u/latenivenatrixian

Velcro (7M, resident cat) and Penny (3 and a half months F, new kitten) have been interacting supervised for a couple of weeks now, for the past week it has been for 30 mins - 45 minutes twice a day. We rarely step in on their interactions unless our kitten is truly overstimulating our resident cat, and when we do it's with redirection with a toy, and not our hands.

He seems very interested in her, but we can't tell if he's starting to want to play, or if he is still not very happy with her presence and mostly showing her that he's the boss. He runs away when he gets too much, but she will often chase him until he turns around to face her (he does not hiss when he does this). He chases her, too, but it's only to follow her and she barely notices she's being followed despite the earthquake behind her.

I'm pretty confident this is going fairly normally, but since this is our first time introducing cats, I'd like to get as many second opinions as possible to get more insight on things like body language and behavior.

We are about a week and a half into face-to-face introductions with our resident cat Velcro (7 years old, male) and our new kitten Penny (3 months old female, soon 4 months). We started them off by slow introductions (scent swapping, base camp swapping, then feeding on opposite sides of a screen door). We are now doing this twice a day, we had started off with once a day.

At first, Velcro had been hissing a lot since she tends to sprint up to him quite abruptly, but now marks three visits since his last hiss! He did growl at her on the windowsill about four visits ago, (only instance of growling) but I think it's because it's one of his spots, and she kept on testing his boundaries. It was funny how she just couldn't contain herself, she just really wants to play, I think, but he's not having it just yet. She does seem to respect his boundaries when he sets them, and when she backs off he relaxes. But sometimes she pushes it and he ends up running away for a bit.

But, each time he runs away from her, he does remain curious, starts going back and continues to slowly get into close proximity until he eventually starts slapping her if she's in an enclosed space/higher up or if she pushes her luck with him. He has a safe high spot in the kitchen he sometimes jumps to, and instead watches curiously from a distance.

For the most part, his body language seems pretty relaxed until he gets overwhelmed and runs away, but I'd love confirmation. His slaps also don't seem like play slaps, he does it pretty hard and I see his ears fold back. Is it a dominance thing? Any feedback is appreciated. This is our first time introducing cats and we want to make sure we do it right.

Both videos ended because I stopped to redirect Penny since it seemed like it was getting to be too much for Velcro.

We recently adopted a kitten from a foster, and in photos two of her siblings look like they have the same dirt in their ears. Is this just wax, or could it be because of mites? Their mother was not in the same home, but was listed on the website. We don't know where the cats are from but I suspect they were surrendered because they have their DOB.

I am an adult in Canada. Vet is accessible and she is going to get her shots soon. Penny will be 3 months old in 3 days, she is not spayed yet. We can afford vet care, but it'd be good to get some opinions first. Should I clean it, and see if it reappears? Or leave it alone?

Four days ago, we adopted a 2-month-old (very soon to be 3-month-old) kitten from a foster. Her name is Penny. Our resident cat, Velcro, is 7 years old and due to pet limits in our previous homes, has never interacted with cats outside of his family when he was just a kitten. His only interaction with animals has been with our dog, who he has known since his first days with us.

I believe we have taken introduction a bit too fast, and I wasn't as informed as I thought. I had been looking at a lot of information from different posts here, but never had been textbook following a method. On her third day here, we opened my door just a tiny bit so they could meet through the crack. The introduction went okay, they both received treats, and there was no hissing from our resident cat, although there was one instance of him shoving his paws through the door a bit aggressively.

The problems arose from the second instance, where Penny began to stick her little paws out of the door. Right away, hissing, and a strike from Velcro. So I closed the door, and without really thinking, tried to move him away from the door (so I could get into my room) and he hissed at me. I'm trying to not let this hurt my feelings, it's normal, but he has never, ever hissed at me.

We are now strictly following the Jackson Galaxy method, starting back from square one, but Velcro is extremely stubborn when we try to do the "challenge line". He won't eat anywhere near the door. He won't even eat in the hallway at all.

My door is a sliding wooden door, so there is a tiny gap still if you don't pull on the door when you close it. Today, I heard a very loud hiss and saw him striking at it with both of his paws. He seemed really agitated and aggressive.

I think it's just going to take some time, especially as we sort of screwed up the first time (we will use a screen door, too, next time they begin visual interaction), but I'm also worried about when they get to the point of finally first meeting, in the same room. Velcro isn't playful, not in the sense where he chases toys. It's part of the reason we got another cat, he tries to initiate chase with our dog (who ultimately does not understand.) We thought it'd be good for him mentally and also physically, since a playmate would likely help him work off some weight. He isn't terribly overweight by any means, but he could stand to lose a pound or two.

The thing that concerns me about them meeting is that Velcro is very big. Not fat big, big big. Larger than the average cat, which amplifies my worry that if he wanted to he could easily hurt Penny, who is essentially a twig in cat form.

Anyway, I'm starting to devolve into worried ramblings for a stage we aren't even close to yet. My main questions are, is there anything more I can do to amend screwing up the first introduction? And how worried should I be about the size difference? I've heard horror stories about cats killing new kittens and the thought of that just has me anxious constantly. I really hope they can get along. Any advice is appreciated.

We got a kitten just a couple of days ago, she is almost 3 months old. We have this little cat area we put up around this wall so if our adult cat were to fall off the "railing" (I'm not sure what you call it) he would have something to grab. However, our new kitten Penny is very clumsy and not yet very coordinated and when she finally has free reign of the place after she's fully introduced to our big guy I'm concerned about her playing in this area. A fall like this could seriously hurt her, couldn't it? Is there anything we can do about this? We might also need some outlet covers for that outlet. Any advice is appreciated. I am an adult in Canada, I don't think I need to include vet info since it's not really relevant but sorry if this isn't the case.