How to Ease Surgeried Cats Back Into Household

[dan32]

I know that when cats return from the vet after surgery, the remaining cats in the household don't recognize the returning ones because of scent. I will quarantine the returning cats for a while in their own room, but wondered what suggestions anyone had to speed up the process?

I searched the boards and found rub all cats with corn starch baby powder and also vanilla extract. Any other ideas? What about Feliway spray?

 

[katachtig]

Those are all good tips. I would recommend reading our article on introducing cats to see if it helps also. http://www.thecatsite.com/Behavior/4...cing-Cats.html

 

[dan32]

After about 12 hours keeping my patients in isolation, I tried the "vanilla extract trick" on everyone's noses and tail bases. After I got done, we all smelled like vanilla. I released the infirmed, one or two growls and that was it. In the past, I've had the non-recognition/aggression go on for several days. Always something to learn..

 

[katachtig]

That is great news. How are the cats doing after their surgery?

 

[dan32]

It was just their neuterings. They were up and around in several hours after being home and started getting rammy in the back bedroom pretty quickly. I released them around midnight all "vanilla-ed" and everybody got back to normal in short order. Today, the day after, it's as if nothing every happened.

I had a previous experience where one cat continued attacking a surgeried cat for days after. That was a more complicated surgery, maybe he had more smell to disperse - or maybe it was the vanilla.