r/CatTraining

Hi guys,

I wanted to share a success story with everything that worked for me. I know most posts here are when things don’t go so well so I’m hoping this gives someone a bit of hope ☺️

Resident cat – Nova

Male, neutered, 2 years old, tabby.

Adopted as a kitten, very spoiled, affectionate, mostly plays alone, calm personality.

New cat – Walter

Male, neutered (a few days before adoption), 4 years old, white.Very friendly, super energetic, loves to play. Smaller than Nova in height and weight.

Timeline: 1 month total from adoption to full free roam (day + night)

Day 1

Walter in his safe room (litter, food, water, window spot, toys, beds).It took him around 24h to use the litter.

Nova was OBSESSED with the door. He hissed a few times and just stayed there all day. Didn’t really sleep, so at night I put Nova in the bedroom with me so he could relax.

Day 2

Started scent swapping with a sock (pet one cat, then the other, repeat multiple times a day, leave it in their spots).They also started playing paws under the door. No more hissing.

Day 3

Let Nova explore Walter’s room while Walter was elsewhere. No hissing, just curiosity.Started giving treats under the door, both ate comfortably. And I started feeding Nova his night dry food in front of his door.

Day 4

Walter started short free roam sessions around the house to explore.

Day 5–6

First visual contact through the shower glass.

Nova puffed up at first but calmed down quickly. Both took treats with the barrier between them.Short sessions (5–10 min), always ending on a positive note.

Day 7

First supervised meeting in bedroom. Nova hissed if Walter got too close. Session lasted around 5 min.

Day 8

Second meeting and Walter tried to play by jumping Nova, he would hiss and get a bit scared, but still followed him around.I got a playpen to help Nova feel more confident.

Days 9–12

Walter in the playpen in the common area while Nova was free.Lots of treats, feeding near each other, tried to play with both. They even napped like this which made me feel there is a huge progress.

Around 2 weeks I started opening the playpen.Lots of wrestling and hissing from Nova. I was worried Walter was too rough (even saw some fur flying), but no injuries.

Posted here and people reassured me it was play, to let them figure it out, they were right. The hissing and wrestling diminished with days passing as well. I would just hear them running around.

After I saw they are getting more comfortable around each other, Walter started free roam during the day, separated at night. Started feeding all their meals together, after most plays gave them treats. Walter tried grooming Nova, Nova hissed no 😂

During this time I started small with unsupervised time.

20 minutes, 1 hour and up to 3 hours. Last time they locked themselves in a room together (I left a window open and I think the wind closed the door lol) and nothing happened. That actually boosted my confidence a lot.

1 month mark was first full night together. They played a bit, then slept. I stayed up until 5am stressing for no reason 😂

What I did extra, used pheromone diffusers (not Feliway, just a random Amazon brand, TopSum), read A LOT of Reddit posts and saw so many videos.

I was super stressed at the beginning that maybe they will not get along as Nova had some previous interactions with other neighbours cats in the hallway and he would just hiss and hide, but I am so proud of my boy for accepting his brother haha. And Walter is an angel, he made this easier by being so friendly, never heard him hiss.

I hope this helps someone that is struggling or doesn’t know when to progress. I know some people take months to reach coexistence but looking back now they would have probably free roam earlier if I wasn’t so afraid to let them interact properly. So definitely go with your gut based on how your cats react in when is a good time to progress or step back.

Initially after first supervised meeting I thought it was a step back with the playpen, but I think it was the best thing that happened for their progress + all the nice people here telling me to let them play. So if you’re not sure about their interaction, feel free to post here.

Thanks everyone!!!

Edit: I forgot to mention that Nova became a bit less affectionate to me during this time, he would always come for cuddles or take me in a spot he liked to get belly rubs. But this is slowly getting fixed now and he started doing it again with Walter right there.

Orange cat is a 1.5 year old female who i’ve had since she was 8 weeks old.

Calico is 2 years old in August, a female i got just over 4 months.

My cats have been free roaming together for about 3 months now and overall they get along really well. But I’m a bit confused about their behavior when it comes to cuddling.

I’ve noticed they try to cuddle and sleep beside each other, but it almost always turns into play fighting pretty quickly. At least once or twice a day, my calico LOVES grooming my orange cat — she’ll clean her for a solid 3–5 minutes. Then suddenly the orange cat seems to get annoyed, and it turns into play fighting instead of them settling down together.

Another thing: they both love this little pouch on the cat tree. One will already be inside sleeping, and the other will try to squeeze in too (even though they clearly don’t fit), which also ends in play fighting.

So now I’m wondering — are they just tolerating each other? Or do they actually like each other but just aren’t the cuddly type? 🥲

We recently adopted a 5 months old male kitten to join our home and make some company to our 2.5 years old male cat.

We followed the introduction steps as best as we could and seemed to go relatively well. However, the older cat sometimes gets into these moods where he plays extra extra rough and we can hear the kitten complain.

My question is, should we intervene or let them work it out themselves?

Hello! We are babysitting the black cat so the orange one is the resident. They are both females and 8m old. We followed the Jackson Galaxy method and last night we let them interacted without a barrier. The black one seems friendly and playful (i think) and tries to play (i think), lays with her belly showing, but the resident cat seems like she tries to hunt/beat her, overall aggressive. What should we do?

Orange cat is a 1.5 year old female who i’ve had since she was 8 weeks old.

Calico is 2 years old in August, a female i got just over 4 months.

My cats have been free roaming together for about 3 months now and overall they get along really well. But I’m a bit confused about their behavior when it comes to cuddling.

I’ve noticed they try to cuddle and sleep beside each other, but it almost always turns into play fighting pretty quickly. At least once or twice a day, my calico LOVES grooming my orange cat — she’ll clean her for a solid 3–5 minutes. Then suddenly the orange cat seems to get annoyed, and it turns into play fighting instead of them settling down together.

Another thing: they both love this little pouch on the cat tree. One will already be inside sleeping, and the other will try to squeeze in too (even though they clearly don’t fit), which also ends in play fighting.

So now I’m wondering — are they just tolerating each other? Or do they actually like each other but just aren’t the cuddly type? 🥲

Hey everyone! Looking for some real advice for our little pet family and a new addition.

We have a five year old big black cat who's generally very sweet and loving and very sensitive. He goes on walks and loves our small chihuahua and never really has any aggression or violent tendencies.

Me and my wife have been traveling more for work and personal reasons and hes developed a bit of a medical issue if hes left alone for too long (we get a cat sitter but it's still not enough)

We recently adopted a new friend for him who's this stocky gray kitten. We had to leave them be for 3 weeks to visit family across the world and had my sister and cat sitter take care of them. We introduced them slowly at first and it seemed to be going well.

Well we got back and I dont know if things are good or if its bad.

These days its almost like wrestling matches every night and morning with these two. I've seen a flying elbow from the kitten and our usually gentle big boy is diving on him.

Is this love between brothers? Our chihuahua sometimes wants to break it up and I dont want anyone to get hurt. Does this look like playing?

thanks for any advice! can post more evidence if this is not solid enough

Hi everyone - we have a resident boy Tux who's about 2 years old, and introduced the new grey kitten (boy, about 6 months old) slowly over the last 2 months.

Overall they get along really well, eat together, hang out, share toys, etc. I'm pretty sure this is play, but I get a little worried by the amount of hair tufts I find laying around after lol. They both instigate equally, and there's lots of belly showing, but sometimes the tux will mount/grab the greys neck and hold also. Should I step in?

Only recently introduced. 9 week tabby, 13 week white.

It seems a bit aggressive. The occasional hiss/meow. Sometimes it seems like the little guy is trying to get away, but then he does things like at the end of this video where it seems like he wants right back in it.

First door introduced, then crate in same room (temporary only for introduction) and they seem to play a lot through the crate and will even sleep next to each other through the crate sometimes.

I've only ever had older cats who already had established play boundaries so im not sure how to read this. Just want my babies to be happy and safe.

Hey everyone!

This is my first boy cat—and my first orange boy—so I’m not sure if that’s part of the issue, but my 23-week-old kitten is a very messy bathroom user.

While he’s actually in the litter box, everything is fine. The problem is what happens after…. he launches himself out of the box and runs, which sends litter everywhere.

A couple other things I’ve noticed:

•	He sometimes dips his paws into his water fountain right after using the litter box resulting in dirty water 

•	When he tries to cover his waste, he mostly just scratches the sides of the box instead of the litter

I’ve attached a photo of the type of litter box I’m using, along with a picture of my very handsome (but chaotic) little guy.

Any advice on how to reduce the mess or improve his litter habits would be really appreciated!

Hi everyone! I'm a Ux/Ui student and I'm trying to find participants to complete this short survey which takes about 5-10 minutes. You can take part if you have:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1FCr6uliIXQS2geMEcScdUBbSz4Pld8gwufCUp2Yoxhk/edit
Thank you so much for your time, I greatly appreciate it!

• Pets
• Fluent in english
• Your responses will only be used for research. If you are willing to help out in user interviews-feel free to connect.

My bf’s friend adopted a cat, Shady, and Shady will always bite, claw, and rub her head and body against my shoes and will even jump on me to get me to lay down so she can rub her head against my face but she won’t let me touch her. Why is that? I kinda assumed it was cuteness aggression but im not sure.

I’m the only person she does this to 😭💔