Cat Intro - Is This Going The Right Way?

[Alice catlady]

First of all, I’m so happy I found this forum, I’ve been reading so many threads the past few days.

Secondly, please forgive me for any mistakes in speiling, as English is not my first language and I live in Europe.

So, on friday I got two new kittens. I already have 3 cats, two boys (13 and 11) and one Lady (13). My mum is our neighbour, so the female has more or less adopted my mum, but goes back and forth. The two boys have my hubby as their person. My baby, the brother of the 11 yo, had to be put to sleep two years ago, so ever since that I haven’t been the main human for any of the cats. We have plenty of space, and the cats also get to go outside.

Anyway, the two kittens are female, 12 weeks old. Ever since we got them they have been staying in their own room. They are getting on amazingly, not scared at all, loving, social and purring. I have been doing the intro as described here, with letting the old cats get used to the smell of them and giving them time.

The boys have been sniffing around, and doesn’t really show any signs of agression. They will sniff for a while, then run away. One of them darted into the kitten room when I was leaving it, he froze, and when the kitten started purring, he bolted out. They seem to be doing ok, eating and doing their old routine. And they gradually stay close to the door longer, without running away. They will both eat in front of the kitten door. I’m being slow with the boys, because they are big boys (7-8 kg each) and one of them can be protective of his humans. However, he doesn’t show any clear signs of agression or stress. The ears can go backwards, but no hissing, growling or puffing, like he does when he is ready to protect his humans.

The female seems mostly to be unbothered. She is most intrested in smelling the door, will eat in front of it with no problem and aboved anything seems to want to go in to the kitten room. Since she has been so cool about it, I let her see one kitten through a crack in the door yesterday. The kitten purred, the adult put her paw in and smacked a little without claws, and the kitten was stilling purring. Yes, she is a weird little purrer. No hissing from the old lady. Since it seems to be going Ok, I let her have a short face to face with the kittens today. The kittens ran around, one hissing once, but most of the time they were purring. One seems very intrested in getting to know the old Lady, who was keeping her distance. If it got to close she would hiss, and then the kitten would stop and just look at her. I only gave them 5 minutes, before the kittens went back into their room, and the adult got treats and praise. She seems a little insulted with me, but not much more than she does when I get a new furniture.

So, does it seem to be going Ok? I’m so scared of doing something wrong or rushing it. I have done intros before, but that was kitten-kitten, resident cat who had kittens or something to that effect. So kittens to older cats is new to me.

I’m thinking I will maybe let the kittens meet one adult at a time, and taking some more time with the boys. Probably because their size is making me a bit more stressed. But do you all think it would be Ok to give them another face to face with the female tomorrow? Seeing that it went Ok, and neither cat seems stressed or angry after the meeting?

If you have any advice, I would be happy to hear them.

(I gather from reading here that letting the cats go outside is a bit more unusual here, so just to point that out, the kittens doesn’t go outside yet. They will stay inside for a good while yet.)

 

[ArtNJ]

You might know this already, but true kitten plus big cat is typically much harder for the big cat than the kitten. If the kittens have had a few days to settle in, they are generally willing to jump on the big cats pretty quickly. The problem seems to be that some older cats get stressed just seeing an intruder, even little baby kittens, and are too timid about it to respond properly when the kitten starts jumping on them. It goes better when the big cat is willing to play with a kitten or even hold it down a bit to teach it to be less jumpy. (Domestic cats dont hurt baby kittens. You can search; you won't find a single post.)

So if the big cats now seem pretty calm outside the kittens door, and if you've taken out a blanket or something from the kitten room to "scent swap" then you've gone as far as you can with it, and need to open the door and see what happens. Since you don't need to worry about violence, you just need to manage things if any of your big cats get super stressed. (Once in a while a kitten might be really scared and need some time, but that usually resolves itself pretty quickly if the kitten has had time to settle in first.)

If any of the big cats have stress, they might chose to eat and go outside, since they are indoor/outdoor. If they seem real stressed, I guess you could allow this for a bit, but the only way they will get used to the kittens is to spend some time, if they aren't at the cowering/not using litterbox stage, you might deny them the outside for a bit if they only want to go to flee.

It will go fine I'm guessing. But don't stress yourself if the big cats have some stress for a bit thats normal too.

 

[Alice catlady]

Thank you!

The big cats hurting the little ones has been scaring me, so it’s good to hear that won’t be a problem.

I do understand that this is worse for the older cats, so I’m keeping an eye on them. This time of year they typically spend a lot of time outdoors, so it doesn’t seem to be more than before we got the kittens. At the moment, the female adult is sitting besides me outside, watching the crows. So she doesn't seem to be stressed out atm. The boys are comming and going. Nothing out of the ordinary, so far.

I have been thinking about keeping the adults inside, but I think it might just make it worse. When ever I have to keep them inside, they will go crazy. The female will start a riot any time I have to keep her inside, If she feels like going outside. She hates closed doors, and will go outside no matter the weather. So I think that might just make them stressed out and grumpy.

I have been trying to swap scents, but so far the adults seems to be ignoring it. So instead I’ve been letting the kittens roam a little when the adults are out doing their morning rounds. Keeping them out of the rooms the adults have as their special place. Is that Ok?

 

[ArtNJ]

Sounds good. I think your ready!

Remember, if one of the big cats holds the kitten down, play bits and the kitten yowls a little, that is normal and teaching the kitten to calm the heck down. You know its ok because the kitten comes right back to the big cats and still wants to play. In the rare case the kitten seems scared of the play and avoids the big cat at all times, you might have to be a bit more active. Once in a while an older cat is just so enthusiastic about playing that the little one can't deal.

 

[Alice catlady]

Once again, thank you. I’m hoping the fact that there is two kittens means they will take out most of their energy on each other. One of the kittens seems very keen to get to know the older ones, but she stopped walking towards her the moment she started hissing. And I will be very surprised If the adults starts playing with them, seeing that they take out most of their energy outside. They mostly play inside in the winter, when they spend more time inside. At the moment they seem to be more in What are you? How did you get in? And what am I supposed to do with you?-mode.

I will try to let them meet our adult female, Medusa, again tomorrow. And If that works out, I’ll get to the boys. The oldest male is the one who gets stressed out at times, so I’ll take my time with him. For his sake.

 

[Alice catlady]

So, today we did round 2, of Medusa meets kittens. She was sniffing at their door, so I let them out. She looked around their room a little, before going into the hallway while the kittens were looking around.

Medusa is in no way, shape or form loving the kittens, but I didn’t think she would. She prefers to stay away from them, but at the same time, keep an eye on them. If they get too close, she will hiss and growl, but nothing else. And the hissing also makes the kittens stop. They haven’t been all the way over to her, they will start walking towards her, but stop the moment she starts hissing. Then they will sit and watch her, or just go back to playing. Kitten Nala never hissed at Medusa, but her sister, Sorry, did hiss a few times yesterday. Today the kittens didn’t hiss at all. I’m thinking that’s good? In the sense, Medusa isn’t meeting two little intruders who are acting angry towards her. So far they seem to be reading her signs, and giving her some space. They are still intruders, but not the angry kind.

Yesterday they only had a 5 min meet up, and today was about 20 min, before I put the kittens back in their room. Medusa was more stressed out after todays session, she would take some cuddle, but wanted out. So I let her out after a little while, to not stress her out by keeping her «in prison» too. She really hates that, so that is a sure way to make her crazy.

So, I have a question, is this staying away from each other «normal»? And how often should they meet?

 

[rubysmama]

Hello and welcome to TCS. You may have already read these, but I wanted to post the links to some articles on cat introductions. I, personally, have never had more than 1 cat at a time, so don't have any experience to share. Hopefully in time all your felines will be one big happy family.

Introducing Cats To Cats
How To Successfully Introduce Cats: The Ultimate Guide
How To Fix An Unsuccessful Cat Introduction
The Multi-cat Household

 

[ArtNJ]

Avoidance is totally normal. Rocky still deliberately avoids Clyde sometimes, three years into it, even though I'd generally say she is 90% of the way to fully tolerating him. If he isn't actively bothering her, she mostly just ignores him. But its way too early to say this is where your headed...things could easily improve quite a bit. In fact, if your kittens stay restrained, the prognosis is excellent. Unfortunately, the kittens are likely to get over any fear before the older cats do, and may stop respecting the signals. So there could be more bumps in the road. Feel free to let us know how its going and ask any questions, been there.

 

[Alice catlady]

Avoidance is totally normal. Rocky still deliberately avoids Clyde sometimes, three years into it, even though I'd generally say she is 90% of the way to fully tolerating him. If he isn't actively bothering her, she mostly just ignores him. But its way too early to say this is where your headed...things could easily improve quite a bit. In fact, if your kittens stay restrained, the prognosis is excellent. Unfortunately, the kittens are likely to get over any fear before the older cats do, and may stop respecting the signals. So there could be more bumps in the road. Feel free to let us know how its going and ask any questions, been there.

Thank you! I’m glad to hear this. We are pretty much in the same place. All three adults have been face to face with the kittens, mostly due to the fact that our oldies are break in crew number one. They open doors, jump in windows and even the second floor balcony. So all of a sudden, they are there. Not very pleased to see the kittens.

The kittens are still restrained, still very much wanting to go over to them. The adults still stay away, hiss and growl If they get too close. However, they have been going up to the kittens a few times, before they hiss and walk away. So they are getting a bit closer to them. The kittens still don’t hiss at all, they just look at them and try to walk over.

So yeah, we still have some way to go.

 

[Alice catlady]

Things are moving forward with Medusa. She will still hiss and keep away, but she is allowing them to go a little closer and will eat and cuddle with us while kittens are there. And she’s more Ok with being inside with them, so that’s good.

We did however have a little situation today. We were hanging out at the porch (I don’t know the right word, it’s like a porch, but at the back of the house?) with the kittens. We have closed it off, so the kittens don’t get out, but they can get some fresh air and hang out with us. It’s a small stair with three steps to get up, so it’s about 1 meter off the ground. Because of the kitty-proofing, you can’t really see what’s going on on the floor. And that’s where the kittens are. My partner was also there, and I guess Lillegutt saw him. So he jumped up, clueless to the fact that the kittens were there. Long story short, he landed almost on top of them. The kittens didn’t mind, but Lillegutt nearly stroked out. He started hissing, but then the hiss turned into some weird kind of oink. Like a pig. Hiss-oink-hiss-oink-hiss-oink. Can cats oink? I guess they can. Poor Lillegutt. Am I a horrible humanbeing for also laughing a little bit? After helping him out of there and conforting him?

 

[rubysmama]

Who's Lillegutt? The mama cat?

 

[Alice catlady]

Who's Lillegutt? The mama cat?

No, Lillegutt (Little boy) is our 11 yo male. One of our 3 resident cats. They are still at the point where they prefer to not be too close to the kittens, so almost landing on them was probably not what he had in mind.

 

[rubysmama]

Got it. BTW, I reread your initial post when I was wondering who Lillegutt was, and saw that you mentioned that English wasn't your first language. Just wanted to let you know, no one could ever tell, as your English is perfect.

 

[Alice catlady]

Got it. BTW, I reread your initial post when I was wondering who Lillegutt was, and saw that you mentioned that English wasn't your first language. Just wanted to let you know, no one could ever tell, as your English is perfect.

Thank you so much! I don’t write English too often, so I get a little insecure at times. But it helps having a lot of non-Norwegian speaking American friends in Norway, and English and Norwegian also being related languages. I also prefer reading books in English, beacause reading a Norwegian translation cost an arm and a foot.

Anyways, Nala has been acting like a troll because she wants to go outside. She is making our lives a bit difficult but plotting ways to get out. Including trying to dart out whenever we walk in or find a way out of the enclosed kitty-porch. So today I took her outside with a leash and harness, so we could walk around in the garden. She loved it and didn’t seem to mind being on the leash. Well, she was a bit upset by me not wanting to go out in the field or into bushes or flowerbeds, but other than that, we were fine.

I’ve been a bit scared of taking her out like that, because of our 3 adults being outside a lot. And today all 3 were outside. However, it was nothing to be scared about. Pan and Medusa both came over to have a look, but they were just sniffing and watching. No hissing or growling at all. Lillegutt also had a look, but was busy sleeping in the shade. So I guess we can do this again. I guess I can also stop being scared about 8 kg of Pan jumping on 1,8 kg kitten. He just seems to want to have a look, sniff and walk away.

I’ve been mentally getting ready to see the kittens get put in their place. But so far, the only smack they’ve gotten was when Nala tried to sneak up on Medusa from behind. Is this normal? Or have we just not gotten to the «put them in their place» part?

 

[rubysmama]

Sounds like things are going well. I've never actually introduced cats to cats, or kittens to cats, so all I know is what I've read. So not sure about the "put them in their place part".

I'm still impressed with your English, though today there was one teeny clue that it's not your first language. The saying is "an arm and a leg", not "foot".

 

[RufusGizmo]

sounds like you are doing great. I integrated two kittens to two older cats starting about 10 months ago, and the two big guys still hiss once and awhile at the little ones. luckily the little guys take their physical playing mostly on each other but once in awhile they will jump on big guys and get the hiss.

 

[Alice catlady]

Sounds like things are going well. I've never actually introduced cats to cats, or kittens to cats, so all I know is what I've read. So not sure about the "put them in their place part".

I'm still impressed with your English, though today there was one teeny clue that it's not your first language. The saying is "an arm and a leg", not "foot".

Hahaha, thank you for pointing that out! That makes sense!

sounds like you are doing great. I integrated two kittens to two older cats starting about 10 months ago, and the two big guys still hiss once and awhile at the little ones. luckily the little guys take their physical playing mostly on each other but once in awhile they will jump on big guys and get the hiss.

Thank you, I’m glad to hear that. The kittens mostly take their energy out on each other here too, so I’m thinking that’s good. And they will get a hiss If they get too close.

I think we are starting to get there with Pan. Pan was my biggest worry since getting the kittens. He is mostly a sweet guy, but he can get stressed and protective. And with him being so big, I’ve been freaking out about him not getting along with the kittens. But now it seems he is the one most open to them. We have been going on walks every day since my last post, and Pan will be there to observere, every time. Today he finally walked over, laid down close to Nala and started slow blinking at her. When Nala blinked back, I was about to start crying! Yesterday my hubby was out walking the kittens for the first time. We made a plan that him being Pan and Lillegutt’s person, his job was to shower them with love, while I take care of the kittens. Both Lillegutt and Pan came over to look at him walking the kittens, but the just sat there. And today Pan gave Nala the blink, so I’m happy.

I had Pan when I got Medusa around 4-5 weeks, and he really worked hard to take care of her. So I’m hoping that my old man has some memories of that. These kittens are older and not scared, so they don’t need the same kind of help that Medusa did. But who knows? Maybe there is some memory in there, of kittens not being all bad?

Medusa is also getting there, I think. Nala found her when we were out yesterday, and when Medusa started hissing when she tried to get close, she started blinking at Medusa. Medusa would not have it then, but today she came over when we were out. She was chilling, getting some cuddle from me and hissing a bit when the kittens got to close. But the fact that she came over, and was there for about 30 min, on her own, is good. She was free to walk away whenever, but she didn’t.

Lillegutt seems to be the one most freaked out still. He will hiss and bolt. The last time we had kittens, he was the kitten, so he is the one of our adult who has never been around kittens. He seems to think they are some kind of alien thing, and really, really scary. So he is probably the one we should focus on in the time to come.