Hair Pulling And Overgroomingnin 10-year Old Male

[Hendrix0418]

This is kind of a long post, but please stick with me!

I adopted my 10-year old male domestic shorthair cat at the end of May, and he didn’t have any hair-pulling or overgrooming behaviors for the first couple weeks. After our first check-up with the vet, I noticed he started over grooming a little and assumed it was stress from the vet. He would continue to do it on and off, but in the last week it has gotten pretty bad. As a final resort last night, I put a small t-shirt on him (he didn’t mind at all), and he didn’t even attempt to pull all night. He resumed, though, when I took the shirt off this morning.

He has been given flea/mite medication recently and the areas where he’s pulling don’t look particularly red or irritated. He was born in the house where he lived all 10 years before coming to me, and he had a cat buddy who he lived with. Now it’s just him and I in the apartment, and he’s alone when I’m at work for 7-8 hours. I’m worried that he’s lonely and missing his bonded friend (his friend was adopted separately before I got him), and that this behavior is related to that.

I have another vet appointment this week, but in the meantime does anyone have any thoughts on what might be happening to him? He’s otherwise a pretty well-behaved cat (eats normally, uses the litter box appropriately...), but I don’t want him to pluck himself raw!

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Furballsmom]

Hi!
Try some low volume classical harp music, MusicForCats . Com or there's an app called Relax My Cat, on a timer, it doesn't need to be on all the time.

Even if you've been in your apartment for a while, you might take a blacklight and check to see if there are any old spots that weren't cleaned.

Do you have cat trees? Both upright and horizontal scratchers?

Can you take him for walks? Something here might help as well;

Try some of these things;

How To Make Your Home Bigger (at Least For Your Cats)

19 Best Interactive Cat Toys: Your Ultimate List (2019) | Heavy.com

Home - the Ripple Rug

Food Puzzles for Cats

The LickiMat - Food Puzzles for Cats

Favorite Cat Toys?

 

[FeebysOwner]

Hi. Do you know anything about his past, and whether or not he was previously treated for fleas/mites? If so, is it a different product than what you are using? Since he wasn't doing it during the first couple of weeks, I was just wondering if it could have coincided with the treatment you gave him, and perhaps he is allergic to it.

Are you feeding him the same food he was getting before? The itching could also be an allergic reaction to a new food, and theoretically could take a couple of weeks to present itself.

Older cats can be so cool sometimes - a much younger cat would have had a fit over the t-shirt you put on him!

Anyway, ask the vet about the possibility of an allergic reaction to the flea/mite treatment (and/or food). If you don't have to give the treatment to him, and he appears to start to get over the over-grooming as it wears off, you might not want to give it to him again.