New kitten problems.

luckat

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/1860542875/026-2515080-2029258

Clicker Training Your Cat (A Karen Pryor Clicker Book)
Karen Pryor

List Price: £7.99
Our Price: £6.39

Synopsis
In this book you will discover a new way to communicate with your cat. Clicker training is a method of training without using punishment, pain or fear. It uses all-positive clicks and treats to help your cat learn. It's easy for you and fun for your cat. This is the answer for all pet owners who want a well-behaved feline companion.

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Clicker training is actually good fun - a game for you and your cat. It'll also teach you how to deal with *people* better!

Now, back to generalities: basic rules for a new kitten: *bring it to an excellent vet straight away to see what it needs in terms of worming, vaccination, etc, and to get advice on diet. Richard Lavelle in the Sandymount Animal Clinic in Gilford Road is a great vet.

I personally don't keep cats in - but there is the risk of the cat being run over. Don't let a *very* young kitten out anyway - it can get itself into bad trouble with other cats. And it's a good idea to let the cat only out the back door, so that it regards this as its territory. It will discover the front garden and the road after a while, but is always likely to centre its attention more in the back garden.

If your cat becomes anxious, apart from looking at problems like bullying, you can get a pheromone plug with a bottle of stuff called Feliway, which releases a pheromone that cats themselves spread from their cheek glands when they're happy and marking their territory and each other (and their humans, when they rub their cheek lovingly on you). It's scentless, but makes them feel secure. You plug it into an electric plug and forget about it, replace the bottle every month or two. Expensive, but worth it.

Good luck with your kitten, you're going to have a great time with it.

luckat

Oh, the kitty's six months old! Well old enough to go out, Zener.

Don't worry about the sleeping; cats are nocturnal animals by nature, and cat-napping is one of their great skills when there's not much going on.

One great toy is a kind of mini-fishing-rod with a stick and string, and a ball of paper on the end. She (and you) will have endless fun hunting the ball as you trail it along the ground, leap it suddenly into the air and let it lie still for tense moments as she stalks it.

A good shop for things like cat trees is Breffni House in Dundrum, just after the turn into Bird Avenue.

luckat

Oh, and... keep her in around Halloween. Some "people" are cruel to straying animals at this time.

Nala

Yeah, I found a little kitten on Tuesday. She had blood coming out of her opening, wounds under her tail and her tail seemed to be broken. I think she'd been interfered with with a banger. Makes me so mad. She came straight up to me and kept purring, poor little mite is too trusting for her own good! I've another cat like that, she'd go to Jack The Ripper! Mine were all locked in for Halloween.

Alun

luckat wrote:

Don't worry about the sleeping; cats are nocturnal animals by nature, and cat-napping is one of their great skills when there's not much going on.

Not to be pedantic, but cats are not nocturnal, but crepuscular, i.e. they are most active around dawn and dusk, which not entirely coincidentally is when their prey, mice and small mammals which are also crepuscular, are also most active. Cats actually sleep quite a lot at night, but you're asleep then too so you don't notice

Alun

neev wrote:

Yeah, I found a little kitten on Tuesday. She had blood coming out of her opening, wounds under her tail and her tail seemed to be broken. I think she'd been interfered with with a banger. Makes me so mad. She came straight up to me and kept purring, poor little mite is too trusting for her own good! I've another cat like that, she'd go to Jack The Ripper! Mine were all locked in for Halloween.

I'd like to take people that do that and do the same to them and see how they like it.

SpaceJunkie

neev wrote:

Yeah, I found a little kitten on Tuesday. She had blood coming out of her opening, wounds under her tail and her tail seemed to be broken.

Although I wouldn't rule out Bangers, it sounds more likely it was hit by a car. The fact that she had some internal injuries and a possible broken tail. If anyone had done that to the cat, if would have a strong fear of humans. That's an instinct they take seriously. I would strongly recommend a vet trip to have her/him checked out in any case.

Alun wrote:

Not to be pedantic, but cats are not nocturnal, but crepuscular, i.e. they are most active around dawn and dusk

Correct. As I mentioned above (somewhere), they have two cycles they go through in our day. They become active in the mornings when we get ready for work (and normally get a feeding) and again in the evening when we get home (and they get another feeding). The fact that this activity of ours coincides with their cycle is one reason cats and humans get along so well. But, they are not constrained to that though. My "hunter" occasionally disappears in the evening and does not come home until around 4 AM.

luckat wrote:

Oh, and... keep her in around Halloween

Unfortunately, this is very true. Even more so if your cat is the traditional "Black Cat" like two of mine are. Some are supersticious an have a real dislike for black cats while others are just cruel people. I keep mine in on Halloween night.

luckat wrote:

Clicker Training Your Cat

I've heard of this before but have never tried it. I have heard that it can give excellent results. I understand that this method can be time intensive and requires that you keep the clicker handy.

luckat

Clicker training is the least time-intensive method of training I've ever used! It's basically a game you and your pet play when you feel like it.

First you "charge" the clicker, by associating it with treats: click, give a (very small, so the animal doesn't get stuffed and get bored with it) treat, click, treat, click, treat, click, treat - until the animal starts looking to the clicker in expectation of a treat.

*Never* click without immediately following with a small food treat.

Then you have the powerful weapon for training. Training is done in 5-minute bursts - just a short game each time - and should be very pleasurable and good fun for both sides.

It's a blast. One story in one of Karen Pryor's books (she's a dolphin trainer who started the clicker training thing) is of a friend of hers who's a pianist, and whose party piece ends with a single Middle C note; she trained her cat to hit Middle C on cue, so the cat hops on her lap when it hears her starting to play that piece, and on cue, at the end of the piece, the pianist lifts her hands off the keys, and *bounce*, the kitty hops on Middle C!

SpaceJunkie

Interesting...

In a way, I guess I have tried a similar method without knowing it. Years ago after my divorce from my first wife, I was living in an apartment and had a cat for companionship. She watched TV, slept and ate with me. She was incredibly fast and bright.

Being a creature of habit and somewhat lazy, I developed a habit of feeding her while I ate. I did this for two reasons. I wanted to do all my kitchen chores at once. Eat, do dishes, feed the furball etc. (I hated every minute I spent in the kitchen) and I wanted to keep her busy and away from the table where I was eating.

The problem was that when it was time to eat, I didn't always know where she was. Sometimes she would be sleeping on my bed, sometimes playing on the enclosed porch and sometimes hiding under the couch. So, in an effort to get her to come to me, I would call her. Usually with less then impressive results. But, I learned that there was one sound she would identify with when I could see her. I would snap my fingers to get her attention and she would look in my direction. I would then pick her up and take her into the kitchen for feeding. Over the months, she associated the snapping of my fingers with dinnertime and would come to me wherever she may be.

Then, one day, she surprised me. I had snapped my fingers to get her to come to me and she did much more. She came trotting in from the porch and climbed me until I pucked her up mostly out of a reaction to the pain and place her on my shoulder. Her claws were long and sharp! From that time afterward, when I snapped my fingers, she would come running and from about 3 feet away, would leap hitting me about mid-chest and end up on my shoulder. I still have a picture I took while hand-feeding her on my shoulder. That was nearly 35 years ago.

My current Siamese female does not respond to any sound I make like she did, but she does know the sound of my truck and meets me in the driveway almost every night when I get home from work. While unloading my stuff, she will jump into the truck bed rubbing her face and body on every edge and corner she can find. When I lock the truck and go to where she is, she will climb onto my shoulder and we will go into the house together. She does this because I often stop at McDonald's (for some takeout) before going home, and she loves cheeseburgers.

ZENER

Guys thanks for the great advice and the resulting restoration of harmony in the Chez Pussy house hold. Unfortunately I need your help again but this time on a slightly more worrying matter.

On Tuesday evening she wanted to go outside so we opened the door as we normally do and let her out, as usual we left the door open so she could come back in if she wanted, she didn't but this is not unusual as sometimes she goes wandering at night. Anyway thats the last time we saw her and my 9 year old daughter - and myself to be honest - is heartbroken with worry. Every time she hears a noise outside she runs to the door hoping it's the cat - it isn't!

A friend tells me that at this age (9 - 10 months according to the vets estimate) it's normal for her to go mating and that she may well just reappear as if nothing has happened. I've walked around the main roads nearby looking for her body but found nothing.
Anyone any ideas ?
Is my friend right in what he says?
Should I start looking for a new kitten?

ZEN

ZENER

My 9 year old daughter Kirsty found our cat - Kitty - in a local park this morning in high grass, she had been hit by a car by the looks of her and was dead. I've spent the last couple of hours trying to console Kirsty but at the moment she is inconsolable and we are all very upset over the loss of our first family pet.

It's difficult to explain to someone so young what dead means, I never realised this until now. We had a small burial and said some words and this has made it a little easier for her.

Thanks again to everyone for your help and advice.

ZEN

tk123

This is TERRIBLE - i'm really sorry Zener & Kirsty - I don't know what i'd do if something happend to my cat - he's curled up beside me now....

Saruman

Oh no thats awful.. sorry to hear it.

eth0_

Poor little thing :-(

karlin

I'm so sorry for you. This is always so sad and difficult and my heart goes out to your daughter -- so hard for her to make the discovery.

Just two notes I was going to make before hearing this sad ending, but they are I think still worth making:

1) wasn't she spayed? As if so she wouldn't have been wandering for mating reasons -- but all cats will wander if left outside, often across streets at night. She would have been unlikely to have been in season at the moment anyway with the weather growing cold -- cats tend to have kittens spring through summer.

I hope all owners of females will remember to spay by 6 months (and keep females as indoor-only cats until they are spayed, as they can become pregnant as early as 3-4 months) as there aren't enough homes for the existing supply of kittens and cats. This is an endless uphill struggle for those (like me) working in animal rescue and a female could easily have two litters a year, up to 10-18 kittens needing homes.

2) please do consider an indoor-only cat if you decide on another cat -- the death rate is so, so high from cars for all outdoor cats -- about 1/4th to 1/3rd will be killed by cars before they are 5. I actually collected some rescue material from a US cat rescue today at a Petco (large petshop chain; they offer only rescue animals for rehoming at their shops, a great policy -- I am out in the US at the moment) which states these figures: avg lifespan for outdoor cats, 1-5 years; indoor cats, 12-20 years.

If after some time you do think of another cat or kitten feel free to PM me and I can put you in touch with one of the very good cat rescues.

RainyDay

Sorry to hear your news.

Karlin - Any idea what the figures for outdoor cats in Ireland would be? I'd imagine there are far more wild predators in the US (outside of the cities) than here in Ireland.

SpaceJunkie

It is always sad to hear about a young kitten who was not able to live out a full life because of tragedy. I have lost 3 (to cars) in my lifetime, all of which broke my heart. One was only a year old, one was approaching 2 years and my latest loss was 6 years old. Having known her for 6 years and having formed a strong bond, she was an exceptionally powerful loss.

It is hard for us adults to cope with such a loss but even more so for youngsters who really have little experiance with the permanancy of death. The little ceremony and burial is really all that can be done in this situation.

As I often tell others, if one decides to let a kitten roam and excercise her instincts to hunt and reproduce, understand the dangers ahead of time and make the decision knowing and accepting the risks. Give them the best advantages possible with full immunizations first and make sure she is Spayed. Cats have no desire to reproduce. They are driven to it by the changes that occur in their body, often called "heat". At the very least, it will help her fend off diseasees and reduce how far she will be driven to wander. A cat on the hunt can easily cover a distance of 1.5 miles radius from where she establishes her home. In today's world, there are just too many roads within that distance. And cats will cross them all sooner or later.

ZENER

Thanks for your very kind replies people, Kitty was special in our house be it only for a short time. Anyone with kids knows the streses and strains of it, getting them to help out and do chores etc. Not where Kitty was concerned - she was treated like a queen, every one looked after and fed her and played with her. The rows weren't over who's turn it was to feed her they were over why someone didn't get their turn. She had a taste for roast chicken and I used go out of my way to buy some for her on my way home, the nose would go up to her bowl instead she would shout up at me knowing I had her favorite treat . . .

She'll certainly be missed.

Thanks again guys, by the way I've been in touch with irishanimals.com with a view to adopting another cat. I'll let you know how it goes.

Ken

pretty-in-pink

Oh thats so sad, poor kitty.

Hope she died quickly and without pain. Shes up there in heaven and she knows you love her very much.

I've had a few kitties die over the years and it still gets me so badly. I still cry over everyone of them- and even over pets I don't know (kitty, millie etc), and some people don't get why. For anyone who knows, its not "just a cat", its a loved member of the family. They are there for you, and mine give you kisses if you're sad/sick. They just know. Best of luck finding a new kitty. Glad you had a funeral, it helps ease the pain. We should make a national "remember your dead pets day", or a day to commenerate pets. National Animal Day?