How to train a Bengal?

Jordan.beadle

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I’ve seen online bengals are very smart and can be trained more than most other cats. I recently adopted a 2 year old male bengal and wondered if it’s too late to try and teach him and what’s the best way to teach him?

Any help would be great as I’m relatively new to owning a cat
 

Rosepud

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It depends on what you're trying to train him, but most cats can be trained to do certain behaviors if you find something they want. For example my cat is very food motivated and I wanted to train her so I would grab a treat and then tell her what I wanted and once she did it she would get the treat. She knows circle, sit, and beg now. It's easiest to choose naturally occurring behaviors or easy things like give me paw where you can pick up their foot rather than teaching them a whole new behavior.
 

Columbine

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Clicker training is the best way to train any animal in my experience. I've personally used it with dogs and horses, but I've heard it works really well with cats too.

From what I've read, cats work best in short bursts rather than longer training sessions. Find a really high value treat for training sessions (ie one that your cat goes absolutely wild for), and keep it for training ONLY. If kitty gets it for nothing sometimes it will lose its value.

Clicker Training For Cats
 

danteshuman

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I never owned a bengal but I have trained a few cats. I recommend clicker training but I just say the same praise all high pitched as I give him his food or treats to reward him “oh you are such a good boy!” I used to just say “good boy/girl” and I noticed my cat Jackie responded to me sucking in my breath all hyper to start my praise of him. Do clicker training clears it up in helping the cat identify what you want them to do.

Jackie gets lots of practice and now sits before I ask him, since sitting = saucer of wet food gets put down. The little twerp has started meowing while he sits to hurry me along. I’m thinking about buying a clicker so I can teach Jackie some new tricks besides up & sit. I taught three kitten to sit up and tap the fingers holding the treats by the time they were 11 weeks old (Jackie was one of those kittens) I taught my previous two cats to sit quietly for dinner/treats.

Age shouldn’t be a factor. My mom’s 5 yr old reformed feral learned to sit for treats by watching my 2 boys do it. One day I shook the treat bag and three cats were sitting there waiting for treats instead of the usual two, so I gave the reformed feral some treats to.
 

Silver Crazy

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SO TRUE! I have two bengals ... the one was able to "train" to sit for a treat and spin ... but ... yeah ... prepare to be trained. Your bengal will soon have you all sorted out and bending over backwards for him. Just you wait
Been trained by Bengals a few times now and don't mind it a bit..lol

I have never tried clicker training..just used treats and verbal rewards.
Bengals are normally so food driven they will do anything for a treat and having a real case of the smarts as well they train really easy. Being very doglike in some ways they seek approval so lots of verbal praise is important.
I taught Blue (3 years old) to high five for a treat at a stage in his socialisation when he would try and tear you apart if you tried to pat him. Took a couple of hours and he never forgot it. High fives now just for the fun..doesn't have to be for a treat.
As for the how, every cat is different so different approaches can apply..read up as much as you can on different ways of training to find what works for you guy,s.
Most of all, make it fun for you and the cat, Most Bengals are a really fun, active and loyal cat and the more time you put into them they give back in truckloads.
Have fun and enjoy. ;)
 
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duncanmac

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What I found works best is to basically watch the cat and praise the heck out of it when it does what you want. We trained specifically only for a couple of things - "Get Down" to get off counters and curtains was started with a gentle nudge and pointing; "Inside" to get them out of the sun room needed a little wrangling, chasing and some treats to get it to mostly work. Some other commands just worked out on there own: "Who wants to play/eat" I just said every time before playing or feeding and they figured it out. Be really consistent in the command - its always "get down" not "down" or "get down from there"

I also added hand signals to some commands like get down or come here which really surprised me when they worked.
 
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