Bossy Kitty - help required

clofty

Hi,

I took in 2 x strays back in April last year (neighbour went away and left the cats behind). The tabby boy (sponge bob) was tame and quickly became an indoor/outdoor cat. The ginger girl (socks) was semi-ferial and it took us a long time to tame her up but she's now an indoors/outdoors cat. Both are always indoors at night, however, they HATE eachother. He will literally stalk her 24/7 when they are in the house and it has come to the point that they have to be seperated (he stays downstairs and she has the run of upstairs). She has had 2 bouts of cystitus which I think are brought on by stress of being stalked by him.

When they are outside he will stalk and chase her around the neighbourhood. I have never seen it come to blows because usually we are there to stop it. Usually there is alot of growling and then screaming from her when the chase is on. They are deffo not playing.

My OH thinks that I am being over protective by seperating them and thinks we should just let them have it out. I would like nothing more than to have my two cats snooze peacefully in front of the fire in the same room each evening but not possible at the moment. Trying to keep them seperated is torture.

Both are neutered/spayed so I don't know where my tom is getting his bossy attitude from. She has been in and out of the house since November and he is still obsessed with killing her.

Any advise would be appreciated.

Fremen

In my experience, it's going to be very difficult to change this behaviour. Do you have any idea how old the cats are? If they're still young they might settle into an uneasy truce after a few months, but I would guess that that's the best you can hope for.

MsFifers

Unfortunately, I agree with the above poster - I don't think there is anything you can do except try to rehome one of them.

The cystitis may be because she is afraid to go to the loo because of him springing surprise attacks on her.

clofty

Vet has advised that he thinks the boy is approx 5 yrs old and girl is 2. We got him neutered about 2 weeks after we took him in (nearly a year) so I'm thinking that he still thinks like an un-neutered tom cat. I think myself that if she stuck her ground with him instead of taking flight that he might stop (I really think he is all bark with no bite).

It would seriously break my heart to get rid of either of them cause they are like kids to us. I heard about this Feliway stuff that you can get to maybe calm the situation in the house. Have any of you had any experience with these plug in things??

She has a seperate litter tray upstairs and he is not allowed upstairs at all but I suppose this is not an ideal situation as she is confined upstairs while he gets to interact with us all evening when we are home. Another concern is while they are out during the day that he will chase her accross the road in front of a car. I tried spraying him in the face with water everytime he makes to go for her in the house but he got kinda used to that.

MsFifers

I have heard good things about Felliway so maybe its worth a shot. But to be honest, by the sounds of things your guy has got his behaviour ingrained at this stage.

I would recommend you read a book called Cat Confidential by Vicki Halls. Its really good about cat behaviour & psychology.

stovelid

MsFifers wrote: »

I would recommend you read a book called Cat Confidential by Vicki Halls. Its really good about cat behaviour & psychology.

She actually has a few books OP.

Also: I wouldn't just let them at it. One of them could get hurt, and it could formalize the dominance of the winner.

clofty

Thanks for the advise guys. Will try the felliway and pick up that book somewhere. You never know! Couldn't get my head around rehoming either of them:(

MsFifers

I can imagine how you feel Clofty! I have a brother & sister cat and although they do a fair bit of sparring and occasionally have a bust- up, they generally get on v. well. I would hate to ever be in the position of trying to stop one picking on the other!