To ask if you would have your cat PTS if they showed signs of aggression towards you or your children.

[bumbleymummy]

I've just been thinking about this recently. A lot of people seem to have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to dogs - if they growl/snap/bite that's it - aggressive behaviour - and, in many cases, PTS but people don't usually feel the same way about cats even if they hiss/growl/scratch/bite.

just to be clear - I'm not comparing serious unprovoked attacks (although cats can be guilty of these but not typically causing the same level of harm as a dog) more the type where someone/something is annoying them and they let you know that they're upset/pissed off. It doesn't seem that there's any 'acceptable' way for a dog to do this really.

Great photo pixel!

My mum got attacked my two dogs in France. They basically hunted her down. She was walking down a country path, saw them far off across the fields, thought nothing of it. They ran up behind her silently, no growling or warning, and pulled her to the ground, where they savaged her leg quite badly before she managed to fight them off. They didn't have rabies.

I have never heard of a cat behaving like this. Yes, they will 'hunt' people in the family (I too spent my childhood terrorised by a tabby who thought it hilarious fun to attack my bare ankles every time I went to bed). But to go and hunt down a stranger going about their business... I do think dogs are far more capable of behaviour like this, as well as having far greater potential to hurt.

Stupid typo: 'BY two dogs'. They weren't my two dogs.

Devora, that's interesting (your poor mum!) as the dogs were hunting as a pack and clearly viewed her as a prey species.

I had a very loved black cat, who suffered a brain injury during routine surgery. She was never the same after the surgery. She was mostly loving with me but could be hellcat to people she did not like. Her main terrorist trick was to perch on top of fridge and leap upon unsuspecting souls. She bit me on the head whilst I was pregnant with ds. I was antibiotics for a month. We tried to introduce ds to her very slowly and gently. She took his arrival hard and began going after him. One sad day, I knew I had to have her pts. I was so frightened she would rehomed to someone who would abuse her because of her behaviour. I think about her, some twenty years later.

Size is what makes the difference to me.

My 5 year old isn't going to be seriously injured by a cat or say a chihuahua.

A doberman however could kill him pretty quickly.

So my tolerance is higher for smaller animals. It isn't endless though. If our cat started attacking I would try to find out why and get it stopped, if the only way it can be stopped is with being put down then so be it.

I love my cat but the humans in our house outrank her.

I had to make the hard decision to get our cat pts. He was My mum's cat and the most loving thing ever. He slowly began attacking my mum and younger siblings without warning. Not just the swipe of legs as you go past but full on clamping jaws into skin. I took him in hoping a house without children would calm him again.

We had good days but a few times he would clamp onto my arm and sink teeth in. The final straw came on a night when we were in bed and he had been sitting asleep on my chest when out of nowhere he woke and sprang at my face. It took ages for me to get his teeth out of my head and then spent the rest of the night locked in the bedroom as he stalked the hall trying to get back and attack again. It sounds silly to think cats can do damage but when they are in a fury they really can. I had to go to a&e to have deep puncture and claw wounds glued back together on my head and face.

A trip to the vets followed the next morning and after a very long discussion with the vet it was decided best to put him down As with his history cat shelters would be reluctant to have him. The Vet said you wouldnt think twice to put a dog down and like humans animals can develop neurological problems which are not fixable and the only way would be to have him constantly heavily sedated which just is no level of life. It was the hardest decision but I couldn't have him always out of it and unaware of life or being passed from home to home with people thinking he will be manageable then just not. Never was it a case of easy solution to a difficult cat as it was the hardest decision I had ever had to make.

My DD was bitten by a cat in a random attack in the garden. We didn't even know it had happened until she yelled. I'd be hanging washing, she was holding the peg basket for me - cat came up behind her and bit the hand that was hanging down by her side. She had certainly never, EVER tormented or even touched the cat before.

We're hoping to get a cat from a rescue centre later this year though. Fortunately it hasn't put her off

lonecatwithkitten and pixel my cat's kindred spirits!!! Mine does that too. Happily stroking then all of a sudden a bite - mostly a warning bite, but if you try and remove the hand then he'll get into a fury. Only thing is to say no and he sometimes removes his teeth from your hand. Fairly often launches himself at our ankles and ghas been known to give the DC a bit of a box if he's wants his food. He is very antisocial, but can be quite loving too I keep him very well fed now, it was either that or thinking about rehoming him. He's a right tough nut too and is always getting into fights in the neighbourhood (although less so in his twilight years). He's perfectly healthy and we've tried the pheromone sprays.

He also knows if you don't like or are afraid of cats and actively seeks you out to mess with you! Evil!

It'll teach us for picking him out as he ran around into everything as a kitten, rather than his sleepy docile brothers and sisters, as we thought he had "character"!!

Mine was scooped up by the lady at the foster home and put into my arms with "how about this one?". He was so cute, that was it, he was mine. I always thought it was random and she could have picked up any of them but now I'm not so sure...She didn't have any obvious wounds that I noticed at the time .

The fateful moment when I let myself in for years of abuse. You'd need a heart of stone to resist that little face though, and readers, I was weak .

Our cat was horrible growing up. You couldn't go near her, she would bite, scratch and spit. God knows why as we never did anything to harm her. I was always amazed when I went to friends' houses at how lovely their cats were. We never rehomed her as she didn't do any real harm and she died shortly after we'd left home but she didn't give us any affection.