avoid having the baseboard heater running and heating the whole room. I'm an impoverished grad student, and am worried about having to pay huge chunks of my stipend to WMECO. Would it be less expensive to run the space heater, and would that be enough to keep me and the cats warm?

I used to live in a drafty old house in Portland, where the wind ripped the plastic sheets right off the windows and we kept the thermostat at 60, so I know the drill about bundling up indoors and am generally a hot person anyway, but I have never been through a New England winter and I don't know if my plan is realistic or not. Can anyone with experience chime in?

How to get cats to use the litterbox?

djduckie — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 06:51:22 -0800

How can i re-litter train my cats? We had two cats, and they were good cats. they are about a year old, litter mates, didn't fight much, used the litter box, or atleast pooped on the tile next to the litter box in their bathroom, which was easy to clean. Then one day we are walking to the apartment and a kitten that looks almost exactly like the jumps out of a bush and comes straight up to us. He let's me pick him up, he has no tags so i decide i'll feed him and see if someoen puts up signs for him. Well, no one did, and he thinks i am the greatest thing on the planet, so it's pretty much too late to get rid of him. The bad news being that the older cats took a while to warm up to him, and now that they have and everything seems ok, one of them has stopped using the cat bathroom entirely, rather opting for the carpet in the dinning room.

I found another similar question and everyone suggested isolation, but the is the problem with that (possibly). There are three of them, and we live in a 900 sq ft apartment. Their bathroom is like a glorified broom closet with bathroom fixtures in it (which as i am sure you could guess take up most of the space.

I know the question of "why three" comes to mind because it often comes to my mind. Well like i said we started with 2, the first we got, and then i realized that with my work schedule and school there were huge chunks of the day that no one was there and i wanted him to have some company, so that introduced his brother. The third was a chance encounter and probably a mistake, but i am a big softy when it comes to poor defensless kittens.

Any suggestions?

Cats are not getting along anymore! Help!

backseatpilot — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 06:12:09 -0800

Our two cats have taken a step backwards and are having difficulty living together. Need some help (re)socializing them. The two culprits: Doppler (formerly feral, about 7-8 months old) and Max (a shade over a year old). They're both male, both neutered, not siblings, and we adopted them at the same time about six-ish weeks ago.

While they were getting used to their new home, things between them were fine. They weren't exactly best buddies, but they would sniff each other occasionally and sleep on the bed next to each other. In the past few weeks, though, something happened that has caused their relationship to sour.

Max has turned a little aggressive towards Doppler, and Doppler is simply scared to death most of the time. Max will chase and pounce on Doppler, who then finds the nearest hiding spot and will stay there for hours on end. At one point he stayed under the bed for almost three days straight, only leaving to pee on top of the mattress. It got bad enough that we banished both cats from the bedroom and had to keep Doppler locked in the office.

Things have improved since that low point - they'll eat together now, for example, and Doppler doesn't stay in the office 24/7 - but it's not really where we'd like things to be. Sometimes it seems like they're both fine living together; if they're both feeling relaxed, Max will come up and sniff at Doppler and Doppler will just hang out and let things happen. However, Doppler is still very skittish - sometimes Max just needs to look at him from across the room and he'll run under the couch. Sometimes Max will attack him while he's using the litter box. We have to keep them in separate rooms while we're out of the house.

I really can't figure out Max's motivations. Sometimes it seems like he's just trying to play or assert his dominance, but other times it just seems mean - I'll hold Doppler and carry him around the house (he seems to like it and feels safe there), and if I let Max sniff Doppler while he's being held, sometimes Max will bite (not hard, just a sort of grabbing a mouthful of fur). Max also just tends to get aggressive when he's excited or agitated (or on catnip!) and will try to attack slippers, dangling arms, or whatever.

We really want them to be able to live together peacefully, and we've been feeling really bad about having to confine one of them to a single room during the day. We tried some slow resocializing after the bed peeing (Max in a crate in Doppler's room, supervised playtimes, etc.) but we need some more suggestions. I think what it boils down to is a) Max needs to calm down and stop attacking Doppler, and b) Doppler needs to "grow a pair" and stop running all the time. Any ideas?

Trapped Cat, No Key

Maias — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 15:39:05 -0800

Another trapped cat problem: How Long Can They Really Live Without Food or Water? Help, I'm supposed to be catsitting but I can't get into the apartment. The owner's contact info-- including emergency info-- is not producing a response. Cat has now possibly been without food/water for nearly 24 hours. It's a Manhattan apartment and will cost a fortune for a locksmith-- and I don't know if they'll let me break into someone else's apartment anyway.

I've tried everything within the building but no one has keys or an ability to get through the digital passkey system (what appears to have happened is the digital lock will open with my password but there's another lock that doesn't so I can't get in).

Any ideas on what to do? I don't know if the cat has access to the toilet for water.

I will not eat them in a bowl / I will not eat them with a roll.

Scattercat — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 10:24:54 -0800

Cats are weird. Help me figure out if this shift in eating habits is a problem. So for the past two weeks or so, our cats (two males, neutered, not declawed, strictly indoor, adopted at barely more than two months old, both brothers, lived together their whole lives) have stopped eating. That is, they eat about half the food we put out for them.

- The food has not changed and is the same brand (Science Diet) which they've eaten their whole lives.

- They still beg for food at the appropriate times (morning and evening), but do not eat it when it is provided to them.

- Even their once-every-two-days-or-so pouches of wet food in gravy fail to excite their appetites. That is, they get all frantic and happy and then lick the gravy off, but they don't eat the actual food. (One of them has always done this, for reference, but usually his brother snarfs up the rest of it.)

They don't seem to be otherwise affected or unhappy. We haven't seen any dramatic weight gains or losses, or any shifts in behavior or attitude. (I mean, they're pretty neurotic, but they're not noticeably differently neurotic.)

What's up, cat-loving Mefites? When should we get worried about them?

(As far as lifestyle changes or disruptions, we're planning to move in about three weeks, but presumably the cats don't speak enough English to realize this, and packing has not progressed to the point where the structure of the house is different. Two bookshelves are empty now, basically.)

Our cat prefers me to my wife

Joe Beese — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 21:01:53 -0800

Bizarre Love Triangle: me, my wife, and our cat As I type this, flat on my back on the couch with my head propped up, there lies on my chest a young adult spayed female cat whom Mrs. Beese and I recently adopted from the local Humane Society and named Jones after the durable feline in "Alien". If I lay down either on a couch or in a bed she will be invariably station herself there within minutes. She sits on the toilet lid while I take a shower. She wakes me up in the night by brushing my lips with her nose.

Now Jones will occasionally seek out Mrs. Beese. But not one-fifth as often as she comes to me. And my wife - who was the driving force behind the adoption in the first place - complains only half-jokingly about feeling left out. "Here comes your girlfriend," she'll frown as Jones crosses the floor to hop up on my belly. Being a little stinker, I can't always resist the temptation to rub it in by saying, "If you don't mind, I'd like to be alone with the cat." Now she talks about our having to adopt a second cat so she "can have one".

There are already sixteen legs in our queen-size bed on cold nights - so I really don't want another pet. Is there anything worth trying to get Jones to share her affections more equally? Or - since I'm not optimistic about the chances of ever changing a cat's behavior - is there any outlook Mrs. Beese could adopt to reconcile herself to Jones being such a Daddy's Girl?

A spoonful of sugar doesn't work well with cats.

grapefruitmoon — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 08:01:53 -0800

Confuse-A-Cat-Filter: How to best trick a cat into swallowing a pill. Help, plz. So, we have this cat. Who has to swallow this pill. To pre-empt the "could you give her something that's not a pill?" inevitable derail: the pill is what needs to be given. Just how it is.

Now, how do we get the pill into the cat? We've tried burying it in wet food. We've tried crushing part of it and putting THAT into her food. No dice. Certainly trying to pop it into her mouth isn't working, especially since holding her down is like holding down an electric eel.

Someone must have at some point in time gotten a cat to swallow a pill. I would like their secrets.

What sex for a new kitten?

CollegeNelson — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 15:49:36 -0800

What is the best sex for a new kitten? And should I get one? Right now I have three cats that have learned how to get a long. Two girls and a boy. Now someone at work wants to know if I want a kitten. Her cat just had a litter and if I want a cat I can pick the sex. I am not sure if I want to get a boy or a girl. The girls(14 and 11 years old) get along with each other and tolerate the boy(3 year old). Also I know I am moving out of state in three years hopefully into a new home but I am not sure so is adding a new cat into the house the best idea. I love cats and have had four cats before I just want to make sure I am not saying yes just because the whole oohhh kitty thing.

Active Cat Boarding in San Francisco

sfkiddo — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 22:46:34 -0800

I need recommendations on boarding young cats in San Francisco. I wouldn't say they are high maintenance, but they are young and very active. Capone (M) and Mimi (F) are a bit over 6 months old, siblings, and very social. Mr. sfkiddo and I will be out of town for 4-5 days next month and have come to the conclusion that we cannot simply have a cat sitter come in for 20 minutes/day. Our kittens need a lot of attention: Capone wants to fetch things for hours a day and Mimi needs a lot of lap time.

My ideal would be having someone stay in our home for the duration of our absence. That said, I'm pretty leery of having a stranger stay in our place. (Unfortunately, our friends can't stay here, they could only do the drop by feedings.) Considering that the key is to have someone give our pets a lot of attention without robbing us blind, what are my best options for San Francisco? Any good boarders here?

How to feed our cats?

lolalivia — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 07:41:08 -0800

Question on the feeding of two cats with different eating disorders. We adopted two cats, Tiger and Grey, a couple of years ago. They are both now approximately three and a half years old. Tiger is a good-natured cat that will eat continuously until he throws up. Grey is a very anxious cat and will usually poop on our bed upon our return from being away for more than two days.

Here is their food history:
- We were feeding them on an all wet Friskies diet, but the vet told us to feed them dry as well.
- We switched to a Science Diet mix of less wet and some dry, hoping that if we mixed the dry in with the wet, it would slow Tiger down. This did not work.
- We found a lot of MeFi-ers recommending higher quality foods to prevent this. We switched to MaxCat. This did work for Tiger, but then Grey started having chronic diarrhea. According to our vet who did many tests and found nothing, his diarrhea was likely a food allergy.
- Now they are both on a bland Science Diet I/D wet and dry diet as before, only Tiger has returned to throwing it up, once or twice a week.
- Grey still has diarrhea, 1 month later, despite my administering anti-diarrheal meds and a probiotic to him for a little over two weeks after the vet visit.

Here is their feeding-style history:
- We have tried feeding the cats in separate rooms, Tiger in the kitchen and Grey in an adjacent spare room.
- When we leave the door to Grey’s room open, Tiger will eat all of his food quickly, then take over Grey’s food and eat until he throws up.
- We have changed the food bowls so they are deeper and he cannot eat as fast. This did not work.
- We have tried feeding each cat a separate diet, but because this entails both separate dry and wet foods for each cat twice a day, this was not a long-term option that we, as pet-owners, could maintain.
- When we close the door to Grey’s room for 30 minutes to give him time to eat, he will not eat all his food at once, and Tiger will finish Grey’s food once the door has been opened. Sometimes he will throw up from this.
- When we remove the food after the 30 minutes, Tiger will eat more quickly when next he is fed and definitely throw it up.
- When we remove the food after the 30 minutes and leave a small amount (about 1/2 cup) of dry food out between meals, Grey will eat throughout the day and, as a result, has gained 2 lbs. in the past year.

In addition, I have tried Feliway plug-ins and collars to help our anxious cat calm down, but they do not appear to help his upset stomach at this time. I cannot afford to medicate him with Prozac or any other long-term medication.

Where I stand is that I have a cat with diarrhea, despite food switches, and a cat that throws up because of the food switches. I am close to a breaking point with this, as I feel I have exhausted almost every option to meet the dietary needs of these two cats.

Fuckin' cats, Donny.

backseatpilot — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 15:51:44 -0800

Question about the feeding of two cats on different diets. We adopted two cats last week, Doppler (6 months) and Maxwell (about a year). The rescue told us to keep Doppler on kitten food until he's a year old, so we've been putting out a bowl of kitten and a bowl of adult cat food. Problem is, Maxwell really loves the kitten food and has been muscling Doppler out of the way to get at it first.

We feed them twice a day, and the bowls do not get devoured entirely at once - there's often a little bit of each food left when I get home from work. I've tried feeding Max first with the adult food, but he won't touch it until the kitten food is presented. Trying to sequester Doppler and the kitten food behind a closed door has been hit-and-miss, since Max gets underfoot and won't leave me alone until the kitten food is on the ground. When they both get put down at the same time, both cats will eat some of each food.

So, two part question. First, is it bad for the older cat to be eating kitten food or for the kitten to be eating adult food? Second, how can I prevent them from eating each other's food with a minimum of fuss?

Oh wow, another cat question

oh really — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 20:02:51 -0800

[CatFilter]: My one-year-old, neutered, fully-clawed male cat is very bitey & doesn't respond to anything that one might think would deter him. Please help! This is especially important as I'm having a baby in January & am concerned about his biting the baby.

The thing about this cat is that he is a very, very good boy. His aggression is all play aggression -- he's not biting out of anger or fear or pain. He does, however, bite me completely unprovoked -- like, maybe I've walked past him & he's decided it's time to launch an attack! Also, he bites much harder than any other cat I've ever had -- even though he's clearly playing, it doesn't feel like it. His bites don't often break the skin, but they hurt like hell. For the record, he rarely uses his claws when playing.

My guess is that he was poorly socialized -- I was told that he was orphaned, & our vet thinks he was probably four or five weeks old when we got him, which is obviously way too young. I don't think he understands that play-biting isn't supposed be so mean! We have two other cats & were hoping they could teach him how to play nicer, but he is aggressively playful with them as well (even though they don't really like it).

Things we've tried:
- squeaking as if we're in pain
- hissing
- clapping/stomping the floor/shouting "no"
- shaking a can with some coins in it
- spritzing him with water
- tapping him on the nose
- blowing in his face
- scruffing him
- ignoring him

These have all had zero effect on him. He didn't like the water, but it didn't actually stop him from biting. At all.

Our vet is stumped & has acknowledged that he's unusually "feisty." Although he's mellowed over the course of the year that we've had him (which gives me hope!), I'm really tired of having my feet & ankles bitten when I walk past him & he's in one of his moods, &, like I said, I'm worried that he could hurt the baby after it's born.

One thing of note is that he tends to bite me way more than my husband -- but he also dry nurses me in the middle of the night & curls up next to me or in my lap a fair amount. I know it's not that he just doesn't like me!

Anyway, any alternative suggestions for getting him to chill the hell out would be much appreciated!

Catmalion?

Metroid Baby — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 10:24:11 -0800

I've bonded with a stray cat in the neighborhood. I have no idea if he can successfully become a house cat. How do I figure out – and do – what’s best for him? We call this little guy Bonus Cat. We've seen him hanging around the neighborhood since we moved here, and I see him at least every couple of days. I feed him every now and then. He follows me around, and will curl up on my lap and purr. I've talked to a couple people in the neighborhood, and no one knows where he came from.

I'm fairly certain he's a stray. He's very thin and goes absolutely nuts when I give him food; he's easily spooked and jumps at sudden movements and loud noises; we've seen him with some pretty bad scrapes and skin troubles that would easily warrant a vet visit. (We've attempted to get him to a vet in the past, but he's thwarted our efforts, and he's made quite impressive recoveries from the injuries we've seen.) He's not neutered, which I'd like to get fixed regardless.

On the other hand, he's definitely used to people: it didn't take him long at all to warm up to me, and he will curl himself around the legs of other pedestrians in the neighborhood. He's very gentle and friendly by any cat standards; I think he may have been a pet at one time, and was abandoned.

I'm trying to earn his trust little by little, getting him used to being a people cat. Occasionally I pick him up, carry him a few feet, and let him back down, so he can get used to being held without associating it with anything negative. I've been trying to get him to come inside the house, too, and sometimes he'll come in, but he won't venture past the entryway. He seems afraid of the indoors.

Generally speaking, it seems like it'd be better for a cat to have people and live indoors, but I'm not sure if Bonus Cat agrees. I'm not sure how well he'd adjust to being taken from his home turf (even if he became my cat, I'm going to move eventually), and I'm not sure if he'd have behavioral issues that would prevent him from being adoptable. I'm sure he sprays, I don't know if he'd use a litter box, and I generally have no idea how he'd react to living indoors even part-time.

What's best for this guy? Should I attempt to housecat-ify him, or continue to let him hang out in the neighborhood and just give him food and ear-scritches when I can? And if I do go the house cat route, how exactly can I best do this and how long will it take?

Dead cat walking? Jack Russell Terriers and cats...

dirtypants — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 09:38:31 -0800

What are your Jack Russell Terrier + cat stories? I can't get a consistent read from The Google. I've been scouring the Tubes for stories about Jack Russells and cats co-habbing. I found a very small JRT while working in a nearby city on a VERY busy street the other day. She was nearly hit, then terrified, etc. I lured her slowly into a building and then slowly trapped and leashed her. Within a half-an-hour she was following me everywhere, and has been an absolute joy. No bites from Craigslist posts, nearby vets and flyers. She wasn't collared or chipped, and she isn't spayed (she is probably close to two years, but very small). So I'm thinking her owners weren't particularly diligent. And they haven't made an effort to find her. But she is VERY domesticated, pretty mellow (but a blast to play with), great with other dogs, off-leash trained, and quiet. This is unlike any JRT I have ever met.

The local animal control (where I found her) has a 3-5 day kill cycle.

So if I keep her (a low probability -- I expect she'll show signs of the JRT traits that drive me nuts, or I'll find her owners, or I'll wake up to the fact that she needs more exercise than Usain Bolt), does that mean that I can never have a cat? I don't want to rule that out by making a dumb choice now. The Tubes are full of "MY JRT JUST LOVES CATS!" stories, but there are the occasional, "I had a cat and JRT for three years and they were BFF until he suddenly ate it" horror posts. I know that there is a bias in those data, as there will be here, but I thought I'd solicit for more info.