New Cat Troubles?

Hello!

I have had Faceman, a neutered 1.5 year old male cat for about a year. I recently acquired a new cat from a co-worker. The new cat's name is Moose and she is about the same age as Faceman. She is also spayed and has no front claws.

Let me tell you about their personalities before I get to my question. Faceman is a very outgoing cat. He's not afraid of anything and is curious about everything. From what I've seen, he's friendly to most other animals and is very playful. However, he doesn't seem to like kittens for some reason. Moose is more of a shy cat. She LOVES human interaction and loves to cuddle and be petted. If she could have that all day, she would. She gets scared in new places and new animals.

My question is about their interaction... in the first weeks, I let them meet through a carrier and after a few more days, let them meet in a supervised room. Moose hissed at Faceman at first and ran away and hid. After a few days of more supervised meetings, they finally started sniffing each other.

Now, it's been another week. Faceman and Moose sniff each other and swat at each other. It looks like the swatting is in fun... They will also chase each other now, except it's usually Faceman chasing Moose. Sometimes Faceman will catch Moose and bite her on the back of the neck (not breaking the skin). It almost looks like he is trying to mate with her, even though he is neutered and she is spayed.

My question is... is it OKAY to let him do that? At first I was really alarmed and took him off of her right away. He doesn't try to do it all the time, but every so often, they will go into that chase mode and he will try to do it again. I feel bad if this is the way their relationship is going to be... him always trying to mount her.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

I have a male an female and the male is also neutered, but also still mounts Kiki. He never hurts her and sometimes she will just walk away. I think this is just cat ways and as long as he doesn't break the skin, I wouldn't worry.

My male does the exact same thing to my female, several times a day, every day. They are both fixed. They were housemates for who knows how long before I adopted them, so apparently this is part of the overall nature of their relationship. I wasn't exactly thrilled with the behavior when I first brought them home but they have both settled in nicely, and are close enough in age and in weight where she is not at a disadvantage. Larke often says that males always tend to try to dominate females, and while I don't know that I would agree with the "always" part, it probably does happen more often than not.

As long as Moose is readily able to defend herself, and doesn't run and hide every time, I wouldn't worry about it, like Daisy5 said. If it ever turns into a full-blown fight (fur flying, lots of hissing and screaming), by all means break it up by making a loud noise or by tossing a toy to distract. Do not try to handle either cat during the fight because you will more than likely get scratched or bitten.