I adopted a stray cat outside my apartment a few years ago. She was originally aggressive both to cats and people, but after I started taking care of her she warmed up to the neighbors, too. Since she’d lived outside for about a decade, I let her out in the yard (supervised) and she came to love lounging and waiting for passers by to give her scritches.
Unfortunately, I’ve had to move. No more outdoor time for the foreseen future, partially because she’s in a completely new town, and partially because there are so many birds around here I don’t think I’d be able to keep her from running off.
There isn’t even a window facing the walkway where she can interact with people through the window, which was another thing she liked doing in our old place. It’s just me to entertain her, and I can be gone ten hours a day.
She has lots of toys and beds and things to climb, but since she loved the neighbors so much, I’m worried she needs a companion. Anyone else been in this situation? How do you help your cat adjust?
Years ago when it was just my cat Maeko and I, I had to travel for work fairly regularly and would be gone for a day or two, sometimes longer. At first, she would wreck up the place and I’d come home to find entire bookcases emptied all over the floor - even with friends coming by to check on her while I was away.
I set up a little shallow window box outside of a window she could perch at and would fill it with water for the birds to use as a bath, and put one of those one-way privacy window clings on it so she could watch the birds without them noticing (unless she batted at the window, which definitely happened with some regularity). After that, she stopped having as much difficulty when I was away.
That’s a great idea, thank you! I just got her comfortable climbing onto her window bed yesterday :)
Do you have room outside for an enclosure?
Nah, I should have mentioned I’m on a second story apartment now.
Birds don’t cause cats to get lost. They rarely go far from their territory and are very good at finding their way home.
This is generally true… but when we moved with a bunch of cats from an apartment into another apartment on the ground floor less than 500m away, just as I was showing one of the cats around, he jumped off of my arms, went ballistic across the terrace, jumped the wall, another wall, across a street, and wet up a cliff before I could do anything.
He stayed in a 1Km radius, so after a week and something, some kids recognized him, and I got to climb onto a precarious bunch of overgrowth on top of a cliff, to finally get him back
Moral of the story: he ran away all scared, but didn’t know how to get back in, so just stayed around… it’s important to make sure the cat knows how to get into the home, not just find the way home but run away again when a dog or whatever scares them.
I’m so glad you got him back!!
Thanks. It happened some 20-odd years ago, so he’s been gone for a while now… even the cliff where I found him is gone… and now I got something in my eye, but no regrets. Well, maybe one: should’ve taken more photos.
Yes for sure, the first few days in a new place are a shaky time - they’re likely to wander off trying to get back to their old home. Years ago we had a cat that went all the way across town to our old place (about 2km?), twice. But generally once they’re well settled in they won’t go far and it shouldn’t be an ongoing problem.
I’ve heard that cats tend to consider up to a 4Km radius as “their territory”. It’s kind of crazy/scary when that involves a city.
I just meant I wouldn’t be able to supervise her. She’s an older cat and I can usually corral her, but that prey drive will have her climbing places I can’t dream of chasing her.
Most cats do like company if introduced very slowly. Like over a couple of months. If it was me I’d probably try it.
I’d like to, I guess I’m concerned about the logistics. I know you’re supposed to keep them separate for a while, which means one cat has to be stuck in a single room while I work out of town. And if they never fully warmed up, I’m afraid it would just be a ton of stress on the other cat if I had to send them back to the shelter.
I’ll probably save up some PTO before I try it, so I can be home and make neither of the cats are being neglected during the process.
I can’t tell you what to do, but maybe my experience will help you. My wife and I got two cats 9 years ago, a third two years ago and last year, unfortunately, one of our cats died, so after a while we filled up to three again because there was stress between the other two. I would say that what we see as “aggressive” is actually more defensive behavior, every time we brought in new cats there was a lot of hissing and growling. We always kept new cats in a separate room for 7 days, with a close-meshed door net attached to the door frame so that the cats could sniff each other but not touch. This has always worked really well so far and in the end they are always inseparable. I would try it, friends of mine had different experiences and had to give up a cat. But that’s not the end of the world either, in the end the animals should feel comfortable and if it doesn’t work out, you can find a better home for the new cat. Yes it would be stress for the new cat if it doesn’t work out, but in the other hand there is the possibility that it works out and it is less stressful for the animal than when it stays in the shelter.
Additionally in between we found a baby stray cat and brought her up (took about 3 weeks of nursing) and our cats were much more open than with new adult cats. Maybe this baby bonus could work with your cat as well if you want to invest the time, it was a great experience. Especially because the cat would have died if we left it where we found it.
You can add lots of toys and treats to keep them amused. Remember at a rescue place each cat has much less space than a room, sometimes a glorified box. It would be really sad if you have to send them back, but I will say I’ve adopted a lot of adult cats and it’s never happened to me. There’s a chance, but I think it’s fairly low.
Have you considered fostering for a rescue? That way you can save a cat and you can get a better idea how your cat will react.
That’s reassuring, thank you. I actually have plenty of extra toys because I learned it’s slightly cheaper to add extra cat toys to my order and get free shipping whenever I refill my kitty’s flea medication
Have a baby.
Great advice to someone who can barely have a cat
Really hoping I didn’t need the /s on there 😉
No you’re good, I was just appreciating how outrageous it was
