Tell Me How Long Did Your Cat Intros Take?

[MoeFridaPearl]

I am currently working on introducing a stray 2 year old female named Pearl into my 2 cat household (1 female Frida 1year 4 months. 1 male Moe 12)

We are about 5 weeks in, trying to go very slowly. Still working on site swapping and sharing meals, through a pet gate. but not completely co-habitating together yet at all. We have had a couple set backs but making progress.

I just want to hear about others introduction stories.. I find them very interesting and helpful. How long did yours take? Was it totally smooth or did you have bumps in the road? How are they now? Did you have a situation where it never worked out? Things like that.

Thanks!

 

[ExoticCatnip149]

I am currently working on introducing a stray 2 year old female named Pearl into my 2 cat household (1 female Frida 1year 4 months. 1 male Moe 12)

We are about 5 weeks in, trying to go very slowly. Still working on site swapping and sharing meals, through a pet gate. but not completely co-habitating together yet at all. We have had a couple set backs but making progress.

I just want to hear about others introduction stories.. I find them very interesting and helpful. How long did yours take? Was it totally smooth or did you have bumps in the road? How are they now? Did you have a situation where it never worked out? Things like that.

Thanks!

Hi,

I'm still working on my reintros of 2 out of my 3 that suddenly don't get along. I'm a month into it and after an intial rough first few weeks, it got better, it really did. I'm feeling all close to the finish line and shit, and boom, I/we experienced a setback last night. On the bright side, I learned something new. That whole, make a loud noise to stop them from going at it thing does NOT work. Fact is, I think it made them go at it. In hindsight, I should've just picked up the aggressor and secluded him. Huge lesson learned. Thankfully no one was hurt.

And so, now that I know they're not ready to be around each other just yet, we'll take a tiny step back and continue doing what worked which is the following:

- Site swaps every 12 hours
- no more free feeding
- meal feeding on either side of a barrier (baby gate) enabling full sight and safe access to each other if desired
- treats together
- alternating placing one in a carrier while the other is allowed to freely roam the entire house for a while a few times a day (I'll wait a few days to do this again as this part may have been compromised last night)

It really is a case by case basis as far as all these tips are concerned, the really sucky part is not knowing how long this will all take. Initially I gave myself 6 weeks...lmfao. Still, a month ain't shit, so I won't complain.

 

[molly92]

It took probably about 5 months for me to get to the point where both cats are fine with each other. Even now, about 6 moths since I got my second cat, one will swat at the other about once a week, but not do any harm. My younger girl, the original, is not the brightest and doesn't always realize that when the elderly cat (newly adopted) trips or loses her balance, it wasn't her trying to attack! She is getting more used to that though. I think Feliway multicat diffuser has helped a lot!

The biggest problem we had in the beginning, once they started sharing the same space, was that Delilah (young, resident cat) didn't like it when Wendy (elderly, newcomer) used the litter box. Didn't matter that we had 5 of them to choose from! Delilah would charge her when she heard her scratching in the litter. Poor Wendy also just couldn't walk very well on the unsteady surface of the litter and she fell in the litter box a lot anyway, so now I have a special box for her that is just layers of puppy pads, no litter. She likes it and Delilah doesn't recognize it as a litter box, so everyone is happy. I do think Wendy uses the standard litter box once in a while and Delilah doesn't mind anymore, so she did adjust to that too.

The only time Wendy hisses unprovoked is at meal times while I'm preparing their food and Delilah stands riiight next to her at my feet. And Delilah doesn't understand that at all so she just looks at her confused and looks back at me like, anyway, is my dinner ready yet? It's pretty cute. Once they have their bowls everyone is happy. They are surprisingly not very territorial about food as long as it seems like there's enough to go around.

Neither of them are the brightest, but they are both troopers! They're not going to ever snuggle up with each other, but they do sleep a couple of feet away from each other now and seem pretty content with their lives!

 

[MoeFridaPearl]

Thanks for the response!!
Sounds like you feel today how i felt the other day when we had a set back.
May I offer some first hand advice, never pick up either of the cats when they start to go after one another, I made this mistake last Friday and got swiped in the face by one while the other hung from my leg when I was trying to take the other out. I am still bruised and my wounds are deep but healing. Use a sight blocker like cardboard and lead one away from the other. I know it’s scary in the moment and our instinct is to grab one but I learned the hard way.

 

[KarenKat]

Hi, and welcome to The Cat Site! Apologies for the incoming novel, but it's hard to concisely explain the details:

I would say our integration (started last November) took about 7 months from when we first brought in the new cat (Olive, 3 yrs) and tried scent-swapping with our resident cats (Trin, 10 yrs and Gohan, 7 yrs) until we could all be in the same room and the cats were not *too* concerned about each other.

Now, I think I rushed the first few steps. Olive lived outside when we adopted her, so we would have her stay overnight and during the day let her outside and the boys could explore where she had been and really get a good scent swap. After about a week of this, we opened the door and had baby gates between them. At the time, I didn't even know about feeding close to the door, so we started doing a few snacks after a few weeks. Olive is precocious and started hopping over the baby gate, and kept trying to explore.

Now, we had two (accidental) scratches and a torn claw, but no real fights. Mostly it was posturing, hissing, growling, and chasing. She stopped growling at Trin after a few weeks, and they would chase each other (somewhat) in a friendly manner back and forth. Trin still walks over and whacks her in the face fairly often, and she outmaneuvers him easily.

Gohan was our troublemaker. He is slow to decide on anything (even for a cat) and it all felt like it was going pretty good for about a month until he decided that no, actually, he does not want a sister. He became very territorial, and would chase Olive every time she poked her head past her safe room. He stared in bread-cat position for hours, but wouldn't cross into her room even after the gates were removed. He was why it took so long to integrate. Slowly but steadily he began chasing less and less, and eventually he stopped worrying about her as often.

Olive was really a saving grace in personality. She was not aggressive, never started any fights (but her panther scream/growl was terrifying when she felt threatened) and so never made the situation worse. And the best part, was she refused to be relegated to her safe room - she always pushed forward to being part of the family. This was really what made it possible, because we didn't need to work with her to not be scared.

Now, after 9 months, Olive has full access to the house, although she is very cautious upstairs and hasn't explored the bedroom or office fully. Gohan will occasionally go after her and lunge, bop her on the head, and then decide it's too intense and leave. They are not friends, but they can lay near the same window without fighting or running. She is still fairly cautious of him.

When it comes to setbacks, we only really had one where we went back a step. We started leaving the safe room door open at night, but Olive got spooked while exploring by Trin or Gohan and she tore a claw in a mad scramble. So we went back to closing the door at night and while we were gone for another month or two.

Beyond that, it's like any longterm goal (exercise, weight loss, practicing a hobby) - the progress is not a straight line, it goes up and down. It's easy to think that if there is no chase one time, that the next time there is a chase it's a setback. Trying to look at the bigger trend helped me get through some of the more trying times.

Sorry about how long this got! I tend to ramble a ton, but hopefully this is helpful. Congrats on the new kitty!

^ Gohan grooming near Olive

^ Trin and Olive Naptime

^ All three in the room together. They like making triangles.

 

[duncanmac]

Depends on where you place the finish line. It took about 6 weeks before we could leave them alone together without worrying that they would kill each other, but it took another 5 or 6 months until they were relaxed and comfortable with each other. And it took probably a year before Duncan would let me pet Barry without beating him up.

Both my cats were young when we intergrated them - both under 6 months - and Barry, the new cat, really wanted a friend. (My intro thread here: When To Introduce New Kittens). During the first weeks or two that they were together, they chased each other constantly. It was like they were running laps around the house. During the first few months I had to give them a time out here and there but I tried to give them as much latitude to work things out on their own as I could because I felt if I stepped in each time they looked at each other funny, the integration process would never finish.

Don't be discouraged by the people who claim their cats were pals after a day - I'm sure it happens - but also don't worry about the people whose cats are still in separate areas of the house after years.

They are pretty much pals now:

Pals!

• duncanmac
• Nov 2, 2017

Whos There

• duncanmac
• May 24, 2018

The Boy in the Window

• duncanmac
• Nov 2, 2017

 

[RufusGizmo]

we got two kittens last august, and moved them in with our 12 year old cats in October (the little guys were sick for awhile and had to be separated). we did not leave them out alone until December, 2017, and they still have their moments where the older guys hiss and growl at the little ones. from all accounts I hear from people a year is a good goal! It really depends on so much, when the two older guys were introduced they were both babies, and the introduction took two days.

 

[danteshuman]

Hmmmmm well the intro between my boys was no intro BUT my kitten was locked in the kitten room at night. The kitten was only allowed out within 3-6 feet of me and was guarded from my resident cat. He was just 6 weeks old and I panicked and went into over protective mode. Once he was bullying my resident cat a month or 6 weeks later, I praised my resident cat when he fought back (and stopped being so over protective.) 11 years later my boys don't love each other but they share very well.

Then the crazy worst case cat introductions were done. Life happened and I was couch surfing for a year while waiting for my SSI to be approved...... this tossed my 2 boys into a new home with 2 other cats and no clearly defined territority. Things did not go well with the elderly female declawed, tail-less cat!!! My punk bullied her!!! She wound up hiding on top of the fridge for a bit. Knowing what I know now I would not recomend that method at all. Ironically the semi-feral indoor/outdoor cat was more accepting of my boys because he views the yard as his, not the house. Eventually my punk learned he would get yellled at or squirted or clapped at if he even thought of hunting the resident cat. After a couple of years I could get them eating within a foot of each other but they hated each other until the day she passed. The thing that helped the most was getting a room to rent so my insecure punk could have defined space of his own.

I would recomend the slow introduction process and plan on doing it when my room mate gets a kitten. Sometimes in life though you don't have the option of doing ideal introductions. Learn from my mistakes. Let your adult cat teach the kitten manners. Do slow introductions (especially when dealing with a 15 year old female resident bottle baby cat!!!)

 

[vince]

The introduction between my two went surprisingly quickly. I prepped the back bedroom for a safe room for Chesterfield (C) beforehand. When C came home with me, Sir Eats-A-Lot (E) saw C in the carrier and gave him a short hiss just to let him know what was what, I guess. I separated them and within a couple hours they were playing under the door, so I chanced opening it. E and C started playing immediately, and that's all there was to their intro. They bonded immediately. Much easier than I ever hoped.

 

[RufusGizmo]

very lucky!

 

[Gizmobius]

I wasn't able to do a slow introduction as the layout of my house wouldn't allow it. They were separated for maybe 24 hours by a flimsy sliding door and they both desperately wanted to see what was on the other side so I supervised and allowed them to roam around and sniff. They've never fought and it's only my female cat, the newer one Stevie, who would hiss and growl at the resident cat Gizmo. There was one incident that resulted in a lacerated third eyelid that I wish I could've witnessed because I don't even know how that could've happened but all of their "issues" have come from Gizmo playing far too rough and using his 4lb weight difference to completely dominate the poor girl.

So it's been a grand total of about 8 months now and for the most part I feel comfortable leaving them alone with one another. If I'm going to be gone for a long time, I may put one in my bedroom just to be safe rather than sorry but they do get along decently well. They clean each other and eat next to one another and laze around together so I know at least they don't hate each other. The boy just plays too darn rough and gets hissed at quite a bit.