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eating only apples posted:Ugh Ferdie's favourite food has changed recipe and he just has zero interest any more. This was the food he used to run ahead of me when I showed him the bowl. We have other food he will eat but not so enthusiastically. If you don't need specific prescription food, try Tiki Cat wet food, I switched over to it and get the big mixed packs of different flavours. The sardine and mackerel one specifically sounds like your cat would love it! It's got huge pieces of fish in it. All the food from them had been really impressive honestly, and I'm so happy that food like that exists for Quill. It legitimately looks like canned food for people and she loves it.
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Jul 2, 2023 18:03
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Thanks for the laser tips that's great to hear. One last question: can cats withdrawl from drugs? My cat was placed on gabapentin and bupenorphine after his surgery, and now that he's off the meds he seems anxious and weird. But it seems to be getting better over time, slowly. And it just made me wonder, is my cat withdrawing from fun drugs like a human would? Cuz it really tracks with what how he's acting.
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Jul 2, 2023 18:20
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VelociBacon posted:If you don't need specific prescription food, try Tiki Cat wet food, I switched over to it and get the big mixed packs of different flavours. The sardine and mackerel one specifically sounds like your cat would love it! It's got huge pieces of fish in it. That does look amazing but I'm in the UK 
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Jul 2, 2023 18:48
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eating only apples posted:That does look amazing but I'm in the UK Booooo. I’ll second Tiki brand. The tuna smells indistinguishable from canned people-food tuna.
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Jul 2, 2023 22:50
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The Ahi tuna from them is actually the only food quill has ever turned down. Wish she didn't because a lot of variety from them uses it.
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Jul 2, 2023 23:22
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gloom posted:A little ball of aluminum foil fascinated them for a long time, it’s light and irregular so when they smack it the motion is unpredictable. Thanks for reminding me of this trick. These don't get anywhere near the level of obsession out of her that the springs do, but they definitely scratch the same itch. Plus the other cat (who's not really interested in toys unless I'm playing directly with her) got into it as well.
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Jul 3, 2023 03:39
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RapturesoftheDeep posted:Thanks for reminding me of this trick. These don't get anywhere near the level of obsession out of her that the springs do, but they definitely scratch the same itch. Plus the other cat (who's not really interested in toys unless I'm playing directly with her) got into it as well. Yeah with cats it's always best to try the old basic toys before getting new ones. Try a string or thick shoelace next. Taima posted:Thanks for the laser tips that's great to hear. Proably don't overthink it? It's equal parts likely that he's just recovering from a really weird and traumatic experience that he has no frame of reference to contextualise.
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Jul 3, 2023 04:14
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Any tricks to get two cats to not fight on sight? As per my previous posts we took my sister's neglected cat llLucy (6or7 year old female) to live with us and our cat Cora(7or8 year old female). I watched and read Jackson galaxy's video/books on cat introductions and maybe I'm missing something. I have Lucy living in our bedroom now and Cora has free reign of the rest of the house. We site swap them regularly to the point that Lucy is comfortable hanging out with us in the living room. Cora seems good hanging out in the bedroom with us aswell. We did the feedings through a closed door for about a month and then moved to feeding them with a baby gate up. However Cora still hisses and growls at Lucy on sight if they aren't eating.im not sure what to do from this point on. Do I just live with two separate spaces for the cats forever, do I go back to closed door feedings, or do I remove the barrier and see what happens? I don't need the cats to be cuddle buddies (would be nice) but I do want to feel like both cats are safe near each other. In Lucy's previous home she was not safe and I don't want to reintroduce that.
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Jul 3, 2023 19:32
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LeninVS posted:Any tricks to get two cats to not fight on sight? Growls and hisses are nothing. That's basic cat communication. I think you have unrealistic expectations for how cats get along. The two of them have to work out their own rules for getting along. They can't do it verbally or write up a contract, so they use physical aggression when a boundary has been crossed. That's how they learn not to mess with each other. In other words, let them hiss, growl, and fight until they work things out. It's what cats do. Unless you see actual fur flying and blood flowing, there isn't an actual problem. Let them sort it out.
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Jul 3, 2023 19:40
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Deteriorata posted:Growls and hisses are nothing. That's basic cat communication. I think you have unrealistic expectations for how cats get along. This! They need to establish boundaries to feel comfortable and you gotta let them do that.
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Jul 4, 2023 01:22
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I wouldn't let them have a full on teeth and claws fight, they can seriously gently caress each other up. But yeah they do need the ability to sort their relationship out. If things get too tense during an introduction you can break it up with a loud noise, like slamming a cabinet door or something. That'll almost always trigger the flight response.
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Jul 4, 2023 01:34
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Thanks for the advice everyone. When should I be breaking them up, only during a brawl? They have been in a pretty epic stare down for the last 30m. Lucy on the dresser and cora on the bed.
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Jul 4, 2023 02:24
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I'd break things up only if you see blood. They may do a fair amount of swatting and rasslin' with claws in. If claws come out and biting gets real, they break them up.
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Jul 4, 2023 02:27
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Stare down is good, they are watching and learning each other.
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Jul 4, 2023 04:33
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LeninVS posted:Thanks for the advice everyone. I would step in if they escalate to yelling at each other, posturing, or anything that seems like the step right before blows. Might be a bit too risky to let them swat at each other and pray they keep the claws in.
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Jul 4, 2023 10:06
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Any advice on finding new ways to socialize the feral cat we adopted? It’s actually kind of a funny situation. My roommate and I (mostly my roommate) trapped and adopted this feral cat about 2.5 years ago now, and named him “Mini-Scratcher”. At this point he’s definitely settled in and has gotten used to being an indoor cat - in fact, he has less interest in going outside than our three other (non-feral) cats. The really frustrating thing about Mini-Scratcher is this - it’s like he’s two completely different cats. When I’m the only one at the house, or when it’s late at night or early in the morning and we’re in the basement (which is sort of like my personal suite of rooms in the house), he’s almost like a normal cat, letting me pet him and lying down on his back and purring while I rub his belly and stroke his chin, stuff like that. At times like this he seems to love affection and has no fear of being touched or petted at length by me. He’s also incredibly gentle and mellow at these times, never having come close to scratching or biting once. He’ll even fall asleep cuddled up to me on my bed, totally letting his guard down. But when absolutely anyone else is around or present at all, he’s like a different cat. He absolutely refuses to be touched by anybody, myself included, and will run away if you so much as approach him or raise your hand slightly in a way like you might be starting to reach while making eye contact with him. My roommate gets away with glancing touches sometimes while Mini zooms away, but that’s it. We thought this behavior would pass and he would eventually let other people be affectionate to him, but that really doesn’t seem to be happening. And it’s honestly confounding to me how he can be so radically different depending on where he is and who is around! I also don’t completely understand why I’m the one and only human he’s chosen to trust - my roommate is the one who feeds him every day! Anyway, we’re both pretty frustrated with Mini being so weird and obtuse at this point. It’s frustrating knowing that he has the potential to be a normal and well-adjusted cat, but only chooses to behave that way when I’m the sole person around. Any advice on this situation, anyone been through anything similar?
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Jul 5, 2023 14:22
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Some feral cats can't be socialized. I was just at the house of one of the leads at our cat rescue charity, and she's got literally dozens of cats at her house - and the backyard (with cat safe fence) is the domain of 3 older ferals that she doesn't attempt to socialize, she just lets them live their lives out peacefully.
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Jul 5, 2023 14:48
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kaworu posted:The really frustrating thing about Mini-Scratcher is this - it’s like he’s two completely different cats. When I’m the only one at the house, or when it’s late at night or early in the morning and we’re in the basement (which is sort of like my personal suite of rooms in the house), he’s almost like a normal cat, letting me pet him and lying down on his back and purring while I rub his belly and stroke his chin, stuff like that. At times like this he seems to love affection and has no fear of being touched or petted at length by me. He’s also incredibly gentle and mellow at these times, never having come close to scratching or biting once. He’ll even fall asleep cuddled up to me on my bed, totally letting his guard down. So if Mini-Scratcher has decided he's your cat only, that's normal. And if he's decided he's only safe when the house is empty except for you, that's also normal. Over time, he may come to feel more safe when your roommate is around, or he may not. But a cat who'll let you cuddle for prolonged periods is socialized; he just doesn't, for whatever reason, like your roommate. Which doesn't have anything to do with the roommate per se; it could be that somebody like your roommate was mean to him. I've had skittish cats before, and it's just a thing that happens.
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Jul 5, 2023 17:07
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Yeah our younger cat Sage is like a big grown up kitten, all purrs and wiggles for my wife and licks and loves attention and kisses But if he even so much as THINKS there's someone else that's going to be in the house, or god forbid hears the doorbell, it's like that da share zone comic and he just hits the bricks to go find a hiding place until they leave
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Jul 5, 2023 20:04
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So, people on the internet seem very keen to recommend Hill's Science Diet pet food. However, when I looked it up, it looks like garbage quality food with ridiculous prices? Wheat and corn are literally the 2nd and 3rd ingredients on this formula:  Am I misunderstanding something?
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Jul 6, 2023 14:31
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Annath posted:So, people on the internet seem very keen to recommend Hill's Science Diet pet food. I've noticed the same thing. What I've heard as an explanation is that the Hill's food that is sold in veterinary offices is not the same as the Hill's food sold at pet stores. If you want the good stuff, you have to get it from the vet.
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Jul 6, 2023 18:07
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I learned a lot reading the nutrition megathread here in PI, mostly that no one agrees on the “best” diet. Our cats were being fed Hill’s at the shelter and the wet food looked better to us than the dry food, so we kept that up for a bit while we worked on finding a different dry food option that we preferred and they actually liked. The amount of research you can do is kind of overwhelming and then your cat(s) might not eat it anyway.  As an update on my own earlier food questions, our licky girl is attempting to eat Orijen wet food, trying harder than anything else we’ve offered her so far (a bunch of the slide & serve pates were fully rejected), so fingers crossed. We’d tried this before and it didn’t take, but maybe this time? I wish they weren’t so picky.  kaworu posted:Any advice on finding new ways to socialize the feral cat we adopted? I did want to comment on this just to share our experience in case it’s helpful. We brought home two feral born cats in late Jan. They were probably caught and brought to the shelter about 3-4 months old, just outside that key socialization window. They didn’t trust the shelter staff, they spent their time hiding and refused to eat while anyone was around, although they would eventually settle and purr if staff pushed the issue on physical contact (mixed feelings about this tbh, I think they were scruffing them which doesn’t help build trust but their priority is to get them adoptable so I understand it). I work from home so the cats get more time with me than my partner. We’ve been careful to do some of the things you’re already doing, like making sure I’m not the only one who feeds them. It’s still normal for them to pick favourites, but what we’re looking for is no fear reaction - no hissing or hiding, no defensive body language. Sometimes we tag team this, e.g. let my partner pick you up, and I give you a treat while he’s holding you. They aren’t lap cats (yet, I actually have hope for them to get there because they love floor snuggles) but they are comfortable with us now. However the fear reaction is still a problem when we have guests over. If I think about it our approach is two-pronged: 1) make it less appealing to do the behaviour you want less of, 2) give good incentives for desired behaviour. So we don’t take away any hiding spots when we have people over, because we want them to know they have safe places to go to, but there are no toys or treats available in hiding spots. Hiding is safe but it’s boring. We encourage interaction with guests, depending on our guests’ willingness and how the cats are reacting. Sometimes maybe that’s just sitting in the same room as them so they have to hear and smell a new person (and nothing scary happens!). Or bringing out their favourite toys, but they only get to play with them if they come out of hiding. Then if they do and seem relaxed enough, maybe we hand the toy to our guest to continue play. Basically, we want them to realize the whole house is their safe place, and that people are only here who we trust also. Sometimes they’re more game than others, but we are steadily seeing progress (just last week we got them to take a tube treat from my sister and also allow her to pet them, and they didn’t even leave once they finished the treat). We have a specific goal for the behaviour we want to see: they don’t hide when company comes over. Because it’s fine to hide for an hour or two, but at some point we’d like to have family from out of town spend the night and we don’t want that to completely upend their routine and stress them out. IMO you can continue to work on this, but you might also be running into what Arsenic Lupin said - it might just be “cat being cat” rather than a result of Mini-Scratcher’s background. I’m not sure if what I describe here will resonate. You’d be better able to gauge the exact behaviour you’re seeing - does it seem like trust is a factor in it?
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Jul 7, 2023 02:27
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I'd like to add that we got two kittens a week apart in age from the kitten room at the shelter. Diana walked straight out of the carrier and became queen of the household; that night she clawed her way up the bed and crawled down the covers between us and went to sleep. Byakko promptly hid under furniture. For the next two weeks we never saw her unless Diana was leading her to the food or the litterbox. (Diana was Byakko's emotional support cat.) We eventually, on orders from the shelter, dragged Byakko out from under the furniture and put her in our son's room, where he cuddled her by force. She became his friend; Diana came in and visited regularly. A year after Byakko joined us we were extremely excited because we could walk into a room where Byakko was without her fleeing. Some months later it was exciting because we could walk past her on the stairs without her fleeing. Then we were excited because she would let us pet her. Two years after we got the pair of them, Byakko loves our son, and wants to be in the same room as my husband and me but without being touched. We know she trusts us because she no longer wakes up when we walk into a room. She accepts short-term scritches when she's in the mood. And that's just the kind of cat she is. She's a good, healthy cat, and she needs her boundaries. Meanwhile Diana sleeps all night on my husband, and wakes him up in the morning by pawing him on the beard, claws out. Having a sociable cat is a mixed blessing. Also, I put a glass of armagnac down on the table just now. Diana came in for a sniff and jumped two feet back.
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Jul 7, 2023 05:12
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kaworu posted:Any advice on finding new ways to socialize the feral cat we adopted? I raised two feral cats. One greets me, snuggles my feet, comes over to chat. The other is very high anxiety as you described, but mellows out if his buddy is nearby OR if it is late at night. They were raised together in the same circumstances, they're siblings, and the tortie is somehow the calm one of the pair. But when nobody else is around (or my old cat is there), her brother comes when called and doesn't even mind being picked up.
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Jul 7, 2023 20:54
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Weird Pumpkin posted:Yeah our younger cat Sage is like a big grown up kitten, all purrs and wiggles for my wife and licks and loves attention and kisses This is how both my cats behave. Koto will literally growl when she hears someone approach up the steps and then hide in one of the cabinets.
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Jul 9, 2023 15:53
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Not to say that Ferdie is particularly smart, but he's over all his puzzle toys. I love the Nina Ottosson range and the turnover toy is arriving tomorrow, but can anyone recommend other puzzle toys available in the UK? Kid loves them, and bonus, we've convinced him that his particularly expensive dry food (Catit Nuna) is actually treats. He doesn't care for treat-dispensing balls. Doesn't get it, won't bother trying. But a few moving parts on a flat tray and he'll be engaged for ages. e: thoroughly recommend this as a puzzle toy, the big wheel in particular took him weeks to work out. You can set it up to be fairly complicated. And it looks real pretty. He knows how the wheel works but at least once a day he will stand on it with both front paws and then look incredibly confused as to why it won't turn 
eating only apples fucked around with this message at 23:15 on Jul 9, 2023 |
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Jul 9, 2023 23:12
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Question for those with scaredy feral cats: how do you deal with vet visits? I have a cat who was born outdoors in my neighborhood, she was spayed and vaccinated as a kitten and the shelter attempted to get her adopted but she escaped from the home and came back to live outdoors here. I spent about a year working with her to get her indoors and now she is indoor/outdoor hopefully to become fully indoor one day (she still loses it if she is inside for multiple days ) but she is only socialized to me. Like another cat described earlier she is wonderful and cuddly, sleeps on my lap and purrs up a storm when we are alone but as soon as a guest stops by she is nowhere to be found for hours. I have tried taking her to the vet but she still hates being picked up and is too fast for me to catch, and I'm worried she would freak out and really fight the vet staff even if I got her there. She has gotten one trip to the local TNR clinic run by the shelter where she was spayed, she got updated vaccinations and a checkout which turned out fine but they are limited in what they can do and she was sedated the whole time. I am concerned about her getting older and not having access to proper vet care. What are my options here?
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Jul 10, 2023 05:19
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Gadzuko posted:Question for those with scaredy feral cats: how do you deal with vet visits? I have a cat who was born outdoors in my neighborhood, she was spayed and vaccinated as a kitten and the shelter attempted to get her adopted but she escaped from the home and came back to live outdoors here. I spent about a year working with her to get her indoors and now she is indoor/outdoor hopefully to become fully indoor one day (she still loses it if she is inside for multiple days Is it possible for you to get a new pet carrier and turn it into a cat cave? Once she's used to sleeping in it or going there for treats, it should be easy enough to just pick her up. You'd have to go very slow and also make her comfortable with being in the car for short trips.
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Jul 10, 2023 06:27
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I have a cat question! Next door's cat Monkey came to visit us yesterday evening (she pretty much has free rein of the two houses, she comes and goes as she pleases - which we find incredibly charming!). She was acting quite strangely. She was being INCREDIBLY affectionate, which is not totally abnormal for her, she's a very people-oriented kitty in general. But also she was acting kind of goofy, and most notably, her fur was all totally on end. Especially her tail - it looked like a chimney brush! I've been learning about cat body language (so as to be a responsible cat uncle) and I know that fur standing on end is a pretty unambiguous "I'm ready to fight" signal. But nothing else about her behaviour said that at all, she was all over us for scritches and purring up a storm. Was she on the 'nip, maybe? Is that a thing that happens? I've tried googling but can't find anything relevant. It's not a big deal, I'm more just curious, really!
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Jul 10, 2023 09:35
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Cats do behave really oddly on catnip but that state usually only lasts 10 minutes or so. Maybe she was spooked by something and sought out humans for comfort, that would explain being affectionate and having her fur stand on end. Of course, some illnesses can also cause that kind of behaviour.
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Jul 10, 2023 09:54
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Lanky Coconut Tree posted:Is it possible for you to get a new pet carrier and turn it into a cat cave? Once she's used to sleeping in it or going there for treats, it should be easy enough to just pick her up. This but don't bother with the car thing that would require getting her into a carrier and putting her through car stress way more times than is necessary. Just accept the car is going to stress her out. The best idea though is get her to chase treats into the carrier on a regular basis and possibly eating her food in there, then you can make her go in like that and slam the door behind her. Make sure the vet knows that she needs to be sedated to be examined. That's what works for my little wildcat at least as long as there's enough of a gap between visits that she is willing to step into the carrier again. When I just moved house I spent two weeks giving her wet food in the carrier every evening and sitting right next to it while she ate it, and she was SO suspicious at first but eventually was ok for moving day. Felt like the absolute worst person in the world though hearing her betrayed yelling when she realised she was trapped. Vet visits are so stressful for her that to a certain extent I have accepted there are things I would take the much calmer less scared cat in for that I just wouldn't for her.
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Jul 10, 2023 11:46
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Barry Foster posted:I have a cat question! Was she also being vocal in her affection? Makes me think of a cat going into heat. Good friends cat had an incomplete spay, and she was continuing to go into heats, which changed her 180 degrees from I hate you and everything to I want to be your best friend why did you stop petting me. Which was super confusing for us, since she was actually spayed before he had adopted her. She's better now after they went back in and got out what was missed. If the free roaming kitty is not fixed, you're probably gonna have kittens soon.
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Jul 10, 2023 16:17
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Gadzuko posted:Question for those with scaredy feral cats: how do you deal with vet visits?
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Jul 10, 2023 17:31
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We’re still working on this with our cats. I think it’s super important that carrier doesn’t automatically = vet, so ours is out in the living space 24/7 with a towel over it to make it cozy and they do sleep there sometimes. (Initially we had to lure them in there with treats/toys.) So far there’s no helping the moment they realize they’re stuck. We’re hoping to keep getting them used to that, closing it up and then letting them out right away, carrying them from one room to another etc. I’m not sure if they’ll ever reach the point of being comfortable with it (or the car, which they’ve only been in three times), but then they’re getting over being scared of the vacuum cleaner and I never thought they’d do that either, so… all we can do is keeping taking baby steps. If time is of the essence though, for the first vet visit we cleared out a room of hiding places other than the carrier so our cats would have to go there once we got everyone closed into the room. We had one of their blankets inside so it smelled okay. It still wasn’t easy but this did work. May not be possible depending on your living space, our old place wouldn’t have had room to do this. For our next visit the vet prescribed gabapentin - they had needed to see the cats once first to confirm it would be okay, although I’m not sure every vet would need that precaution. It wasn’t magic and we still had to set aside time to get them into the carrier, but it did help, and it helped them during the visit. Another bonus of making the carrier itself feel safe to them is that they actually wanted to be back inside it at the vet instead of hiding somewhere else, so at least bringing them home was easy.
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Jul 10, 2023 18:38
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Arsenic Lupin posted:Have you checked to see if there's a mobile vet in your area? That might be less terrifying. Doesn't work with cats who are scared of strangers. It was the first thing I tried with my one and the verdict on her health was "well she must be in good health because look how quickly and agiley she's avoiding me". The only thing that works is get them to a vet who can sedate them properly so they can be examined.
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Jul 11, 2023 12:45
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Organza Quiz posted:Doesn't work with cats who are scared of strangers. It was the first thing I tried with my one and the verdict on her health was "well she must be in good health because look how quickly and agiley she's avoiding me". The only thing that works is get them to a vet who can sedate them properly so they can be examined. Any good tips for socialising cats with strangers? Mine are super selective and possibly also racist.
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Jul 11, 2023 13:01
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Lanky Coconut Tree posted:Any good tips for socialising cats with strangers? Mine are super selective and possibly also racist.
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Jul 11, 2023 14:24
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That's about how it is when my parents come over. I'm lucky if Dusty will even come out and Koto will barely peek out of the cabinet to see them. It's kind of funny when people come over though. My cats will open the kitchen cabinets with their paws and crawl in like some sort of bomb shelter drill.
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Jul 11, 2023 16:42
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lol the last time maintenance came over Niko kept following one of the guys around, jumping up on nearby tables and chairs, just to meow in this guys face. 
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Jul 11, 2023 17:35
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My AC is currently dead. It's going to be probably a week until it's repaired. I'm putting ice in my cat's water fountain and leaving out a frozen water jug she can hang out near if she's too hot. She seems to be okay, if lower energy than usual. Do I need to worry about her dry food spoiling? Is there anything else I can be doing?
Yak Shaves Dot Com fucked around with this message at 17:51 on Jul 11, 2023 |
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Jul 11, 2023 17:36
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