Dogs chasing cats

My poor cats -- they have gotten along pretty well with my little dog, who is quite excitable but stopped short of hurting them. Now we have adopted a stray, who is also small and seems quite submissive but is used to chasing cats. The two dogs are suddenly ganging up on them and both cats have had clumps of hair pulled out in the past 3 days. I have yelled at the new dog if I see him just looking at the cats, but I think my other dog gets over excited and the whole thing gets out of control! Help! this is not fair on the cats. we are keeping them separate as much as possible.

what breed is the dog you rescued? perhaps he has never been around cats.
no offense, I know how frusturating it can be but yelling at him isn't going to help the situation. of course you need to think of your cat's safety first since they were there first. did you just get the stray dog off the streets or did you adopt from a shelter or a rescue?
here is a link that should help you for dog to cat intro and re introduce the dog and cats slowly to each other don't rush it. good luck!
http://www.leerburg.com/dog-cat.htm

Sorry to hear that. A quick fix: put up a baby gate or some other blockage and keep the dogs seperated from the kitties in another room or area of the house. That way they can still interact, but if the dogs get to excited and rough, the cats can jump over to the safe zone You can simply take the gate down if/when they get along better. Cat trees also help in the same manner- the kitties can climb up and away from the dogs until they all calm down. Hope that helps. Fingers crossed that they all get along soon!

Thanks for your suggestions. He is a stray from off the road that has been hanging around our house for months, and I have seen him chase other dogs and cats on the road. (I have taken him to vet etc so I know he won't transmit anything to our pets) The first week he was inside, he was very good with the cats but now he is attacking them when I am not looking. I think they all get excited and start chasing around and he doesn't know it's play. Since he has attacked the cats a few days ago, we are keeping them separate unless I am with them. We do have a child's gate and that is helping the traffic flow!

Is he neutered? Also it sounds like an obedience/training class would be a good idea, as well as teaching the "leave it" command. You have your work cut out for you, best of luck. Please let us know how things are going.

OMG~sounds like my household!! For some reason Yoda has gotten BAAAAAD about chasing my cats!! I am seriosuly thinking about finding him a home because of this. He is either going to cause me or the cats to have heart failure!! Im not kidding-he is awful!!!

Best of luck to you. I havent found a way to *cure* him of this!

lee that is so kind of you to take him in and take care of him!
The poor boy probably was never taught any manners by anyone so he does not know how to behave around the cats!
Is he really attacking them? If so maybe he is not a "good fit" for your household. I am curious why you say he is attacking rather than engaging in rough play.
If he has a twisted idea of how to play (dogs play chase with each other, so why not with the cats, right? Makes sense in "doglogic") then keeping them separate will solve the problem eventually.

We've had our dog for a while luckily shes been with our oldest cat for a long while but even when we got 2 new cats (one a kitten) she did need to be retrained. Curiosity was her problem, shes harmless and we know it but the cat doesnt unfortunately. We tried sitting in the same room with the pets while holding the dog so she got use to it. Took some time but now u'd never of known since she doesnt give em much of a second glance.
However we have had past dogs who've been less well behaved. If its simple curiosity then hopefully wont take long. You said it went well when first introduced maybe the cats got it then and its being more cautious.
Hope it works out.

You really have to nip the chasing in the bud. You can't let them do it. As long as the cats run, the dogs will give chase. One of my cats has learned not to run and the dogs are fine, but the other one is a runner.... Just yelling isn't going to do it, so I'd keep a lead on the dogs (not on a choke collar or anything that could get them hung up -- just a normal buckle collar) so you can get to them and give them a leash correction to stop it. You need to be an alpha with them -- let them know that you are the boss and this is not acceptable behavior. You can kind of stand over them (posture) and give them the meanest voice you can give (deep -- sound angry). Ever seen a dog chew out another dog for a bad behavior? Like that. And then make sure that in every aspect of the dogs' world, they know that you are in charge. Nothing in life is free. If they want to eat, they have to perform a command like sit. If they want to go out, they must wait while you open the door and walk out first. The alpha leads. If they want on the furniture, they must be invited. You eat before the dogs eat. This is all important in making sure that they know that you are in charge. When they know that, they will respect you when you chew them out over going after kitties. Otherwise, your words don't mean a darned thing because they might very well think they own you. I have had a couple of foster dogs who were cat chasers, and it was misery. One was such a knucklehead (and he jumped baby gates) that I had to literally leash him and tie the leash around my waist to keep him from going for the cats. He was impossible. Another one just needed to know that I was in charge. Still others need to have a cat ride around the house on their heads with all of the claws dug in to know that chasing kitties isn't cool.