N/d Anybody Know Anything About Kittens?

[Legz]

Hi all, sorry its not a doggy post, its a kitten one as i have no idea where else to ask and lots of people on here seem to have cats and dogs so thought i would give it a crack.

We have been given a kitten and we have had him for approx 2 weeks now, we got him when he was 6 or 7 weeks old. Long story short he was found under a hedge one night by my neighbours daughter and taken to the vet who estimated age was 5 weeks. She kept him for just under 2 weeks but her little boy developed a rash and they thought it was cat allergy. Neighbour asked us if we could take him otherwise he was off to the animal welfare league. He was more than likely a stray he somehow separated from his mum. Haha now im thinking maybe it wasn't a rash maybe they just realised this little kitten was very hard work and we got suckered.

Now the issue is i haven't had a kitten for years, my last 2 were chinchillas from a breeder and i cant remember much about them as kittens (would have been 7 years old at the time) but they were sweethearts and this little guy seems mental! He is not scared of anything (he was chasing and pouncing on the staffy after 2 days) will purr and smooch and have a cuddle, then like a switch go from purring and snuggling to outright feral, bite your face and claw and attack. It seems like play, he runs feral around the living room (has heaps of toys) but will constantly out of no where attack us, grab arms, legs, pounce at our faces etc. Just sitting down on the couch and playing with toy with him will every time resort to him attacking arms/hands etc. He really bites and wraps himself around whatever body part he has and claws in. It seems like very rough play, hes certainly not scared and you can untangle him and say NO and push him away and he'll fly back at you and grab hold. Even picking him up when he's in a feral mood will result in him latching on and biting.

The problem is he seems to be feral most of the time!! What can we do??? We have now resorted to a spray water bottle to spray him when he latches on, is there anything else we should/shouldn't be doing? At night he goes into a crate (extra large is my brothers am staffy cage) and during the day he is either running loose or in the crate (he's at my partners parents house while we renovate ours) so doesn't get to run around all day long which i don't think is helping the issue. How long is he going to be this crazy for?? He certainly doesn't act like a timid stray, more like an in your face tiger. Any suggestions? My partners parents are being great allowing him there but they are getting pretty over being attacked constantly.

[Jacquiboss&scoop]

I have raised a few kittens and temps are variable LOL treat the same as you would a pup , no growl crate , sounds like the little feral is getting over stimulated , we had a cat who was easy to do this to with just too much patting.

They do learn but as he is missing his littermates to teach him how to go a little easier you need to do it instead , crate when he is impossible is a good one.

the spray might be a bit much for him try hissing or something that makes a hiss noise with him , good news is he will grow out of it for the most part soon

[persephone]

he may well have a good dash of feral in him - which , when added to an early kittenhood street experience, and little handling from humans early on, may mean you need some good training methods.

I have a 1/2 feral cat - and he was hard to handle as well... thankfully with my muddling along , and not too many demands made of him, he , at 3 has settled muchly :D

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[Ons]

I am no expert in kittens but my understanding is that kittens who are taken too soon from their mothers don't understand appropriate behaviour around others, that mothers and litter mates teach their kittens by biting them or other disciplining if they become rough and the kittens learn that way. I believe that the appropriate time to take a kitten from their mother is 12 weeks. All I know about this is theory is that my first cat I got when she would have been 8 weeks if that (rescue cat from vet) and she bites or sticks her claws in yet my other two cats mostly don't and they were at least 13 weeks when taken from their mother. With Hyacinth I give her a sharp no and put her down and she is is getting better.

This probably doesn't help you much with your kitten but may give an explanation. I would pm The Spotted Devil as well as she knows alot about cats and kittens and ask if she could help. There is also a specific area for cats but off topic. You will need to get to 150 posts before you can access it so start posting away :D

[Enigma]

PM Kirty she does cat rescue. She should be able to advise you

Lynda

[Monah]

Does sound like he is overstimulated and does not have enough 'run' time. But, like all of us, there are different temperaments amongst cats. I've had several feral cats (have one now too) and they have not been like that even though the youngest was only a couple of weeks old when we found him, all the others , about 7 of them , have been under 5 weeks.

I have had quite a few pure breds who have been little &^^%$#$%^&!!! though ;) ;) and who have been with their mothers for up to 12 weeks!!!

Dont stir him up at all, dont pick him up if he doesnt like it, if he is just jumping on people without any encouragement (as no one speaking to him or wiggling fingers etc), dont move (this will make him latch on).

Usually a loud hhhssss!! will break the 'spell', but if not, no screaming, yelling, wriggling, silly behaviour (from the humans). Still and calm works best. Often humans overstimulate kittens without realising it.

Chinchillas are extremely laid back so you would not have noticed this with them.

Many other breeds or moggies are not. I love a fiesty cat ;) he sounds like he has a big personality. Purring and smooching is good, but the 'attack' phase is not, cats often do this when they are very overstimulated. Try and keep him calm when smooching and stop the behaviour before he gets into attack mode.

I have a cat who is 17 who is still 'crazy'

Cats normally will not just play with toys on their own. Does anyone pull a string with maybe a bit of paper of something else attached, around for him to chase? He sounds like he has a LOT of energy to burn off. We've always had several cats at once and they all have the crazies for a couple of hours a day, leaping on each other, chasing, attacking, and do it to the dogs too.

There are cat experts on DOL who I'm sure will be able to advise much better than I ever could.

Dont give up on him, he is a baby and may have had a really rough start. IMO he is not doing anything out of the ordinary, but we also dont want to see any injuries.

I still have one cat who loathes his tummy touched, so we just dont go there ;) please be very careful if he is doing this to dogs as one snap and he will be gone!!! He may be a little young to be teasing the dogs and might be best for hiim to be separate, or at least out of reach, until he is a bit older or can get out of harms way FAST.

good luck, he sounds adorable.

[Legz]

Thanks for the replies guys, appreciated.

Haha Monah he is the type of kitten who will just literally run circles full pelt around the room leaping and jumping with or without toys with no encouragement from us, we can ignore him completely and he will do it. He will entertain himself if we don't do anything, but we can be sitting quiet and the next thing we know he has latched on to our ankles, or his favorite is to attack when someone is walking past... he hides behind the couch/in doorways and leaps out feral. We have one of those wands with material and a feather on the end... we try to direct his play to toys only not us. We don't play with our hands with him (im going to have to check if the partners parents are doing this though) we try to keep it to toys only. Ill pass on all advise about stimulating him and no shouting when he latches on...he has drawn blood numerous times and its hard not to yelp when hes latched on for the 5th time in 30seconds.

In saying that he is gorgeous and has a huge personality and boy does he make us laugh. We never have him and the dog together unsupervised and we keep a close eye on things that hes not pestering the dog to much or the dog isn't getting to excited trying to play back. Its just hard at the moment because im thinking he should run ragged til he falls down exhausted but he gets more and more wound up that after 2 hours of still going mental my partners parents have had enough (cant blame them) and put him back in the crate where he hangs upside down from the top! He also gets to go outside in a secure courtyard with lots of bushes and things to hide/play with for a few hours everyday but still maybe not enough.

Do we still use the water bottle or stop that? So far it seems to work when we have it, but if we dont have it near we're not sure what to do.

Thanks again!

[persephone]

Those things with feathers are ok- but a few paper grocery bags , some old socks with some screwed up paper in the toe, and then ties in a knot, and a couple of ping pong balls to bat around will let him 'hunt' safely ..and remove the idea of "human hand moving= play/attack"

[mokhahouse]

We were given a 400 gram 6 week old kitten whose mother was dead and he was just as you described. We used a dog crate all set up inside so he could have some down time and so could we.I used to hiss at him like a mother cat if he was behaving badly. The hardest thing was getting the other members of my family to not play to roughly with him or wave their hands around like toys. They wondered why he would then go for their hands when they least expected it. We cheated and adopted from a shelter a kitten 2 weeks older than him a couple of weeks after we got him so he could learn kitten behaviours and I also of course had always intended having 2 cats. This helped a lot but he is 10 months old now and can still be a little feral but is the most loving lap cat, full of fun and adventure.

[Burkes]

Haha, sounds like a pretty normal kitten to me. I have always ended up with scratches galore for the first month or so. Wait till he starts doing foot attacks in the middle of the night

But, the good news is he will grow out of it. My youngest cat is 18mths old and still runs around the house like an idiot, attacks the dogs and does stupid things but definately for not as long and she no longer scratches or uses her claws on me. It doesn't usually take long for them to grow out of using their claws.

Maybe get a scratching post, then he can go crazy on that instead of your legs

[Agility Dogs]

Maybe get a scratching post, then he can go crazy on that instead of your legs

Our 'garbage bin cat' is a nasty piece of work and behaved exactly as you describe for about 14 or 15 months when she first came to live with us. She has settled considerably, but still has her moments where she feels the need to take a piece out of someone or something. (Nursing badly scratched hand at present.)

She LOVES her scratching post too.

I think it has something to do with being removed too early - her mother was 'run over' or so the story goes. We got her at 7 weeks. The only animal she won't attack is our most mild mannered/submissive dog strangely enough. I think becasue they grew up together Xena might have got a couple of good ones in before Jazzy, the cat realised she could win the game.

[noisymina]

Feral genes do exist. We've seen it before - specially in a litter my B-i-L's cat had a long time ago.

Taking them from the litter too early is bad too.

Add the two together.............and it's not good news. As my DH found out not too long ago.

He's had cats all his life and this one was the first cat he has ever taken to the vet and got PTS for aggression.

It was a pet shop kitten, bought on impulse by someone elase and re-homed by my kind (sucked in? DH). We paid for de-sexing etc and did all the right stuff. Had the thing for about 2 years. It was always a challenge, but DH thought it was doing ok. But then it started getting worse and worse. We did have another cat - and it was belting her up more and more as well.

In the end, we had to put an end to it when the cat started attacking him. We have a 2yo grand-daughter who visits as well. And, like an aggressive dog, one cannot just pass the problem onto someone else, can one?

I'm sure it is quite possible it had some medical problem we could not diagnose. Anything is possible.

But the mix of feral genes and early separation were paramount, I think.

Edited August 12, 2010 by noisymina

[Kirty]

Kittens (like puppies) learn how to be good kitties from their mother and siblings. Ideally, a kitten should not leave its family until it is 10 weeks old. Unfortunately, kittens who end up in new homes before this time often exhibit inappropriate behaviours. To a certain extent, what you are describing is normal behaviour (testing the boundaries), but it needs to be nipped in the bud ASAP.

Cats have a very fine threshold between "I like that"/"I'm having fun" and "I'm going to bite you". If you overstimulate a cat, it will cross the line and bite/scratch. So you really need to try to prevent him getting to that aggressive stage. Try not to play rough games with your kitten. Use toys (furry mice, feathers on a string, laser pointer, etc) to play with him and if he does exhibit rough behaviour, the game is over. I wouldn't necessarily use a water bottle, I'd just deposit him on the floor. Some people don't like scruffing a cat, but I have found it can be successful in situations like this. If he starts to bite, say "NO!", grab him by the scruff and put him on the floor or further away from you. Game over. Don't push him with your hands or he will attack them. If he comes back for more, pick him up by the scruff and put him in 'time out' for a few minutes. If you have a stand-alone toilet or small laundry, these places are perfect for time out. Try not to use his crate or he will associate it with being punished. Don't smack him or yell at him - be calm and assertive.

I have hand-raised kittens before and they often go through a stage of biting and seeing what they can get away with. My little foster failure LA was a real biter when he was little! He would often come up for a snuggle and then attack my hands. He used to bite REALLY hard. I would dump him on the floor every time. Now he is the smoochiest, most affectionate kitten. He knows that behaviour is not allowed so he doesn't even try it any more. The most important thing is to be consistent. Good luck!

Edited August 12, 2010 by Kirty