I have a new maine coone kitten 4 mos and big about 6.5 lbs. I have two older Abys, one 13 with cholangeal hep who is the alpha animal; one 12 who is brilliant..truely. I have an 8 yr old schipperke. I have tooo many animals. I think this kitten was the tipping point. the newbie has been here for 2 months. The schip is finally putting him in his place with growls. the older alpha has been growling since we brought the newbie home but will only threaten him. I thought my 12 yr old Bert would be the one to teach him and set the parameters. It's not happening and I'm starting to see what looks like dominance behavior from the kitten over Bert. Bert will not growl or threaten him. He just looks distressed and runs away or gives up his favorite places to him. I know Bert can fight and set the ground rules because I've seen him in skirmishes with the older cat. Now the kitten has peed on a piece of furniture with an action that looks like spraying although only one of his testicles has descended. I've had animals all my live and usually leave it to them to iron out the heirarchy with my loose supervision. I'm afraid that if they don't start setting the ground rules to him in a more authoritative manner, ie, knocking him around a little but, that he will be the dominant cat when he continues to get much bigger. any advise or should I just be happy there's been no blood shed.
Optional Information: Pet's Gender: Male Pet's Age: <1 Name of Cat: Brutus Already Tried: Letting them work it out; separating them; teaching NOOOOOO
Hi,my name is XXXXX XXXXX X've been with this company since 2008. I'll be happy to help you with your question today.
First, I want to assure you...you don't have too many animals. I live with 9 cats and 4 dogs!!!
I know that you want the older cat to be the dominant one, but what we want really doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. If you really watch, you'll notice that the alpha animal often changes as time goes on. I have an 18 year old cat (the only one with his claws) who should be the alpha since he's the biggest and has been here the longest. However, the true alpha animal in our house is a 6 year old tortie girl who weighs about 6 pounds!!!
One thing you may want to try is to get some Feliway diffusers. These are pheromone diffusers that really can help with some of the redirected behaviors like urinating on things they're not suppsed to and the growling/arguing that is going on with them. You can pick them up at any petstore or vet's office.
You're already doing absolutely everything that you should be doing...letting them work it out on their own and keeping an eye on things. I really think the Feliway will be the missing step to getting everyone sorted out.
I hope this helps.
we have thought, since kolohe, the older cat got sick, that bert was really the alpha. when bert was a 7 wk baby runt, kolohe took care of him, licking him all over, carrying him around; sleeping with his body wrapped around him. this from a 1 1/2 yr old neutered male. they have been the closest of friends and, while bert is definitely extremely smart, he has always demurred to kolohe. we thought that one of them would do the same for brutus but he's not a runt in need of help. I guess I'm going to have to let the power shift occur. bert just never wanted to be alpha.
I know it's hard to see that shift. When Klawws (our older guy) gets bossed around by Inde (short for Independant!!) it's painful to me because he's the older dude who should be respected. The good thing to remember is that Bert didn't want the job, and is happily letting someone else run the show.
one last aspect of this. have you had any experience with maine coons? I've had abyssinians for the last 27 yrs and before that siamese and just regular cats. i was able to teach my very first aby tricks. i taught them to kolohe when he was about 5 mos..took a month. bert learned the tricks just from watching kolohe when he was 8 wks. since then he's learned many more. this new guy doesn't seem to be interested at all.perhaps some of this is breed personality although I've never put too much stock into that with cats
In my experience, Maine Coons tend to be more self-centric...meaning, they'll learn tricks...if they want to.
They tend to be a little more indepenant...which I think is partially due to how big they can be.
Experience: Associates Degree in Veterinary Technology.
Hi,I'm just following up on our conversation about Brutus. How is everything going?CVT_in_MN
Interesting Bella our schipperke has finally put her foot done so to speak. The kitten was annoying her while she was sleeping . He finally gave him some little yuppie type barks. He persisted. She stood up stared straight at him. He danced over to her with his back up snd his ears back. At this point she would usually run over to me but she stood her ground and just stared at him with her lip lifted. No growl just a straight stare. The kitten stood still made a little teeny questioning meow, sat down and they had a stare off for about two minutes. He backed down turned around and ran away and she ran after him with her little huffing sound. We wanted to give her a standing ovation. Not if the cats could just step it up. Anyway in the afternoon I came in and all three of the cats were sleeping together on the same bed. So we'll see. The old cliché about time will tell but I was glad to see Bella step up.