Aggressive cat

DEFTLEFTHAND

I posted here a couple of months back about my petulant young cat. He's now nearly two years of age and has grown quite big, in the last few weeks he has become very aggressive towards our elder cat. Our eldest will turn 11 this year and is a beautiful quiet animal, the problem is our young guy attacks him on a daily basis. If I feed the two together the young cat will ignore his own food and attack the other fella trying to get at his food.

It worries me because I can see the older cat is becoming quite distressed with the situation. The young cat is bigger than him and is a pure ginger colour, people have told me the ginger's are very aggressive which I thought was a joke at first but now I'm starting to believe them.

I should note that he's perfectly friendly with humans and loves attention.

planetX

The colour of the cat has nothing to do with temperament, the people who said that probably had encounters with an unneutered ginger. When I was a kid I thought that black cats were more aggressive, it was because of a neighbours unneutered tomcat who used to tear strips out of my gentle neutered ginger cat.
Is your younger cat injuring the older? If not you're describing a fairly normal situation for unrelated cats living together. The younger one is in the prime of his life, he's top cat. Make sure they have enough space to be able to avoid one another, and definitely feed them seperately to reduce the stress on your older cat.

Pumpkinseeds

It sounds like a power play for top cat position to me. I sometimes have it with my 2 male neutered cats. I got a Da Bird toy at Christmas and it exhausts the 2 of them so they don't have the energy to harass each other as much. I'd agree about feeding them seperately, both my chaps prefer it that way.

I have a Feliway diffuser in the living room, where both of them spend most of their time and it really helps calm things down. I always know if its run out as things get a bit tense with the 2 of them.

doubter

I have 16 cats, and they all live together fairly happy. One thing every cat has is his or her own spot.Where they withdraw when they want peace. Find a space for each of them that is theirs. help them in the beginning to understand this is the others territory by removing them if they cross into it (all it could be is a sleeping spot on top of a locker or somewhere) and things should improve rapidly.

Themadhouse

Are they indoor or indoor/outdoor?
I would feed them sepretely. Give the older one some of time to himself in a room on his own.
Feliway plug in might help or Zylkene tabs for the younger one.

Its a play on alpha, the younger one is putting his name on the house. Once there is no injury to the older one I wouldnt be too concerned but I would still give him some space on his own.

My "ginger" fella is 10kg, not overweight, and he is a in general a pacifist. Colour has nothing to do with it.

DEFTLEFTHAND

Themadhouse wrote: »

Are they indoor or indoor/outdoor?
I would feed them sepretely. Give the older one some of time to himself in a room on his own.
Feliway plug in might help or Zylkene tabs for the younger one.

Its a play on alpha, the younger one is putting his name on the house. Once there is no injury to the older one I wouldnt be too concerned but I would still give him some space on his own.

My "ginger" fella is 10kg, not overweight, and he is a in general a pacifist. Colour has nothing to do with it.

They alternate between outdoors and indoors, the elder guy nearly spends all his time inside now, the youngster hunts quite often, I find half eaten rabbits at my front door most days. :pac:

I have started feeding them separately now, the fighting can get nasty at times, the younger guy has grown a lot bigger than the older one so he completely dominates him in a fight, blood has been drawn on occasion. He is neutered so this behaviour alarms me, although I suppose like you said he's trying to assert himself and be the dominant male.

I might give the Feilway plug in a try.

Pumpkinseeds

I find the Feliway great. Depending on the size of your home you might need 2 of them. Its like cat valium for my 2. One of them is unconcious on the sofa with his head on a smaller cushion and the other chap is passed out on a spare bed upstairs. Both of mine are indoor/outdoor cats and I hate rainy days as they can get pent up, peevish and restless like bored kids.