Morning all.

We have recently taken in an 18-week kitten from a rescue centre. We’ve been through a placing procedure and discussed (in terms of temperament and behaviour) what would and wouldn’t be suitable for us.

We had our last cat, who was behaviourally-challenged to say the least, for ten years or so until her untimely demise. We’ve left it a few years and have now taken the plunge again.

We were slightly surprised when we went to collect said kitty that, as he was ‘handed over’, the placement staff remarked that the reason he had been brought in was because he had a tendency to attack the previous owner’s children. The home is very scrupulous about classing potential adoptees as ‘child-friendly’ or not.

Anyway, we were assured that he had a relaxed temperament and after a brief settling in period, would be fine.

I’m not sure how long that settling in period is supposed to be, but at the moment things seem to be getting worse, rather than better. As I mentioned, we are relatively experienced with cats – my wife has always had cats, and we had our last cat doe a decade or so, but we’re really struggling with our adoptee’s behaviour.

He’s basically constantly manic – I understand you have to play with kittens to wear them out, but three hours solid (and I mean solid) failed to make any kind of dent, meaning it’s constant ‘zooms’ from one end of the house to the other, regular pouncing and attacks, including a couple on our seven year old son. He remembers our last cat and is sensible around the new one, but on one occasion he was just sitting watching TV when the cat zoomed up to the top of the sofa and clawed his head.

Does anyone have any tips, tricks etc which might help? He’s got a bed, toys, food, and we’re trying the regular play sessions, but nothing seems to calm him down. The home have basically said “well, if you can’t cope, bring him back then”, which isn’t hugely helpful – I want to persevere but my wife is close to her wits’ end.

Catnip*

*This may not work…

Get a dog. That’ll learn him.

Get some Feliway diffusers and plug them in around the house. You should soon have a very chilled out cat.

Can he get outside yet and attack the local wildlife/other cats? Or too early? (our cats came to us at 1yr old. We didn’t do the kitten phase). He’ll learn soon enough what he can and can’t do once the local boss cat has a word.

My cat was once a bit like that. He then had a go at a fox and quickly learnt a few life lessons.

He’s basically constantly manic – I understand you have to play with kittens to wear them out, but three hours solid (and I mean solid) failed to make any kind of dent, meaning it’s constant ‘zooms’ from one end of the house to the other,

Part Bengal ?

We had one a bit like this. In fact it was our first foster-cat, first cat ever and we wondered what we had let ourselves in for! Young (not kitten), boisterous, demanding, always scratching at furniture for attention etc.

We coped for a while but it was hard work. It went through one failed adoption and came back to us within a week or so. What really worked was introducing another fairly large mature cat who could act as a target for playing/teasing but also stop the nuisance with a slap when it overstepped. They were adopted as a pair.

Has cat got any high level stuff to sit on and feel smug? Might be tearing around because he/she is feeling a bit insecure.

Play, then feed, then sleep is the normal pattern. Might not be for a kitten, obvs.

You actually have 2 separate issues, one that will resolve itself, the other that you need to really get to grips with.

The first issue – limitless energy. You have a nuclear powered kitten, been there and done that with 2 bengals, you feel like it isn’t you trying to wear them out, but the other way around. The good news is this too will pass, as he gets older, there’ll start to be the odd day when he doesn’t play as much, then the odd day without a zoom. Slowly, the energy level will fall. In the meantime, you need to wear him out as effectively as possible – get a Da Bird toy and run him ragged, let him recover, then repeat until he can’t possibly get up and chase it any more. That’ll buy you a few precious minutes of peace and quiet. As you have a family, get them all involved in wearing him out – one after another. If you have hard floors get some cat springs from Amazon. He will love the play ( see also next problem ) and a knackered kitten is one that is well behaved.

The second issue – attacking humans. This must never be allowed. You must never use hands as toys or do anything to encourage this. Learn to see the signs of an attack – wide eyes, focusing on his “prey”, slinking down ready to attack. This is the point where you need to be ending this “game”. Basically, he needs to learn that when he attacks a human all games come to an end. Understand that chasing or shouting at him is a payoff, all payoffs must end. For my two, they *loved* play, so any biting/attack caused them to be carried in a distinct manner – 2 hands under their chest and belly, carried at arms length ( the only time I carried them that way, so that they understood that the next part of the “punishment” was coming ) into their safe room for a timeout. Simply, bad play means all play comes to a stop and there is no payoff of any sort for the kitten, only a negative outcome. He will learn:

attack human = end of play with no payoff

and learn not to attack. Also, when he is preparing to attack firstly try to distract him with a toy if possible, secondly hiss at him – communicate directly in his own language that his expected behaviour is not acceptable. If he ceases, give him a stroke and make a fuss of what a good boy he is to positively reinforce the behaviour.

With Babbage, one time he’d been a little swine, and was getting carried to timeout – he very briefly grabbed my hand with his mouth, turned, looked at me, realised it was a bad idea and very definitely started licking my hand – this was the point that I realised that the message had got through and that he’d realised that biting a human was not in his best interest. He has grown to be a fine and *very* gentle cat.

Good luck.

Good stuff but why not just buy a plastic water pistol and shoot him every time he attacks a human? It won’t take long for him to learn.

We have a 10 week old kitten at the moment, same mad energy and an affinity for climbing up me and biting my face. He gets put in the cooler (dining room) when he does it and is slowly learning. Our older cat is around to slap him when he gets out of hand, although she’s taken to joining in the careering around the house at warp speed when playing with him. All good fun.

for the truly batshit crazy kitten, even a water pistol is a toy.

but why not just buy a plastic water pistol and shoot him every time he attacks a human?

[video]https://youtu.be/WJcWoksdlOM[/video]

Thanks all – we’ve tried the Feliway stuff with our last moggy to no avail, but I will try again.

Thinkyourself lucky my two adult bro cats, well let’s just say I heard when I was away from home that the littleman (cat) was humping the bigman (cat).

I know that their breed is loving etc but yeeesh! Think I might be having the “can you relieve my cat” chat with the vet.
😯

@cranberry

What did you have as the cat’s safe room? A room in the house or something else?

It is my home office/their room. Their tree is in there, food/water, litter trays.

If they always want to be around you and playing, it is the loss of this attention/play that is the negative consequence of bad behaviour.

You could use any room that is empty of the rest of the family. Leave them in there for at least 15 mins.

I also was lucky that the breeder of my cats taught them that when “ACK” gets said, they are to stop doing whatever they are doing – that still works* 3.5 years later.

*Sometimes

My partner has a 4 month old kitten and it is a livewire, he springs from nowhere and attacks your leg as you walk by, still wee baby teeth so no pain. He lives with me sometimes and is chucked outside most of the day, trying to get him off the cat litter tray as one of his deposits can waken you 50 yards away.
Ive always had cats and had fights with them but they stuck their teeth into my skin but never punctured me, my kids never scratched or bitten although would have their food nicked if not alert

Thank you to all for your advice. For those that are interested, I’m afraid yesterday evening it all got too much for my wife so he’s been packed off back to the cats and dogs home. It was, well, kind of fun whilst it lasted…