- Joined
- Sep 29, 2022
- Messages
- 6
- Purraise
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We adopted a new cat (1.5 years old, male) 11 days ago. We have been working on slowly introducing him to our resident cat (3 years old, female). We've had our resident cat for a little over 2 years and she was the only pet in the house. We've been following the general advice of having new cat in his own room, site swapping (happens at least once a day for an hour), scent swapping, etc. Our resident cat was hissing and growling a bit under the door, but that has reduced significantly over the last few days. New cat is as easy-going as it gets and even after a couple of accidental meetings that included some serious hissing and growling from resident cat, he wants nothing more than to meet his sister.
We are at the point where during meal times we can open the door to new cat's room for full visual contact. Resident cat eats in the hallway about 6 feet from the open door, new cat in his room at the same distance. They occasionally look up when they are eating but both go back to their food pretty quickly. Here is where we are unsure of how to proceed next: when resident cat finishes her food (she eats faster), she starts to walk towards the door. She's not hissing or puffed up, but we are a bit scarred from the previous meetings and we close the door so she cannot fully approach new cat. She'll sit outside the door for a minute and then leave. Should we allow her to come into the room and approach new cat? Maybe leave the door cracked and let them make contact that way? We feel like we are making good progress, but don't want to rush things. At the same time, we've also read that taking it too slow can be a negative. Any advice or ideas would be welcome!
We are at the point where during meal times we can open the door to new cat's room for full visual contact. Resident cat eats in the hallway about 6 feet from the open door, new cat in his room at the same distance. They occasionally look up when they are eating but both go back to their food pretty quickly. Here is where we are unsure of how to proceed next: when resident cat finishes her food (she eats faster), she starts to walk towards the door. She's not hissing or puffed up, but we are a bit scarred from the previous meetings and we close the door so she cannot fully approach new cat. She'll sit outside the door for a minute and then leave. Should we allow her to come into the room and approach new cat? Maybe leave the door cracked and let them make contact that way? We feel like we are making good progress, but don't want to rush things. At the same time, we've also read that taking it too slow can be a negative. Any advice or ideas would be welcome!