kitten attacking toddler

[pinkbunnies]

Hi everyone, I am a first-time cat owner with a 2 year old daughter. I adopted a stray kitten(named Tiny) my neighbor found when he was about 5 weeks old and now he's about 3.5 months old. These last few weeks, Tiny's attacks on my daughter, Michelle, have been getting worse. He runs after her, and launches himself at her hands and bites her feet. She gets really upset and starts crying. The vet said to ignore Tiny when he gets aggressive but that doesn't seem to be working. Please help.

 

[rad65]

Does your daughter play roughly with the kitten? Since your daughter is so young, any contact between her and the kitten is going to be rougher than if an adult were doing it. The kitten may have learned to think of your daughter more along the lines of another cat than a human owner, since cats can start to play extremely rough with each other. Children really don't learn how to properly pet and interact with animals until they're on this side of 5-years-old, since their motor skills simply aren't developed enough. Adult cats tend to do better with young children because kittens are like children themselves and they similarly don't know how to gauge their strength/aggressiveness. I'm not sure what you can do to help at the moment, but the kitten should get better as he gets older, since that is going to happen much faster than your daughter growing up and developing proper muscle control to avoid playing too roughly with him.

 

[p3 and the king]

Any interactions with a child this young and a kitten this young should be heavily monitored anyway.  Toddlers can unintentionally hurt a kitten.  And kittens can unintentionally hurt a toddler.  My suggestion is to limit their interactions as much as possible.  When they do play, make sure you are there to monitor it and try to limit it to times the kitty is laid back and more in the petting mode.  There really isn't much you can do at this point.  Your daughter is too young to know how to properly handle a kitten and the kitten is too young and small to know how to defend itself properly (aka running away or getting up high where the toddler can't reach).

I never suggest anyone get a kitten or puppy for children this young.  It almost never goes well.  But the best you can do is limit their interactions and monitor them.  No disciplining the kitten.  It is a baby too and does not understand. 

 

[anne springer]

From the sounds of it, I'd say your kitten thinks of the child as prey. It happens with more aggressive cats, or cats looking to find their place in the home. This is easily remedied with a little work. Do you play with the kitten regularly? Are you disciplining him? Yelling and getting angry will not help the situation at all. Instead, what needs to happen is regular play sessions, by everyone in the household with the kitten. He needs to learn to play with his own toys, and that people are not toys, no matter the size. Jackson Browne of My Cat From Hell advises anyone dealing with an aggressive cat to make sure they have a hunt-kill-eat play routine. Toys on a stick work great for the hunting and "killing", and then you end it with either treats or food. Be calm and gentle when you're playing, no rough treatment and no forcing him to play. If he starts going after your daughter, instead of yelling and screaming (by both you and your daughter), distract him with a toy. You can throw a ball or try the toy on a stick. Good luck!

 

[rad65]

From the sounds of it, I'd say your kitten thinks of the child as prey.

I'm sorry but I have to completely disagree with this statement. A newborn baby is already almost the same size as some cats. A two-year-old is far too big for any cat to think of them as prey. Cats aren't honey badgers, they don't take down animals larger than themselves.

 

[smitten4kittens]

When my kitten was 8 weeks old he did this too. If I wiggled a cat toy on a stick for him he played with that instead of my ankles. Teach your daughter to use a toy on a stick to play with him. Do it often to keep him tired out. A tired kitten is a well behaved kitten. I think this kind of play is normal for a single kitten. In his mind he is playing, not being aggresive. Try a toy like Da Bird. You could also try a Feliway diffuser to help calm him little bit. I hope things get better.

 

[anne springer]

It is too prey behavior, and fighting for dominance in the household. This is a simple concept in cat behavior. Understanding this makes it a lot easier to correct and deal with it. If you ever watched My Cat From Hell, Jackson has talked about this sort of thing. The real way of solving the issue to how you play, what you play with, and how you react. If someone's squealing or in fear, of course the animal s going to go after it! If you are indifferent or distract, there's not going to be a reaction.

 

[p3 and the king]

It is too prey behavior, and fighting for dominance in the household. This is a simple concept in cat behavior. Understanding this makes it a lot easier to correct and deal with it. If you ever watched My Cat From Hell, Jackson has talked about this sort of thing. The real way of solving the issue to how you play, what you play with, and how you react. If someone's squealing or in fear, of course the animal s going to go after it! If you are indifferent or distract, there's not going to be a reaction.

This is not a fight for dominance.  This is a 3 month old kitten.  This is just playing.  Plain and simple. This is how kittens play.  True, they are learning to stalk and hunt but they are not thinking about that at this point, it is just playing right now.  If you go into it thinking a tiny BABY kitten is trying to hurt a toddler, possibly 4 times its size... That's just silly.  And you are going to create bad problems for this little kitten.  It is just playing.  The kid is too young.  She needs to limit the interaction between them.  THe kid does not have the motor skills to properly play with the cat, either.  I am sorry you disagree but arguing your point is not helping the poster.  We all watch Jackson Galaxy, too.  Trust me, he would agree with this feedback over yours.