My fiance’ and I adopted a couple of kittens from the local animal shelter last week. We named them Chloe and Daphne. They’re a complete riot, but also a total handful. Apparently everything is a toy to a kitten and everything even remotely in reach is a target to be jumped on, and barring that, knocked over. Our 15+ year old cat, Sammie, has not been thrilled with them. She hisses, but doesn’t swipe or anything, so that’s good. I wish she would get along with them a little better, but it’s only been a week, so there’s still plenty of time for that. For their parts Chloe and Daphne are pretty respectful of Sam and give her a fairly wide berth when she chooses to deign them with her presence. Chloe is the braver of the two and really wants to go right up to Sam, but Sam just isn’t having it.
Anyway, I just wanted an excuse to post a picture of the kitties. Chloe is on the left and Daphne is on the right.
Kellie had been trying to hold them for me to take the picture and was unsuccessful. I grabbed them and the picture is of the two seconds during which they gave up the struggle. After the picture was snapped the struggle was renewed.
They’ve really gotten much more affectionate toward us over the last week. That first night they were really attached to playing with each other, but now they’ve really incorporated us into their routine. We bought some cheap blankets at Target to put on the furniture so they can get up with us without getting hair or claw marks everywhere. Both of them will get into moods where they purr like crazy and just want to be scratched and loved. It’s very cute. Chloe is definitely the lover, but Daphne gets in moods where she wants to be scratched and loved on too. Daphne will usually give a nice head butt as she passes by too, sort of acknowledging that, “Hey, I like you, but I’ve got shit to do.”
Bwahahah, cats are the best. Congrats, MSUSteve! Learning their personalities is fascinating.
As far as integrating cats goes, we had a hell of a time with our two guys. Oboe we’d had for about a year when we adopted Elvis (we didn’t name him! Don’t hate!). Got both of them as adult rescues, so they were both adults when we integrated them.
Omigod. We had a cat apocalypse for nigh-on two weeks in our house. Took them that long to not immediately start fighting in each others’ presence.
There, now life is simplified for all cat owners everywhere. Did you ever read the old Dungeons and Dragons Monster Manual where some monsters had the line “Alignment: always Chaotic Evil” - that’s cats for you! If it’s causing mayhem, it’s an evil cat. If it’s not causing mayhem right this moment, it’s planning to and it’s still an evil cat.
How did you get them to get along? Was it just a matter of time? Were you separating them during the day or anything like that, or did you just figure they had to get used to each other and leave them to sort it out?
Because Daphne and Chloe are kittens, they defer to to Sam so far. Sam isn’t much for confrontation and most times elects to just go into the basement and lay on the couch down there rather than be upstairs with the kittens. We’re keeping the kittens out of the basement for now because there is just way too much for them to get into, but eventually they’ll have the run of the house and their litter box will be down there with Sam’s.
So they’re going to have to be able to coexist, which for the most part, they do. Sam just spits and hisses if they get too close. It’s sort of cute because you can tell it’s defensive and nervous, not really aggressive. I just don’t want Sam to spend her twilight years hiding in the basement, ya know?
I first read the thread title as “News cats” and was expecting some YouTube video of cats sitting at an anchor desk with footage of a man getting hit in the crotch by a football playing behind them.
The two very cute kittens are almost just as good, though. I also agree with ReptileHouse, they totally have that “the jig is up” look on their faces. Congrats on the addition to the family!
Patience and time. We separated them during the day, locking Elvis in the bathroom (with a towel stuffed under the door because otherwise they’d fight through the door). When one or both of us were home, we made a point of spending time with them and trying to project an aura of calmness, breaking up fights when we had to but otherwise leaving them to do their things.
I honestly didn’t think we were going to make it for a while there, but it worked out in the end. Is Sam a snuggler? Can you pick her up and pay attention to her with the kittens around? That worked well for us with Oboe (it was his house, after all, so he felt like he was under siege).
Sam is very friendly and loves attention, but she does not like to be held. She does like to be petted and even likes to play. Of course she likes treats too. They all get along swimmingly if each of them has a treat. I’ve given them treats in very close proximity to each other and Sam has not batted an eye.
It sounds like your situation was pretty dire. Mine is very tame and not even worth complaining about given the lack of any physical element to it.
I have four cats. 16m (Cookie), 5f (Luna), 3f (Lilu), and 2f (Izzie). None are related, all were brought into the house as kittens.
Something really weird happened with Izzie and Cookie. Izzie LOVES Cookie. She constantly assumes a demure pose in front of him, or rubs up against him, or lies down in front of him. He usually ignores her, but sometimes he’ll groom her an she loves it. If Izzie is sitting on my lap and Cookie walks by, Izzie will always jump down offer herself to him. We call it whoring herself out. It’s very cute, and a little weird.
And even weirder, Lilu has gotten into the act and will also seek affection from Cookie. But not nearly as much as Izzie. Lilu never did this before Izzie started it.
Our guess is Izzie is the alpha female and wants Cookie to give it her. But everyone is fixed, of course.
They do look like little mischief makers. How incredibly awesome. Your older cat probably feels like her domain was impeded on so it will take a lot of time for her to cozy up.
