What do you think this means?

Hi,

I've been through so much with a biting 6 month old kitty, and hopefully am making some progress now. I've already talked to an animal behaviorist, the vet, forums, and have tried most of the techniques people have suggested. He is getting a little better, but I wonder if there is something going on in cat language that I'm not aware of?

He used to run at us and just bite our faces with no provocation. I think it was his way of getting us to play. (In looking at it in a positive light.) But tonight, after lots of NOs!, and distractions and everything else I've learned to do, something changed. He still will leap at our faces or jump on our laps suddenly and leap up but instead of biting, he will tap us. He jumped at my daughter who cringed in terror, and he tapped her on the forehead with both paws, and then jumped down again. It's so cute, but we still don't trust him completely. Does this make any sense to anybody? What do you think it means? Tag, you're it? Or is he trying to scare us, but not bite? We tried asking him, but he wouldn't give.
Thanks

One more thing. Also, tonight everytime he would start to bite my daughter's foot, and she would say NO BITING! he would stop, look at her, and then gently tap her foot with his paw. And he jumped up on me and tapped me on the chest once. What do you think?

My cats tap me when they either want me to throw a toy mouse or if they want some love.

I think your NO's are finally getting through to him

He's growing up! There will be other changes too, for the next year, not always good, but not always bad, but you'll need to ride it all out just like your mother did when you were a teenager :-) and eventually he'll settle down.

Mine race up and tap me when they want to play, it sounds as if he's a playful kitten who is only just learning that biting isn't the appropriate way to initiate a game

How young was he when he was separated from his mum? Often kittens are taken away too young and don't have the chance to learn from their mum that biting hurts and is wrong. We have some play-biting issues with Radar (he is much better than he was), he left his mum at 8.5 weeks, whereas Sonic just doesn't do it and he was with him mum until 13 weeks which is a much more appropriate age to leave them and he obviously learned more manners

We've had the same problem with Blossom, only it was the feet & hands if we were petting her. I've realized I petted her where she didn't like it, on the tummy, she's fine on the head, under chin & back. I thought she had stopped the feet attack as she hadn't done it for a few weeks. Then yesterday she did it again. I know she's probably bored & we should play with her more. She was found dumped at a few weeks old, hence no training from mum & siblings, only us & the 2 dogs. She's also the same age as your kitten.

Awwww bless him, he's a little attention seeker My Sophie taps at me for attention as well and i think it's so cute.

If anyones showing fear cats are very clever and can pick up on it. I know my late husband used to be terrified of my parents cat and ignored her, but they always say if you ignore them they come to you, and her trick was to jump on the back of the chair he was sitting on because she knew he would shoot straight off it!

Thank you. He was so tiny when he was taken from his mom. Way too young. We got him from a shelter and we could fit him in our hand. Maybe about 8 weeks. We love him so much, but the tiiting was getting unbearable. Now we have our back yard fixed up and safe for him and he gets a lot of energy out now chasing bugs. (and eating them, yumm!).

And the biting is getting better. As you say, it must just take time. And lots of NO BITING! I talked to an animal behaviorist who said after we stop him, we have to immediately distract him with what he can play with. So we've been doing that. Thanks for your answers about the tapping.