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Well, unfortunately the same pattern has taken hold again, and I believe I am losing hope in any ability for the older cat to accept the younger. After a seeming improvement on Sunday, Monday followed up very badly. I was off work, and monitored them fairly extensively, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible...eyeing them while sitting on the sofa.
The first bad occurrence was early in the AM, prior to them being together. We have been sleeping with the older cat to reassure him and try to eliminate any fear. He likes to park himself on your chest sometimes in the morning. He was purring, and then started licking my face. I wasn't even petting him, so know there wasn't any petting-induced aggression. He then bit me on the chin, starting off gently but then rapidly and quickly increased the pressure until it was a full-on bite. It drew a nice amount of blood. I didn't discipline him, but needless to say I made a sound, got up, and had no interactions with him to let him know I was unhappy. I have never had one of my cats do that. (I've had four previous cats, spread across almost 30 years...)
Second occurrence was mid-day, while we were doing laundry. I opened up a drawer to put away some clothes, and he jumped up in it to explore. I picked him up to keep him out of it, and he emitted a growl/hiss and twisted at me in a very aggressive way, trying to bite and swat. I could tell he was in a bad mood when I put him down, and foolishly didn't think to separate the cats at that point. They had been doing some low-level playing, nothing very bad, but then within about a minute they got into a rather strong bit of wrestling, with quite a bit of fur being ripped out of the young guy, while he was making distinct sounds of discomfort, much more than I'd heard before. I tried to distract them, and when they were apart I picked up the little one to get him out, and the older one clearly wanted to attack me. He had his ears plastered back, mouth was open, and I could tell he was considering attacking me.
Finally, later in the evening we tried having them together again. Things were going fine, at one point both were asleep in the living room. The young one up on the cat tree (we have two separate ones in the living room) and the older one was in a shelf in the entertainment center. I've noticed that generally the older one doesn't sleep nearly as much, and suspect that may be part of the problem. He was just cat-napping, not really out. And he spent much of his time with his attention focused on the young one. After about a good half hour of looking at the young one, who was completely asleep, he went over, climbed up the tree, and started grooming him. After about 10 minutes or so, the kitten finally woke up. He gave a few bats at the older one to get him to stop but the older one wouldn't. He jumped off the tree, and went into the bedroom. The older one followed, and then out of the blue jumped on him and started wrestling. Again we saw big clumps of fur coming out, so distracted and separated. Likely now for good.
The older one is now back to occasionally growling when I talk to him. I think he really didn't like me picking him up from that drawer. After re-reading in-depth the Cat vs Cat book about all of the aggression types, I believe that the older one is exhibiting multiple forms at this point. He believe he is showing signs of dominance aggression with me (direct stares, only accepting affection when he wants it, swatting at me with claws out if I even try to move my hand toward him and he doesn't want it, frequently sitting right in the middle of floors and halls in a way that you are forced to walk around him, and suspect that bite in the morning on the chin was 'mouthing') and some kind of status aggression with the young cat. (And the fact that the younger cat does not back down is what worries me. Again, one of the books I was reading indicated that aggression based issues are usually worse of cats that are close to each other in status and are not willing to yield. I think that is what is going on.) It is truly a case of Jekyll and Hyde with him. 10 minutes or so, once a day, he is an extremely loving cat, wanting to sit on your lap, mash potatoes, and purr. When he's had his fill, he'll get up. Other times he seems ill-at-ease, mostly focused on where the younger one is, even if he can't see him.
I feel badly about it, but we have talked extensively over the last couple of days and believe it best for him to get a new home. We have Feliway. Tons of vertical space. Three litter boxes spread throughout the home, as well as three food/water stations. We feeding him a special calming cat food the vet prescribed. There is no marking, no pooping outside the box...nothing to indicate he is miserable or having territorial issues. We play with them independently and together, multiple times a day. There is no hostility manifest when they see each other. I don't think the older one truly has hostility to the young one. But I don't think he is going to be happy. He just seems fixated with the young one and I haven't seen any reduction in the resulting aggression no matter what we do. And while they eat together and play, in an instant it switches into clearly-not-play. He also initiates interactions that result in aggression when the younger one is sleeping or not interacting with him at all. I am extremely afraid one or both will get injured. We cannot monitor them all the time, and keeping them separated all the time is very difficult, due to the layout of our house.. I'm also fearful that the younger one will learn to be more aggressive from how the older one "plays"...if you can call it that. I suspect he was not socialized enough with either people or other cats. We are at a total loss to understand how he could be so friendly at the shelter, in a room full of probably 6 other cats, where he had only been a couple weeks, and be so different in our home after more than four weeks. The only difference was that the shelter had a room full of adult cats; there were no young ones. I remember that every other cat in the room seemed timid, and that may have helped as well.
I would feel better about things if I saw the aggression resulting from them competing for some thing or space, or if it was due to the young one trying to play with the older one when he wasn't in the mood. That I could imagine getting better and working itself out. But what I'm seeing now I do not have any optimism it will get fixed as it seems to be more compulsive and behavioral.
The first bad occurrence was early in the AM, prior to them being together. We have been sleeping with the older cat to reassure him and try to eliminate any fear. He likes to park himself on your chest sometimes in the morning. He was purring, and then started licking my face. I wasn't even petting him, so know there wasn't any petting-induced aggression. He then bit me on the chin, starting off gently but then rapidly and quickly increased the pressure until it was a full-on bite. It drew a nice amount of blood. I didn't discipline him, but needless to say I made a sound, got up, and had no interactions with him to let him know I was unhappy. I have never had one of my cats do that. (I've had four previous cats, spread across almost 30 years...)
Second occurrence was mid-day, while we were doing laundry. I opened up a drawer to put away some clothes, and he jumped up in it to explore. I picked him up to keep him out of it, and he emitted a growl/hiss and twisted at me in a very aggressive way, trying to bite and swat. I could tell he was in a bad mood when I put him down, and foolishly didn't think to separate the cats at that point. They had been doing some low-level playing, nothing very bad, but then within about a minute they got into a rather strong bit of wrestling, with quite a bit of fur being ripped out of the young guy, while he was making distinct sounds of discomfort, much more than I'd heard before. I tried to distract them, and when they were apart I picked up the little one to get him out, and the older one clearly wanted to attack me. He had his ears plastered back, mouth was open, and I could tell he was considering attacking me.
Finally, later in the evening we tried having them together again. Things were going fine, at one point both were asleep in the living room. The young one up on the cat tree (we have two separate ones in the living room) and the older one was in a shelf in the entertainment center. I've noticed that generally the older one doesn't sleep nearly as much, and suspect that may be part of the problem. He was just cat-napping, not really out. And he spent much of his time with his attention focused on the young one. After about a good half hour of looking at the young one, who was completely asleep, he went over, climbed up the tree, and started grooming him. After about 10 minutes or so, the kitten finally woke up. He gave a few bats at the older one to get him to stop but the older one wouldn't. He jumped off the tree, and went into the bedroom. The older one followed, and then out of the blue jumped on him and started wrestling. Again we saw big clumps of fur coming out, so distracted and separated. Likely now for good.
The older one is now back to occasionally growling when I talk to him. I think he really didn't like me picking him up from that drawer. After re-reading in-depth the Cat vs Cat book about all of the aggression types, I believe that the older one is exhibiting multiple forms at this point. He believe he is showing signs of dominance aggression with me (direct stares, only accepting affection when he wants it, swatting at me with claws out if I even try to move my hand toward him and he doesn't want it, frequently sitting right in the middle of floors and halls in a way that you are forced to walk around him, and suspect that bite in the morning on the chin was 'mouthing') and some kind of status aggression with the young cat. (And the fact that the younger cat does not back down is what worries me. Again, one of the books I was reading indicated that aggression based issues are usually worse of cats that are close to each other in status and are not willing to yield. I think that is what is going on.) It is truly a case of Jekyll and Hyde with him. 10 minutes or so, once a day, he is an extremely loving cat, wanting to sit on your lap, mash potatoes, and purr. When he's had his fill, he'll get up. Other times he seems ill-at-ease, mostly focused on where the younger one is, even if he can't see him.
I feel badly about it, but we have talked extensively over the last couple of days and believe it best for him to get a new home. We have Feliway. Tons of vertical space. Three litter boxes spread throughout the home, as well as three food/water stations. We feeding him a special calming cat food the vet prescribed. There is no marking, no pooping outside the box...nothing to indicate he is miserable or having territorial issues. We play with them independently and together, multiple times a day. There is no hostility manifest when they see each other. I don't think the older one truly has hostility to the young one. But I don't think he is going to be happy. He just seems fixated with the young one and I haven't seen any reduction in the resulting aggression no matter what we do. And while they eat together and play, in an instant it switches into clearly-not-play. He also initiates interactions that result in aggression when the younger one is sleeping or not interacting with him at all. I am extremely afraid one or both will get injured. We cannot monitor them all the time, and keeping them separated all the time is very difficult, due to the layout of our house.. I'm also fearful that the younger one will learn to be more aggressive from how the older one "plays"...if you can call it that. I suspect he was not socialized enough with either people or other cats. We are at a total loss to understand how he could be so friendly at the shelter, in a room full of probably 6 other cats, where he had only been a couple weeks, and be so different in our home after more than four weeks. The only difference was that the shelter had a room full of adult cats; there were no young ones. I remember that every other cat in the room seemed timid, and that may have helped as well.
I would feel better about things if I saw the aggression resulting from them competing for some thing or space, or if it was due to the young one trying to play with the older one when he wasn't in the mood. That I could imagine getting better and working itself out. But what I'm seeing now I do not have any optimism it will get fixed as it seems to be more compulsive and behavioral.
