r/adventurecats

took my adventure cat mei mei on a one night camping trip!! just about nothing went as planned but we still had a blast

The only times he meowed was while we were moving. He seemed to enjoy ducking with us under things and watching the water and dragon flies move. 10/10 would take him again.

Hello everyone! Twitch and I have made some tremendous progress since our last post, but the questions I have never end. Since starting some small outings, I’ve made some discoveries about Twitch and want to make sure I’m not pushing her too hard!

We took a trip to her grandparents house (my partner’s parents haha) because we don’t have central air, and this heat wave has made the house 80°+. We didn’t feel comfortable leaving her in the heat. On the way she meowed the whole time, and from what I know about the way she meows, she was stressed. She had a couple moments of open mouth panting (nothing too long, we made sure she had the car ac on her!) that worried me.

This trip was more of a necessary one, but I had hoped it would help her get used to the car. We’ve had a couple trips back and forth since, and it doesn’t seem to get better. She’ll take tube treats, but her favorite freeze dried treats aren’t enough to make her stop. While I want to help her get used to it, I don’t want to push a line of stressing her out too much.

How can I help her? How do I know if we’ve pushed too much? At what point is it time to throw in the towel and understand she’ll probably never get used to it?

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.