I don't think I fully understood I was getting a semi-feral kitty from a sanctuary a month ago, but you never really know what you are going to get from a shelter either. We were slightly under-prepared for how good Julius would be at hiding, but adapted quickly. Julius has his own room with plenty of "cocoons" I was told by sanctuary staff told to introduce my resident boy, Greg, to him fairly quickly since Julius was a colony cat and used to being with other cats, and that this would help him adjust. That didn't seem to quite hold up in practice. I let Greg in the room and he calmly sniffed everything, then tried to get under the bed to say hello to his new friend. Julius did not really enjoy this, and made a distressed sounding meow so I pulled Greg back. I tried a couple more times, trying to make sure Greg didn't approach too fast again. He was great, rolling over and showing his belly, purring while I pet him in view of the new boy, but when he tried to get closer Julius hissed.
Every other resource I know of says to introduce cats more gradually, and it's worked for me before. We were already doing our best to respect Julius' body language for our human interactions, so I've been doing that for cat to cat now too. We have a gate installed in the doorway and I have been trying to encourage some interaction with that protection in place. I think it's going fairly well, Julius sometimes comes out to the gate now looking for Greg ( Or someone) , Greg sometimes will show up and play with a toy, but then Julius retreats and just watches. Greg gets bored and walks away, but then Julius will come back to the gate looking for him. Last night he didn't retreat immediately but chirped at Greg first. I think I might have them playing with a string toy through the gate soon, and they both LOVE catnip so that helps. So maybe things are actually coming along fine, but I've never had a true semi-feral before, so I guess I am looking for reassurance that gradual is better.
Every other resource I know of says to introduce cats more gradually, and it's worked for me before. We were already doing our best to respect Julius' body language for our human interactions, so I've been doing that for cat to cat now too. We have a gate installed in the doorway and I have been trying to encourage some interaction with that protection in place. I think it's going fairly well, Julius sometimes comes out to the gate now looking for Greg ( Or someone) , Greg sometimes will show up and play with a toy, but then Julius retreats and just watches. Greg gets bored and walks away, but then Julius will come back to the gate looking for him. Last night he didn't retreat immediately but chirped at Greg first. I think I might have them playing with a string toy through the gate soon, and they both LOVE catnip so that helps. So maybe things are actually coming along fine, but I've never had a true semi-feral before, so I guess I am looking for reassurance that gradual is better.