New Cat

[hartof]

Looking for advice with how to handle bringing a new cat into the home. We have a lovely 2 year old male, up until 4 weeks ago he was a house cat but now goes out in the daytime and has his routine. He's always in for the day around 2.30.

We've just brought home a 9 week old male kitten. When I got home I brought him up to our bedroom whilst Dcat was out and set up camp. Dcat came home went straight to sleep. When he woke we stroked him after stroking the kitten to swap scents but dh thought we should let Dcat see the kitten so he knew he was there. Put kitten in his carrier kept in our room and Dcat sat on the landing to see. He was fine, didn't get close just sat down to look then went downstairs to get on with his usual thing with dh.

I got kitten settled shut the door and also went downstairs and the kitten started squeaking which attracted dcat to the door. He started palming round and eventually settled.

I'm just so worried we've ruined his life, and will hate us. I'm also worried if I let him out tomorrow he won't come home? I watched Jackson galaxy's video and will start to follow his tips but does anyone have their own tips that have worked? Sorry for the long message I'm very anxious!

It very much depends on how chilled out is your older cat. If your older cat is distressed, eg. more whining than usual, really trying to escape the house etc. then you have a problem. I'd be very surprised if he was distressed from your description. Keep the older cats routine the same as normal.

Keep doing the scent swapping and use a blanket to transfer smells between them. Some growling and swiping is to be expected but the kitten has to learn that older cat is boss.

It's also entirely possible that your older cat will welcome his new playmate without incident. We introduced a new kitten to our cats two months ago, he's mostly ignored by the older cats but our youngest cat then (18 months) acted as if we had ruined his life for four days, he moaned and huffed like a teenager. Then he discovered that the kitten was a great new plaything!

There is hope.

Thank you, you've reassured me. He is very chilled out my cat he loves to greet people who come to the house, he lets himself in the neighbours house so he is very friendly. And around other cats he's been intrigued.

Fingers crossed!

Okay. They met quicker than we'd have liked due to the kitten being fast and escaping the bedroom. The first week we pretty much kept them away out of sight of each other. The second week we started introducing them more but now they're fighting and it started off as play fighting but I think big cat is trying to teach the kitten who's boss. He's not a violent cat but he has pinned the kitten down, I've read this can be normal but I'm just worried they'll never get on?

The kitten is put off by big cats behaviour and goes in for more. The thing is they keep going behind the sofa to do this where we can't get to them and we haven't been able to block it off so far.