Help with cat burrowing in bed

[TKHein]

Hello, my female cat (<2 years) is getting under the covers with me and my wife at night. It usually starts around 4am after she’s been quiet most of the night, and in theory we don’t mind, but the problem comes with her clawing our feet and ankles. Not slashing or anything, just prickling, but it’s still painful and frustrating. And right after that she’ll jump onto the dressers to mess with stuff.

I’ve been trying to get her to wait until my alarm to start acting out in the early morning by just ignoring her then dumping on the attention after getting up, but after a few weeks it hasn’t been very effective yet and my wife is very bad at the ignoring part. We have a covered cat bed currently stationed under my bedside table we call ‘the cave’ that she does use sometimes, but never sits still for long.

What I’m getting at is, how can I stop her burrowing and clawing? Or better yet, the obnoxious behavior in the early morning altogether. The only other thing I can think of is getting up when she starts being a gremlin to give her attention and trying to go back to sleep after, but wouldn’t that just be rewarding her behavior?

 

[FeebysOwner]

Hi! If what she wants is attention, then getting up to give it to her when she bugs you, would sort of be considered a reward. The only thing I know to suggest is that once she starts this burrowing behavior, pick her up, tell her no, place her outside the room and then close the door. She should eventually realize that the only way to stay the whole night in your room is to stop bugging you.

Is she doing this because she is hungry and wants to bother you so you will get up to feed her? Do you leave food out overnight, or have a timed feeder that could open around 4AM? If it is food related, taking care of her hunger might resolve the whole issue.

 

[susanm9006]

When she is burrowing, does it seem to you she is playing or does it seem she is trying to find a comfortable place to lay down? I have had cats that prefer to sleep under the covers with me and would dig and scratch at them until I lifted the covers up so they could settle in. But I have also had ones who like to race under the covers as play. Those get a “settle down” and removal from the room if they dont.

 

[TKHein]

Hi! If what she wants is attention, then getting up to give it to her when she bugs you, would sort of be considered a reward. The only thing I know to suggest is that once she starts this burrowing behavior, pick her up, tell her no, place her outside the room and then close the door. She should eventually realize that the only way to stay the whole night in your room is to stop bugging you.

Is she doing this because she is hungry and wants to bother you so you will get up to feed her? Do you leave food out overnight, or have a timed feeder that could open around 4AM? If it is food related, taking care of her hunger might resolve the whole issue.

I’m pretty certain it’s not because she’s hungry, at least not exclusively. We feed her wet food four times a day including right before bed, and when I’ve tried giving her food right after waking up she doesn’t go for it until after I’ve petted her to her satisfaction.

 

[TKHein]

When she is burrowing, does it seem to you she is playing or does it seem she is trying to find a comfortable place to lay down? I have had cats that prefer to sleep under the covers with me and would dig and scratch at them until I lifted the covers up so they could settle in. But I have also had ones who like to race under the covers as play. Those get a “settle down” and removal from the room if they dont.

A bit of both. Sometimes she’ll settle down and sleep with us, but it feels like more often she’s treating our legs as toys.

 

[Draco]

I'd make sure her claws are trimmed down so it's not so prickly and hurting. My cat likes to curl under the covers at her legs, and she makes biscuits on my legs until she falls asleep. I have to make sure she's trimmed and it makes it more bearable.

The best thing to do is ignore her. Any attention is a reward.

 

[Meowmee]

Hello, my female cat (<2 years) is getting under the covers with me and my wife at night. It usually starts around 4am after she’s been quiet most of the night, and in theory we don’t mind, but the problem comes with her clawing our feet and ankles. Not slashing or anything, just prickling, but it’s still painful and frustrating. And right after that she’ll jump onto the dressers to mess with stuff.

I’ve been trying to get her to wait until my alarm to start acting out in the early morning by just ignoring her then dumping on the attention after getting up, but after a few weeks it hasn’t been very effective yet and my wife is very bad at the ignoring part. We have a covered cat bed currently stationed under my bedside table we call ‘the cave’ that she does use sometimes, but never sits still for long.

What I’m getting at is, how can I stop her burrowing and clawing? Or better yet, the obnoxious behavior in the early morning altogether. The only other thing I can think of is getting up when she starts being a gremlin to give her attention and trying to go back to sleep after, but wouldn’t that just be rewarding her behavior?

Maybe play with her before bed and clip her claws. I hope you figure it out. Banish her from the bed, wear socks etc.

Play with her until she is tired.

Try a kh heater pad under her cave, that may attract her to stay there.

Suddenly my Quinn has refused to have his right front claws clipped. He kneads my arm pretty hard before sleeping and at other times too, and it’s killing me, lol. I have to get him when he’s sleepy and have the claw clipper handy.

If she is hungry give her a snack overnight to munch on.

 

[cmshap]

I started a thread that's slightly related to this...

Tips on comfortably getting my cat to sleep in my bedroom?

My cat is about 10, and I'd like to start allowing him in my bedroom to sleep with me in his later years. But his "nighttime antics" still make me have to keep him out.

Conventional wisdom says to feed him a meal right before bed, and play with him to exhaustion right before bed. That's more easily said than done, however. Right before bed, I am tired. Playing with my cat to exhaustion is work. But it makes complete sense why that would help.

I received some other suggestions in that thread about putting things like food puzzles on the floor next to the bed at night.

My biggest problem with all of this is that I have insomnia. When I get tired, I want to go straight to bed, fall asleep, and stay asleep. So I haven't really tried working on this yet. The transition of acclimating him will take a little time of discomfort on my part.

 

[danteshuman]

My cat has perfected annoying me awake. So I would either try leaving out dry food (which works) of any time your cat wakes you….. you calmly kick her out of your bedroom. Then no matter what do not open the door until your morning alarm goes off! Try running a fan to drown out the protest meows or door rattling. You can train her to let you sleep for a few weeks or she can wake you up predawn every morning of her life.

 

[Alldara]

Removal from the room and shutting the door is the only thing that's worked here. Magnus will perform increasingly dangerous antics to wake us up. (We've done a lot of cat-proofing we thought we'd never need to do).

Leaving some enrichment out at night is also great. We do some treat enrichment overnight to help deter them from bothering us.

If Calcifer is attempting to sleep in the room and Magnus is bugging, I don't feel right kicking Cal out, so another trick is that I come down and lay on the couch. I think Magnus thinks I'm watching birds with him but I'm getting another couple hours of sleep.

 

[iPappy]

I'm in the put them out of the room once they start in group, too. I would maybe ignore it, but it sounds like play which IMO is self reinforcing. (It's why ignoring a dog while they root through your trashcan or ignoring a kid having a great time coloring all over your walls has never, ever worked.)
For some reason, my cats wake around 4AM too and I have taken to shutting them downstairs because the game of chase they were playing in the rooms outside my door were just as loud as if they were in the actual room!

 

[danteshuman]

Cats are most alert around sunrise and sunset. Leaving out dry food let’s me sometimes miss Jackie’s 6 am breakfast and sleep in until 10 am! I feed him at midnight and this also lets me sleep in….. do a late night meal helps them sleep. A play session then meal, then get ready for bed, works best. I did the munch harder longer way of playing dead (not rewarding him for waking me up) and it took months! The first month was the hardest.

Because this is a habit it will take longer to break. I recommend kicking her out of your room if she wakes you up; it has worked on my past cats & worked on many kitties.) Just remember do not crack and all play happens out of the bedroom for at least 6 months.

 

[piano cat]

Try putting some orange peels in your bed, down by your feet. Cats generally don't like orange, I use them to keep my cats off my screens and off my dining room table.

 

[Caspers Human]

Is she treading on you? ("Making biscuits.")

Even if she's doing it on your legs and feet, it might be because she's happy and comfortable. Kittens tread on their mother in order to get milk and it's a behavior that's often carried on through adulthood. To put it in a simple way, they remember the "good ol' days" when they were with their mothers.

If this is true, I wouldn't suggest to discourage the behavior. I'd try to find a way to redirect it to something less bothersome.

Casper likes to make biscuits on his Girl-Humans tummy when they are in bed. She likes it and Casper knows not to do it too hard. She, basically, taught him the limits. When he does it too hard, he gets pushed out. After a while, he learned.

Me, I never learned to be comfortable with animals in bed. I was never allowed when I was a kid.
I let Casper come and sleep next to me as long as he lays down by my waist. Even as much as I have learned to tolerate it, I still can't sleep with the cat near my face. Casper will, occasionally, make biscuits with me. It doesn't realy hurt but, as much as I understand the behavior, I still don't like it when I'm trying to sleep.

My solution is to pull up a pile of blankets or a pillow for Casper to make biscuits on. That, I can deal with.
In fact, one of Casper's favorite biscuit-making places is a flufy, fur pillow. We consider it "Casper's pillow," now that he uses it so much.



That picture was taken a while ago. Now, that pillow is practically threadbare but Casper still likes it so we just let him do it on the pillow whenever he wants.

If you gave your cat a pillow or a special stuffed toy, maybe she will start using it as her own, personal "biscuit-makin' spot" and wouldn't wake you up, at night, so much.