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Help with cats......please?

C

Combwork

Super Member
It says anything goes, so here goes. We have 6 cats, 5 for a long time and a stray we've adopted. The stray (ex Tom) has been castrated, looked after and he gets on great with all the other cats.........except one; this one's also a modified ex-Tom. How can we make these two get on? We can't afford any more vets bills. One answer would be to try to re-home the newcomer, but is there any other way? These two don't have to like each other; just tolerate each other. This evenings stupidity started with the 'newcomer' fast asleep in a chair when the other (who's the smaller of the two) jumped on him.

Think Tom & Jerry, only with real cats. Outcome? Two cats, each with a well chewed paw and another trip to the vets. Any ideas guys, preferably ones that don't involve euthanasia? It's insane; I've seen these two start at the top of the stairs and roll down, like a furry football with claws. They are both nice cats; I don't want to lose either if at all possible.
 
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i gotta ~13 year old white female who wont tolerate any other cats at all. so i guess i've no advice to offer you. sorry.

good luck!
 
I guess if you can tolerate it, they should eventually establish who's boss and where the proverbial bear shits in the woods. I'd think a few good ass-kickings one way or the other and they'll have it figured out.

Sound cruel? Mebbe...until you recall they are animals and that's what animals do to establish the pecking order.
 
My experience with cats isn't as strong as with dogs but I'll give it a try. With dogs you can work it out by reinforcing the good behavior and disciplining the bad. It takes time, but it works 99% of the time, and I live with a house full of bulldogs, most of them bred for generations to fight. They get along great, but it's been a trial at times.

If the former stray has only been neutered a short time, it may be that the testosterone hasn't fully left his system yet, and that he'll calm down further as it does. My oldest male cat (also neutered - at 5 months of age) never tolerates newcomers immediately. It takes him many weeks usually, and if the newcomer is an adult male even longer. Even so, he does eventually warm up and so far at least the animosity has always been temporary.

Tools: Try keeping them separate when they can't be supervised, and when you do put them together watch them like hawks. When they start up, squirt them with a water bottle or a water pistol. They hate it and it will stop them from doing whatever it is you disapprove of. Keep it up long enough and they'll get it, they'll be soaking wet but they'll get it.

If not, there's always the option (although I hate to suggest it) of de-clawing. It's extraordinarily painful, they'll never be able to climb or defend themselves again, but it will make a cat a great deal less dangerous. I'm not fond of the practice, especially when it's done solely as a way to protect furniture, but as a method of saving a life it's worth considering.

Good luck to you - I've been where you are and it's not pleasant. I hope it works out well for all.
 
Trim the claws of both of them as close as you can. When they both realize they can't do any damage to each other they may calm down.

We did this with our more aggressive cat. After one major asskicking he started avoiding our other cat. Cutting claws of both may avoid conflict altogether.

Eventually they actually started to get along. We'd often come home to find the two of them sleeping back-to-back on the sofa, or we'd wake up to find them both snuggled together on the footwarmer. It was laugh out loud funny!
 
You can purchase claw covers that are quite effective and easy to apply. Using a nail clipper to snip off JUST THE SHARP POINT of their claws works as well. Once each cat's place in the hierarchy is established things will settle down.
 
Bring another woman home to live with you and your wife.

Once you figure out how to make that work, try the same thing on the cats.
 
We've adopted not one but two cats from the great outdoors. As most everyone else has said, your two contenders will eventually establish between the two of them some sort of peace. It may never be anything but a strained truce, but the worst of the scrapping will stop. I not only disapprove of declawing cats, I'm disgusted by the very thought so in my mind declawing is NOT an option. Keep an eye on them both, use a water bottle if the altercations look to be escalating and they'll work it out.

Oh, I also used a really loud whistle to startle anyone who looked to be getting an attitude. A quick burst of shrill noise and they found another place to be and FAST.
 
My ex and I had a cat, then I brought home a stray that adopted me while I was out of state visiting a friend of mine. Well, they HATED each other and would beat the crap out of each other all the time. Then one day my girlfriend and I were out, and when we came home the two cats were alseep, together, in an empty flower pot. ??????? And when we broke up, I took the former stray and my ex got the other..and these former enemies literally were pulling their hair out because they were stressed by the other's absense.

Cats don't make sense. I love them and can't live without them, but trying to figure them out is a worthless pursuit. That said, I totally agree with the above advice of trimming their nails and letting them fight it out. Some sort of order will eventually be established. And maybe one day you'll come home with them all asleep in a flower pot.
 
Try to find a new home for the stray if euthanasia is not an option. Unlike dogs, cats are fiercely independent and highly difficult to train/re-train. Another way to look at it is the new cat has disrupted the harmony in your house; something you are entitled to. Whatever you decide, don't put it back outside.
 
As a many-decades cat owner, I'll agree with minimizing their ability to hurt each other while at the same time letting them work things out. With supervision, of course.

However, I'll toss in another thought...at one point, in a previous life with a previous wife (what is that, alliteration?) she had the total number of cats in the house up to six or seven. Things started to get crazy. All were neutered, of course, but they still have to establish a hierarchy, and there simply isn't enough square footage in the house to accommodate them all. When somebody started peeing on the kitchen counters (no, it wasn't me!) I put my foot down and half went to the animal shelter.

You might have reached a tipping point, population-wise.
 
We have 3, 1 tom. He gets along with everybody; the 2 girls hate each other. Sometimes they are tolerant and will sleep near each other but mostly it's just hiss, growl...the older girl will sort of flirt with the male but then he gets too close for comfort and she starts growling at him. He just kinda looks puzzled.

They are very strange animals. Every one I've ever known had a distinct personality and would, at times, do the oddest things.
 
Thank you.

That all makes sense. What I'm trying now is to make a fuss of the original male; feed him first, scoot the other one out the room the moment the growling starts. Basically, help to reestablish the original cats dominance. Strange thing is that the dominant cat is an old, slow moving neutered Tom that never fights with any of them. Calm, placid, nothing disturbs him.
 
I have a few in the house, the last one in was a Tom I found out in the barn ripped to chunks on Christmas morn a number of years ago. We have the largest population of Eagles in America in this area and they pick off many a small critter. This guy was 19 pounds when I found him, too heavy to carry off.

He moved in after a massive vet bill. My wife said I should have put him down, I was the softy and it was Christmas morning.

mousefight.jpg

[the new guy throws a punch at another former tom turned house kitty]

He fought it out with my toughest cat and it took a while to determine who the victor was. After a while it was the new cat, and my other long time resident tough cat decided that he wanted nothing to do with the newer larger cat. That just made things worse because he'd run and the other would chase.

I have a another cat who hates cats, loves people but can't stand animals.

Times. feed the separately. One has his meal in the bathroom, the other, the bedroom. The rest get the rest of the house.

They adapt to this quickly.

Reestablishing the original cats dominance didn't work, they did settle on separate territory. The old cat gets the kitchen and living-room, the newer cat takes the bedrooms. The cat who hates cats takes my mancave, they generally pass quickly through the others territory.

Next, tell your veterinarian. They have drugs that adapt behaviour.

Things do work themselves out. Currently we have a dog (Corgi) who delights in playing with the big cat. They have a grand time chewing on each other.

Cat nip also helps.
 
>Bring another woman home to live with you and your wife.

Once you figure out how to make that work, You will get the Nobel peace prize. Seeing as how much that can benifit mankind.
 
Anything is possible if you're patient enough. This picture is my dog Cain. So named because when he came to live with me he tried to kill everything that moved, our chickens, our dogs, and especially our cats. He's a Boxer/Chow cross, a fighting dog on both sides of his family, and has the scars to prove it.

CainLinus2.jpg


Anything is possible...
 
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