Screaming Cat! Reason?

[chaucer]

My sweet Henryetta is a feral/semi-feral I fed for several months and then was able to rescue when she was pregnant and help her care for kittens. She's now spayed and has been an indoor-only cat since last April and has adapted wonderfully.  She's loving, sweet-natured and gets along with my other indoor-only cat, a neutered male named Chaucer, but she is still afraid of other people.  Both cats are about 2.5 years old.

Henryetta has never really objected to other cats coming by to dine. She looks at them through the glass or screen and it's all okay. However, there is one cat that comes round that she clearly hates.  Anytime this cat is in the yard, she starts growling.  Last night, it escalated. The cat came closer to the door and Henryetta was most terrifying in appearance and sound. She didn't just growl and hiss, this was a full-on scream like some sort of panther and if she could have leapt through the glass it would not have been pretty.  Chaucer was not far off and he went over. She must have hissed at him because he came from under the curtain with his tail fluffed and then started to go back under. I clapped and Henryetta ran off with Chaucer following. I was afraid that Chaucer, who I've had since he was 4 months old and has not been in a fight, would get seriously hurt so I managed to get him to another room until Henryetta calmed down.

My questions are:  Why that cat and not the others that come around?  They are in her territory.   Is it possible that while she was living outside she had some tangles with this cat?  Did it perhaps hurt some kittens she might have had back then and she remembers this?  How common is this screaming?  I've had cats all my life and never heard anything like this before.

 

[sivyaleah]

There may have been something about the body posture of this other cat that she recognizes as being a threat to her.  We have a few cats that come to our back door also.  Casper, hates all of them but Cocoa seems more interested than angry by their presence.  Only with one cat have I seen her lunge at the glass door, also with a sound I never thought I'd hear from her.  

Redirecting your cat, when this occurs is probably the only thing you can do unless you have a way to block the door off visually.  We tried doing that for a while with a heavy piece of cardboard at the bottom of the door but it got to be annoying for us personally getting in and out of that door.  Plus, the cardboard eventually starting to bend over.  Since these cats rarely come by, we just deal with the occasional thru-door argument, although not happy about it.  I'd suggest other methods but since you are welcoming the ferals for care, none seem appropriate for your situation.

 

[chaucer]

Thanks for replying. It's a long, sliding patio door so I can't prevent her from seeing out.

The cat in question is a large male and whether he is feral remains a question since he will come right up to the door with me standing there. Two spayed females belong to my neighbor and one of them will do that so this male may or may not belong to someone in the neighborhood behind me.  I feed one particular cat and would like to trap him, especially since he now has a hurt foot, so I do have to put up with a variety of cats coming through to dine and I don't really mind, but Henryetta's behavior concerned me. I don't want her to turn on Chaucer while in that state of anger.   She is a stocky Torbie and outweighs Chaucer by at least 2 pounds, has thick skin and has, no doubt, some street cred (as the vet likes to say). Chaucer is lean, tall and has soft skin and no fighting experience.