Hey gang - It's been a long time since I've been to TCS and I'm back looking for help. I'm sure that there must be similar posts in both "behaviour" and/or "introducing new kitty" but I'm not finding specifically what I need. Here's the deal. I have two cats, Chester and Moe. Chester is a long-haired orange tabby (absolutely gorgeous), about 5 years old and the playground bully. Moe is a skinny little black and white noodle cat resembling a penguin who is a happy-go-lucky crazy affectionate little dude, about 6 years old. My boyfriend has moved in with me with HIS gorgeous long-haired stripey female tabby, Dusty, who is about 7 years old. We moved Dusty in about 5 or 6 weeks ago and did "all the right things" introducing her to the other two cats. All was fine. We were surprised, in fact, at how well the introduction went, other than the initial hissing and spitting and "who's that smell belong to", the usual stuff, but nothing alarming. Chester is the alpha male and always has been. Dusty has been queen of her castle and unlike Moe, she doesn't back down from Chester which he is quite perturbed about. Over the last couple of weeks, we've noticed that Chester (primarily) has been cornering Dusty in various places, including the room where the litter boxes are (we have three boxes) and now Moe is sort of his lieutenant in this behaviour. The problem is that over the last three days, Dusty is now peeing and pooping nowhere near her litterbox and did a poop this morning right in front of my boyfriend on an armchair with Chester and Moe ganging up on her on either side. I caught her last night peeing on a garbage bag on the kitchen floor. Chester and Moe were nowhere in sight, but I think the thought of going to the litter box and the association of being cornered in there is stressing her right out. The cornering/ganging-up is a constant battle and we have decided to go through the re-introduction process again. I have put Dusty back in the room where we initially had her when we brought her home. She has familiar-smelling things there, as well as all the amenities (food, water, litter), including a wicked floor-to-ceiling cat treehouse which had been a constant source of territorial battles but she is no longer showing a lot of interest in it, probably because of the constant battles. I've laid a towel down on the floor in front of the door, sprayed with a citrus scent to try and block Chester and Moe from smelling Dusty as much as possible as well as to prevent them from playing nasty footsie under the door. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated regarding how to stop the Terrible Twosome (who really aren't bad kitties) from cornering Dusty and how to get Dusty de-stressed and assimiliated (again) into our happy cat home. Sorry for the length of this post, but wanted to try and be as detailed as possible.
Thanks to all for your time and suggestions.
Thanks to all for your time and suggestions.
