The Multi-Cat Household

The saying goes "one cat just leads to another". According to our latest survey, this holds true for the cat lovers visiting these pages. Apparently, over 70% of you have more than one cat and about 40% have three or more cats.

Watching your cats interact with each other can be a lot of fun. Yet, if your cats do not get along, life can be miserable for the cats as well as for the owner. To provide the best conditions for a good relationship between cats there are three things you should do -

• Introduce the cats properly (see our article about introducing cats).
• Create the right environment for them to live together.
• Deal with their confrontations in an appropriate manner.

The focus of this article is on the second item: how to set the stage so that your cats can live together with the minimum amount of friction.

Setting the Expectations for Life in a Multi-Cat Household

Before we address the issue of resources allocation - let's put things in perspective. When you have more than one cat, you will probably witness an occasional cat spat from time to time. Our aim is not to prevent cat confrontations altogether, but rather decrease the frequency and the intensity of hostilities so that the cats enjoy a better quality of life.

Don't expect all of your cats to necessarily adore each other. You may see Ying-and-Yang cuddling among your cats, especially if the cats have been brought up together since kittenhood. Then again, you may not. The cats are more likely to just co-exist peacefully in the same territory. Whichever the case, even in the best of circumstances the occasional hiss is perfectly normal and appropriate. Your cats are just being cats. Just think - don't you ever hiss or spit at the humans who share your territory?

Manage Your Cat-Resources Wisely

If you want to have several cats living under your roof in relative peace, you need to make sure that there's enough of everything to go around. Never make your cats compete for resources, whether that be food, litter pans, water bowls, toys it is this type of competition that is usually the cause of many cat fights. And this can and should be avoided.