Kitten biting VERY hard

Don't let her do it, and give her something else to play with.

Not easy to do, is it?

Kittens do go through this phase. You're right, she's not being vicious. She's learning to hunt through play but being young she probably doesn't realize that it hurts and she probably hasn't yet developed the motor skills to restrain herself.

There are mixed feelings on the forums about letting your cats play with your hands. I fall into the group that does allow my cats to play fight with me. I've managed to teach them how to play without hurting me. That means though that I have to be willing to get scratched and bitten while they're learning.

If you'd like to play with your cat with your hands you can but you also have to be willing to take a few scratches while they're learning! If you'd rather not, do as Mr. Blanche suggests and offer them a toy and leave your hands out! Otherwise, you can try overreacting to the bites by shrieking and snatching your hand back. They often know they've caused pain. You can tell if your cat realizes it hurt because they'll usually sit back then lick their lips, I know sound crazy but that's how it goes. When they do that, pet them to say it's ok then resume play as if nothing happened. They'll learn the boundaries through repetition.

It will just take some time. At nine weeks they move so fast that by the time the word "no" is out of your mouth they're on the other side of the house ! It gets much easier as they get older.

I have 10 week old kitten and have had her for about a month now. She was rather calm for the first week, but after that, all hell broke lose. Anyway, our kitten likes to bite at pretty much anything that moves -- from our feet, to our faces, and even our lips when we eat.

Usually, when she does this, we do something to let her know it is not ok. Generally, this means, removing the motivator and not our kitty (Lola). Lola loves to be held, so if we pick her up to remove her, it isn't teaching her anything persay. We need to remove ourselves/the object (ie: feet, etc). If that makes sense. It's hardest at night, when she attacks our feet, so I usually have to wrap my feet in a light weight blanket.

As a reward, when Lola is playing right, we have a treat box. Finding a treat that worked was hard though, since most treats are made for cats -- not a little kitten. I called the vet and she said to just pick up a kitten food you do not feed her and use this as a treat (we feed Lola Blue Buffalo Kitten). Based on this recommendation, we picked up Meow Mix Kitten and put the little morsels in a Tic Tac box and shake it, put treats in our hands (generally about 3) and let her eat out of our hand.

Now, she is learning when she hears that shake, it is a reward. She comes rushing and even "paws" the Tic Tac container. The little morsels are the perfect size to fit in it and it is much cheaper than continually buying the treat bags (less than $4 for a 3.5 pound bag). She usually gets about 10 a day, which is excessive, but it is working and Lola is not overweight -- and the treats are tiny!

Lola is learning, albeit slowly, but she is learning. We also reward her when she is doing well, not neccessarily associated with play time as well.

I hope that made sense.

What about your other kitty? Have you introduced them yet? That might be part of the solution - an adult cat to smack her over the head when she misbehaves.

You could always try a gentle scuff as you're putting her down. Until they get around ~4 months a scuffing instantly makes most kittens settle down.

Lol, SO true! Hemmy bit hard as an adult. He was a stray that I found as an adult so there was no working with him when he was a kitten. My female cat, Kit, solved a great number of Hemmy's issues for me by whacking him when he was out of line.

Don't intervene when Mufasa does that - he is teaching her boundaries... unless he is truly hurting her. It will take lots and lots and lots of repetitions for her to "get it" - she is just a baby.

When she bites down hard - yeah - shriek as someone else said, hiss or blow a puff of air in her face and say "no" ..... Don't try to pull your hand away... that revs up the prey drive and she really will think it's a game. Push TOWARDS her - counter-intuitive, I know... but that will shock and startle her, too. And she is more likely to release your hand, leg, foot... etc.

I read some where if you want to use your hands in play and don't want to be scratched to put oven mits on them. Don't know what to tell you about feet. I think feet are just impossible to resist to kittens.

Pushing her away just means play to her.

When she bites, say NO Chemul, in a firm (not loud) voice and turn your back. Ignore for five minutes, (turn your back, do not even look at her) then return to activity. Do this three times. The third time after you tell her no, get up and leave the room and ignore her when she follows you, better yet, if possible, shut the door and leave her in the room alone for five minute, then open the door.

Ignoring, walking away, is what mama cat does with kittens who get too rambunctious. It will take Chemul time to learn, but she will understand what the ignoring means.

Learn her signals. Cats and kittens get over stimulated during play and petting, and once they are past that threshold, there's no point in continuing the activity until they've calmed down. Once you know what to watch for, you can stop the activity before she bites, which will help her training be successful.

Watch for wide wild eyes, and eyes fixated on a body part (of yours), rippling back, lashing tail, ears gone back.

As she learns, you will begin to see her stop herself before she launches. That is a reason for lots of praise and happy face and happy voice.

I do not recommend using your hands at all. At all. She is not going to differentiate your hand from the hands of anyone else. If she thinks it is okay to treat your hands as toys, she will think it is okay to treat anyone's hands as toys. No one wants a cat who bites.

Use toys for play, and stop petting the second she tries to bite, or the second BEFORE she bites, and with time and patience she will learn what is acceptable.

While I completely understand not wanting to use your hands to play with your cats, it's been my experience that just because my cats will play fight with me does not mean they'll play fight with others. I've never had a guest or even my spouse be bitten by one of my cats because the cat mistook them for me. They act very differently with others.

Can't count on that though. I think kittens should be raised without hands or feet as toys. Once they are well on their way to being brought up with "manners", perhaps hands would be okay.

Jennie likes to roll over and invite me to tickle her yummy tummy, and when I do that she grabs my hands and bunny kicks ( without using claws) and gives me a couple of love nips with her teeth.

However I would not do that with a kitten just learning.

As bad as it sounds, most of my kittens have learned pretty quickly that getting underfoot is a bad idea once they get a paw stepped on or accidentally kicked (not hard, now shoes are allowed in the house). The only cat that still hasn't learned is MewMew - she doesn't attack feet, but she gets her paws stepped on a lot.

I play with my cats and kittens with my hands some, too. But it's very different - no hard play and no clawing or biting is allowed. They all know it. If a kitten or cat can't understand those rules, and some never can, you just can't do it.

I have to admit secretly that I love the feeling when cats bite my hand *properly*. I don't know how to describe this, but on a scale of:

1. very gentle bite
2. gentle bite that does not hurt at all
3. firmer bite that hurts *just a little*
4. stronger bite that starts to really hurt
5. bite that breaks skin

I'd prefer 3, and sometimes even between 3 and 4. Of course I'm not insane and bites that are strong enough to break skin are defintely not acceptable.

Over the years I've trained my cats to bite me with exactly the forces I wanted at *my* initiation, and we all enjoy it mutally. For them they get the sensation of "eating prey" and me, I don't know, but I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one!

So to OP, it's your choice. Whatever you do, just make sure that level 5 bites are not allowed. Scream "VERY VERY LOUDLY" when they do it. It worked for me during my own trainings. Good luck!