I think I messed up introducing my new kitten to my cats

I love stream-of-consciousness.

By long, hard experience, forget the isolation techniques. Just bring the kitten in, show it to the sandbox, and let them work it out for themselves. Honest, this is what has worked best for me.

Yeah, you didn't mess up.

They'll all work it out.




I'll tell you what though, I had littermates, female, and when they were about 10 we got a third cat.

One of the sisters, Simi, never recovered from this, but quite honestly, she was a raving lunatic anyway. Kind of like Mrs. Rochester in Jane Eyre.

Sister Lulu and Jezzer would try to sit next to each other and Sim cat would run from across the room to throw herself between them and have an angry seizure.

When Simi later died, I'm sure it was from a brain tumor or something, all living creatures, feline and human, who lived in the house breathed a sigh of relief.

This reliable-looking website suggests starting the introduction process all over again. You can find their recommended introduction proces here:

Introducing your new cat to your other pets

PS: If Chai's and Roger's been-there-done-that experience tells you the opposite, which it does, go with the been-there-done-that-experience.

It's been a few years since that first story, and when Jezzer was 14 or 15, we got little roland, who is now as big as a black panther.

Jezzer is about the size of a cotton ball.

I kept roland in the room with me for the first couple of nights, new surroundings and all. But from day one he had the run of the house.

He annoyed Jezzer to no end with his energy, and when he started bringing her down like an antelope, chasing an bringing her down by the neck, we had a little talk with him.
Mr. Tea would take a fly swatter and WHAP it on a table, saying "You want me to beat you crazy with this flyswatter?". Cats hate load noises like that. Now, if he occassionally misbehaves, Mr. Tea will say, "Want me to get the flyswatter?" and roland will slink out of the room.

There're really good friends now, he's kinda protective of her, like a big brother.

PS - roland has never been hit with a fly swatter, or anything.

When he started play biting me too hard, I bit him back. Now he just gentlely grabs with his mouth.

Just throw them all in a shower/tub full of water. They'll "bond" quickly.

Taya
From my experience you are doing good. If you have the kitten in a carrier leave it out with the other cats even if you aren't there. Let your other cats get used to this kitten. The adult cats can't hurt the kitten if you have it in a crate.

Then there has to come that time where you let that kitten out with the others. I would just advise you to be home that day to observe. I have never had an adult cat of mine seriously injure or kill a kitten.

Cats are territorial and you brought in a stranger. Sometimes they end up all getting along but, I have experienced it where that didn't happen. The worst my cats did (as adults) was ignore each other or fight, but not to the point of injury or death. I let them fight (as adults). Each wanted to be dominant and the fighting established which one. Even after all that, they still fought sometimes. I only broke up the fight a few times when I felt it was getting out of hand.

Good luck

(TTH only has 7 fingers)

How did you know that :wink:

I broke up those fights without getting bitten or scratched. btw did you get in the shower/tub with yours so all of you could bond

oh, you might want to buy an extra litter box....spring for the jumbo size.

sometimes cats feel they don't want to use the same box as someone else.

If one of them starts wetting outside the box, buy a box of puppy training pads, and put it next to the box. When they urinate on that, there's no odor.

We had 2 big litter boxes in the mud room, each at the opposite end.
Now that Jezzer is getting older, she's starting to lose her marbles, but in a totally cute way.

First she decided she didn't want to pee in the litter boxes, and went into an open closet area of the mudroom. (Note, oxyclean...5 or six scoops in a quart of hot water...soak tile overnight) So, we moved a litter box into there.

Noooooo....I don't LIKE the litter box in there. I'm going to go under daddies recliner and POOP to show you how much I don't like it. Luckily, there was an area rug under the chair protecting my pride and joy, my top of the line carpet.

So, the litter box gets placed a few feet behind the recliner....in the....middle of....the....dining room.

Yay! I LOVE pooping in the dining room!




But....I don't wanna pee in the litter box in the dining room. I wanna pee on the tile floor NEXT to the litter box in the dining room.....YAY!

Hence, the discovery of puppy training pads.

Well....she's old....you don't get rid of your grandmother when she starts peeing in the dining room.

roland has his dignity, and retires to the mudroom, where there is an air filter to capture his gaseous emissions.

I've introduced new kittens to cats a couple of times - the hissing is normal and will continue for several days even in the case of a mild tempered cat. It takes a while for them to get adjusted, not just a couple of hours together - but several days. Then all of a sudden they get used to each other.

Roger is exactly right - the cats will be pissed for a while, but they work it out.

Or they'll kill each other in the process. Either way, you won't have to worry about them fighting any more.

That is hilarious

If they're indoor cats I wouldn't worry - indoor cats are wimps and are incapable of hurting a fly.

unless they're roland.

he kills and eats flies....and moths....and sometimes you just hear crunch crunch crunch.

and takes down Jezzer like an antelope.

Yeah there are those rare house cats that are just plain mean. My brother rescued a wild kitten - he then proceeded to play rough with it as a kitten and continue while it grew into a cat. Pretty much made the thing mean.

Then when he got married to a woman with a child he left it at my mom's house - no way would he have a mean cat around a kid even though he was responsible for making it so. All you do is walk in the house and thing hisses at you - the kids won't go near it.

My indoor cats are so wimpy they won't even kill bugs. When I had a balcony, they would, however, go out on it and hunt down leaves and kill them. Then they would proudly carry in their kill and stack them up as a gift for me.

My cat is as sweet as can be, but he'll kill anything that moves smaller than he is with the exception of our other pets. More than once our hamsters escaped, and while Lou certainly took the opportunity to chase them, he never hurt one of them. Weird. He'd also sit on top of the birdcage and scare the crap out of our birds. The birds finally got fed up and flew away one day.

Gee - fancy that. Having violent, territorial tendencies in a household of yours. Go Figure.

You sir, are an ass.