r/adventurecats

Hi everyone,

Our 5 year old neutered male Caesar, a Nebelung, is an apartment cat.
This weekend was his first real “getaway” from the apartment (besides going to Grandma’s house).

He is not too social and only in the last year has he been comfortable in the apartment hallway of our building, exploring it calmly and being friendly with passing people.

In this picture, the area is completely new; he’s been in our small cottage for only 12 hours now, pee’d once, ate only a few bites of food, hasn’t drank any water at all, and has barely slept.
We will be going back home tonight, a day early for his sake.
His breathing has been faster more often than slow since his trip here.
He’s been quiet, barely meowing.

Now he’s chilling under a table, breathing normal.

I just feel like I should give up on him becoming an adventure cat. I wasn’t expecting him to be this stressed. 😩😔

So what are tips, tricks or general advice?
How should I know when to call it quits on pushing him?

Thank you!

Moritz growls a lot! It is usually smell-induced and not aggressive (no ears backward, nor dilated pupils).

• The opening scene is near a farm that slaughters cows sometimes (on request, not industrially). He generally does not like to go towards that farm and is always happy to go away from it. The farmer told me that animals can smell the killing. Seems believable.
• The Dog-Hotspot is a very nice demonstration of negotiation behavior. He first looks at me and asks for help with his eyes, I then give the Go-Command to see if he can overcome the situation on his own - which he denies with a hiss. He then is allowed up the shoulder immediately.
• The dog/wildlife marking spot is very typical hormonal growling. You can hear his nose going. I have captured that behavior before here at 0:10 - 0:40 and here.

I interpret that growling as very much for me, not against me. He wants to communicate his concerns/alertness so i am ready for whatever he imagines.

One such worst-case imagination is a running man with sun-glasses 😂 It could have only been topped if the guy had walking poles.

After the run across the meadow, I remove some ticks and other stuff from his fur with a flea comb!
This is a new permanent addition to my kit and it is awesome. I have fixed the comb to me with an extendable id-card holder and added some velcrow so it doesnt dangle all the time.
Its much better than picking stuff with my fingers and... yes - it works for insects in my own hair too!

JJ is a very friendly, confident and athletic almost 1 year old cat. He was part of a barn litter as a kitten and we adopted him at 8 weeks. He transitioned well to being an indoor cat, he had a month of mad dashes to the door at about 5 months but got over that. We have lots of windows with deep ledges, cat trees and a loft for his entertainment - he is quite the climber and loves to walk the loft railings. We live on 5 acres in the woods and are hoping to work up to leash walks around the yard, down our road and on our trail.

Yesterday he fought the harness for 5 minutes, I took it off and left it on the floor over night so he could sniff it. This morning he sat while I put it on, laid down for about 10 minutes and then I was able to coax him to walk into the kitchen with some ice cubes on the floor. When I took it off he laid on it which seemed like a win. He is very motivated by fresh water and ice cubes, he comes running whenever he hears water running.

I plan to keep putting it on daily and work up to adding the leash inside the house. I want him to positively associate the harness with trips outside eventually. I’d welcome any suggestions and will search the sub as well.

Here are the things we've gradually done in order:

1. Harness & leash indoors: walks and plays in it just fine
2. Harness & leash in backyard: absolutely loves it
3. Stroller indoors: plays and chills in it
4. Stroller in backyard: chills in it, watches birds
5. Stroller around the block: loafing looking unfazed
6. Stroller to the park: curious, seems to enjoy it. Was a 5 min walk, a few cars and people pass by
7. Stroller at the park: started panting with tongue out and tried to escape (harness was clipped to stroller). There were different birds and trees around, two dogs that didn't bark, some cyclists and people on scooters. I stopped for a minute, gave him water and we turned around to go home. It was about 24 degrees Celsius. On the way home, he started calming down and was back to normal at home.

Are there any steps I can take between #6 and #7 to help him not panic? I gave a treat to reinforce his calm behaviour, but maybe the park was already too overstimulating. It was only his first time there, so I'm hoping that maybe he can slowly get used to it. Thanks in advance!

Just adopted a cat.

Enoki is doing great and is eating and cuddling me and purring and it’s just great.

I bought a harness and plan to begin that training once he has some more time to settle in and is clearly comfortable.

I don’t think I want to let my cat be an outdoor cat in the sense of letting them leave. Although I do plan spending lots of time outside gardening, hiking, beach walks, I also hope to live on my own land one day and farm. I want this cat to be able to join me as much as possible and with the utmost safety. I have no idea what is possible with cats.

I’m curious how well trained can I make Enoki to be outsides. Are leashed walks the ceiling? Or is it possible to have a cat that can be outside but never really want to run far away off your property.

Forgive me if I sound naive I have no education on this subject at all.

Thank you all

We've been taking her on long walks around our neighborhood, but this was her first time on a trail. (her green shirt is for UV protection)

Mt Falcon Park in Morrison, CO was the perfect place to start ☺️ It seemed like she enjoyed the views.

Hi all. Exactly as the title says. My 14 year old boy went deaf a couple of months ago. I’ve thought about taking him out on a harness for years since he’s very interested in the outdoors but I was always too scared. He’s actually comfortable in a harness since I would regularly put him in one over the years but just never made the leap. Since losing his hearing, the vet has suggested that it might be a good idea for the added enrichment. I‘ve taken him out near the front door a few times and I swear it’s made him years younger. He has become so energetic and playful 🥹 My issue is he won’t go inside the backpack! I bought it about three weeks ago and I’ve left it out for him. I’vre tried treats, cat nip, play, a used shirt. He’ll go in for the treat or the nip or toy but won’t fully get in. I would love to make the backpack his safe space because we are in a condo community and im worried being in the yard he’ll be spooked by a dog. He was recently spooked by the neighbors and I slipped him into the backpack but he just leapt out. Thankfully he didn’t try to run, just slowly made his way back to our front door. how long did it take to get your cats in the backpack?? Does anyone have any other advice?

She liked playing with the pinball more than i did lol