Moving and Converting!

My fiance and I are moving to another house January 24th. We were taking care of a few of the neighborhood cats, and just friday our Girl got hit by a car

We are taking her brother with us, and are going to get him fixed and immunized, and we are going to try and keep him as an indoor only cat. His whole life has been outdoors and I recently have been letting him in the house more and more for extended periods of time... Right now as it is we have no inside cats, because my girl Dinah is staying with my mom untill I move back that way. ( I did not expect to move in with my fiance, and we are moving so soon that to move Dinah twice would have been unnecesarily traumatizing...) I dont have a litter box yet, but I will most likely get one tomorrow and introduce him to it.... he has never used one before....

Any tips to get him to use a litter box? And what about socializing him with Dinah when we do move?

I am just so afraid he wont be able to adjust to inside life. He is so sweet and loves to be pet.... He hates being held though, and growls when you do, but as soon as you put him down he will come right back for petting...

I also dont want him to get pissed off an start scratching the furniture... my fiance is bringing his 3000 leather couches He would be very very unhappy if something happend to them....

Any one have some successful strategies???

Soft Paws & lots of scratching posts to help with the scratching.

As for the litterbox, most cats automatically use it. I'd keep him confined to a small room with food/water/litterbox at first, as you do introductions & to help him figure out the LB. You can also try Cat Attract litter.

He might try to bolt doors at first, just watch him carefully.

Originally Posted by white cat lover

As for the litterbox, most cats automatically use it.

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That has been my experience too.

Originally Posted by Persi & Alley

That has been my experience too.

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There have been a lot of posts to the contrary here.

Well I kept him inside last night over night as a trial, adn at first he was terrified of the litter box.... I would even put him in it and he would run away from it! Finally at 4 in the morning I had to get to go to the bathroom, and I think he finally had to go enough that he went in (very reluctantly) and went.... his pee is so strong

AFter being neutered his pee should lose some of that smell. It may take a month or two for him to completely settle from the neuter and to completely lose the hormones.

I'm going to assume your female is spayed. That should help the introduction. There is some threads here about introduction--I would definitely do a long intro.

There is a good chance he'll never let you hold him and you shouldn't force that but something we've done with our adopted cat who doesn't like to be held is like when he sits on our lap is we wrap our arms around him like we would if we were holding him, so he gets used to that closeness so to speak. He will now allow us to hold him for very short periods of time--and we make sure to put him down before he starts to get paranoid. He's doing much better--we always speak to him and let him know we dont' want to hurt and that its okay to be held.

Good luck--you're doing a good thing.

Leslie