Biting when grooming the other cat

BeccaT

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Things have been going rather well between our two cats now that it's been several weeks since our newest was adopted, aside for this one thing.

A few days ago, our resident cat (Annie, 8 months) has decided to start grooming our new cat (April, 10 months) whenever she gets close to her, but never seeks her out to groom her. Generally, April will let Annie groom her until she starts to bite which happens without fail every time, within the first few seconds of grooming. This grooming is only one-sided and Annie only ever grooms April's head/ears area.

I'm wondering if this is normal behaviour? Annie was adopted when she was 2 months old and therefore hasn't been socialised or raised with other cats, which I think made (and still makes) playing between the two of them complicated as Annie has no idea how to play with other cats anymore. The grooming-to-biting usually ends in a bit of a scuffle between them too as April will bite back (understandably so) and I have to break them up, but there's never any noises being made or other nastiness.

I've also read that cats have been known to groom other cats in areas where they're injured/infected etc. and I'm wondering if it could be that. I've noticed some dark spots on April's upper ears on the inside over the past few days and I have no idea what they are or if they're harmless. She doesn't necessarily overly-scratch, but she does scratch her ears a fair amount. We have a vet appointment booked for her for a general wellness check so it's something I'll bring up to the vet regardless, but thought I'd mention it here too.
 

susanm9006

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I think it is probably just kitten behavior. Lick, lick, bite is pretty normal at their age. Always good to get a vet check up though.
 

ArtNJ

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Yes. Normal for cats. And for owls licking tootsie rolls. Lick, lick, bite -- it takes 3!

The play drive is so strong for young cats, it overwhelms the grooming. Same reason many wives complain they never get a decent massage from their hubby :flail:
 
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BeccaT

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I think it is probably just kitten behavior. Lick, lick, bite is pretty normal at their age. Always good to get a vet check up though.
Yes. Normal for cats. And for owls licking tootsie rolls. Lick, lick, bite -- it takes 3!

The play drive is so strong for young cats, it overwhelms the grooming. Same reason many wives complain they never get a decent massage from their hubby :flail:
Thank you both of you, I'm hoping it'll blow over or at the very least, I hope it's not aggressive. The biting is consistent from both sides when they play, but there's rarely any noises from either side and they keep going back to each other and doing their cute little butt wiggles and pouncing. None of it seems super aggressive per se but I still worry a lot about the two of them fighting instead of playing.

Will update this post after we've been to the vet!
 

ArtNJ

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It sounds like healthy play. My 2 1/2 year old still does the lick lick bite to the older one to initiate play.

Cat are predators, and practice predator behaviors in play. Play biting each other is normal. My wife loves when one of my cats opens his mouth wide fangs showing. There is no noise, its just play posturing, so yeah its funny. Like "I'm going to bite you so hard! You better run, here I come!"
 

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Normal in my home. If I'm close by I try to use my hand to prevent the biting a bit. Our 1.5 year cat gets a bit rough with our 10 month cat. It can be normal for the age.
Are they hissing or poofing up at one another? Wrestling is a big part of their play at those ages. Jackson Galaxy has some videos on the differences in YouTube. (Mind you, 1.5 is so poofy that we always find bits of hair when he plays with the other cats 🤣) Keep watching their body language for signs of stress when approaching one another and try to get each associating the other with good things like treats and toys and attention.
 
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BeccaT

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Normal in my home. If I'm close by I try to use my hand to prevent the biting a bit. Our 1.5 year cat gets a bit rough with our 10 month cat. It can be normal for the age.
Are they hissing or poofing up at one another? Wrestling is a big part of their play at those ages. Jackson Galaxy has some videos on the differences in YouTube. (Mind you, 1.5 is so poofy that we always find bits of hair when he plays with the other cats 🤣) Keep watching their body language for signs of stress when approaching one another and try to get each associating the other with good things like treats and toys and attention.
They do occasionally poof up to one another, mostly April though. I thankfully haven’t heard hissing from either side since we started the introduction process. I find their body language hard to read, as like I said they’ll poof up to each other but also their tails are low and sometimes their ears are back, but it is a back and fourth between them rather than one running away from the other and not going back to initiate again. I’ll check out the Jackson galaxy video!
 

susanm9006

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Kittens will poof up at each other when they are playing, often accompanied by the sideways crab walk. It’s sort of a game of “look how scary I am”. All part of normal kitten play with a friend.
 

ArtNJ

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I love the sideways crab walk! We don't have a cat that does it now, but we used to call that the "Bandy Hop" after our very first cat, who whould kind of hop while in that sideways position.

Poofing could also be a sign of a bit of startlement, or a little bit of residual stress, but if they are regularly playing then its probably just as Susan mentioned.
 

IndyJones

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As long as there's no yipping or growing or hissing let them be.

It's kind of like how little kids rough house. My cats both adults do the same thing and I only break it up if one of them cries or I'd they do it in a place where ther could crash into something.
 

ArtNJ

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I can't believe I said Tootsie Roll, getting old I guess. I meant to say that for some young cats, licking their buddy is like an owl licking a Tootsie Pop! Lick, lick, bite, every time!

Random aside, in googling Tootsie Pop just now, I learned that someone did a study, and it actually takes 673 licks, not 3, lol!
 

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Yes that's true too!

Vocalizations can be normal too. My cats growl when playing...even at toys. They also do little "ffft" sounds at toys and each other or even humans when playing.

It really depends on your cats which makes it so hard to give advice on this subject.

More subtle signs are: are they hyper focused on one another? (Cat fights are so hard to break up because a noise or movement will make them go at the other cat rather than back off like a dog). Do they take mini-breaks while playing? (A sign of trust. Stopping to look around or mini-groom. Thus won't always be present if they are really in to the pkay. You'll see this more at the beginning or near the end of wrestle time).

For example you can grab a wand while they play and if you can drag it around and they alternate between each other and the wand, it's a good sign that it's play. They may prefer still to play with one another but that's okay. Sometimes my cat's will watch the toy and then hop at each other instead.

Nobel, our old man cat, is a VERY vocal player. I don't know how to describe the difference in sounds...but it sounds similar enough that I can mistake the two and usually have to check with my eyes. However, there's a few sounds he makes where I just KNOW Calcifer is being too rough. (Can't play with the old man, they way you can with Magnus lol)
 
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BeccaT

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Yes that's true too!

Vocalizations can be normal too. My cats growl when playing...even at toys. They also do little "ffft" sounds at toys and each other or even humans when playing.

It really depends on your cats which makes it so hard to give advice on this subject.

More subtle signs are: are they hyper focused on one another? (Cat fights are so hard to break up because a noise or movement will make them go at the other cat rather than back off like a dog). Do they take mini-breaks while playing? (A sign of trust. Stopping to look around or mini-groom. Thus won't always be present if they are really in to the pkay. You'll see this more at the beginning or near the end of wrestle time).

For example you can grab a wand while they play and if you can drag it around and they alternate between each other and the wand, it's a good sign that it's play. They may prefer still to play with one another but that's okay. Sometimes my cat's will watch the toy and then hop at each other instead.

Nobel, our old man cat, is a VERY vocal player. I don't know how to describe the difference in sounds...but it sounds similar enough that I can mistake the two and usually have to check with my eyes. However, there's a few sounds he makes where I just KNOW Calcifer is being too rough. (Can't play with the old man, they way you can with Magnus lol)
This advice is so helpful, thank you! Yes, there's often mini-breaks between them when they're playing/roughhousing. And it's common that the younger one will run up to the older one, and kind of hop around her and I take that as her trying to initiate, but not be too physical yet. Most of it is chasing, with the odd time one will pounce on the other and knock them on the floor which again, I sometimes worry looks too rough, but there's rarely any noises. I think the only times I've heard noises recently is when Annie is sleeping and April walks up and starts biting her randomly and then they scuffle, and clearly Annie just wants to be left alone.

Yesterday, I did catch April grooming Annie for the first time! It was brief and around her butt area (but as in her body near the tail, not under the tail!) and I don't think it ended in biting. They're slowly getting better every day it seems. Will still update with the vet visit information after we've been this afternoon.
 

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This advice is so helpful, thank you! Yes, there's often mini-breaks between them when they're playing/roughhousing. And it's common that the younger one will run up to the older one, and kind of hop around her and I take that as her trying to initiate, but not be too physical yet. Most of it is chasing, with the odd time one will pounce on the other and knock them on the floor which again, I sometimes worry looks too rough, but there's rarely any noises. I think the only times I've heard noises recently is when Annie is sleeping and April walks up and starts biting her randomly and then they scuffle, and clearly Annie just wants to be left alone.

Yesterday, I did catch April grooming Annie for the first time! It was brief and around her butt area (but as in her body near the tail, not under the tail!) and I don't think it ended in biting. They're slowly getting better every day it seems. Will still update with the vet visit information after we've been this afternoon.
Sounds like it's going great! Nobel is slow-to-warm. Takes him 6 months to a year to fully acclimate to a new cat in the house.

Put shortly, Cal has been here 4 months and Nobel initiated friendly play for the first time this past week. He was still howling like a banshee when Cal so much as sat next to him about 50% of the time at the point where you are (not hissing and growling, but like Cal was murdering/hurting him--while not touching him. Fully supervised so Cal didn't have a chance to do anything to him we didn't see). Nobel doesn't even like being a solo cat and he's over here being drama. Calcifer and Magnus bonded quickly and easily within a couple weeks. Magnus and Nobel bonded within 8 weeks, but Magnus still had to go to the spare room at night because he's a trouble-gremlin. Personality plays a big part of this: Magnus we rescued with a personality geared to Nobel. Calcifer we rescued with a personality geared to be more like my late cat, who co-shared registered therapy cat role with Nobel. Nobel and my late cat co-existed at best. She bullied him and played the victim and I was too new to "cat-reading" to realize it. Cal loves Nobel though, so they'll get there.

Some cats just take extra time. Keep having them associate one another with good things and you'll do fine. Roll back an introduction stage if you notice their relationship backsliding.
 
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BeccaT

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Vet update!

They looked at her ears and said everything looked fine. I mentioned the dark spots and the vet said it could be the sun, similarly how our skin pigment changes in the sun, cats also do. She also apparently had tapeworms which we had no idea about, but were assured they were harmless to her and Annie and she received a shot for it, which she'll have to go back for in 3 weeks.

Also, it turns out she's 1 year + 1 month old! We hadn't properly looked at the dates on the file we were given when we adopted her, but the vet did and said she'd be a year old now rather than 10 months which is what was written on her adoption card. I'm wondering if that has/had anything to do with how her and Annie are together, but I've read that as long as the cat(s) are under 2 years old, they should get along better than those that are older.

Sadly, Annie is back to hissing and freaking out over April's presence but I've read about this and the vet also mentioned it may happen because she'd just been to the vet. I'm hoping this'll blow over by the end of the day and we won't need to start separating them at night again.
 

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That's lovely news! Her age being a few months off won't be too much of the issue. Cats introductions take time and a few months is a normal amount of time for a safe introduction.

Yes she smells like vet now. Don't be discouraged, it should get back to where it was in a matter of days.
 
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BeccaT

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That's lovely news! Her age being a few months off won't be too much of the issue. Cats introductions take time and a few months is a normal amount of time for a safe introduction.

Yes she smells like vet now. Don't be discouraged, it should get back to where it was in a matter of days.
Thank you! Yeah, things seemed to be back to normal by the end of the day. They're pretty much back to normal now but they seem to be playing rougher than before, they'll pin each other to the floor and bite and I've heard more hisses/growls from them than before, but they'll still have their moments of grooming each other and lying next to each other. I'm just hoping that this'll blow over, but we'll be taking April back to the vet in 3 weeks for a booster so I guess I'll plan ahead and try to get her scent on a towel or grooming brush before she leaves.

I also had another question that I didn't want to make a whole other post for considering it's somewhat related, but am I okay to keep feeding our 1 year old dry kitten food until our other cat is a year old? I worry about her putting on extra weight, but trying to feed them separate types of food would be a major chore as they're already fussy about when they eat, the youngest has a sensitive stomach and they swap bowls a lot when I do feed them.
 

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Thank you! Yeah, things seemed to be back to normal by the end of the day. They're pretty much back to normal now but they seem to be playing rougher than before, they'll pin each other to the floor and bite and I've heard more hisses/growls from them than before, but they'll still have their moments of grooming each other and lying next to each other. I'm just hoping that this'll blow over, but we'll be taking April back to the vet in 3 weeks for a booster so I guess I'll plan ahead and try to get her scent on a towel or grooming brush before she leaves.

I also had another question that I didn't want to make a whole other post for considering it's somewhat related, but am I okay to keep feeding our 1 year old dry kitten food until our other cat is a year old? I worry about her putting on extra weight, but trying to feed them separate types of food would be a major chore as they're already fussy about when they eat, the youngest has a sensitive stomach and they swap bowls a lot when I do feed them.
Sometimes you might need to roll back the introductions. After the vet might be a permanent thing. It's a stressful experience and some cats don't appreciate other cats in their faces. My friend and I were discussing this recently, her cats have been together for years.
Nobel went to the vet yesterday and when we came home he spent a half hour in a room with the door closed decompressing before we let him out. My friends like to leave the cat to at least take a nap in the private room.

As for the food issue, yes most cats can stay on kitten. Cats can continue to grow until the age of 2, however the growth is slowed after 1 usually.

Kitten food is higher in calories..you'll need to watch your older cat's body and cut back if she begins getting too robust. Some cats put on too much weight and cannot continue with kitten food.
 
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