female cat becoming agressive?

I just recently got my female cat Charlie spayed, and I hoped getting her spayed will calm her down, but she is still aggressive. Not to people, but to my other cats. Mostly my other female cats. I have four other female cats. One is 14, one 5 and two twins that are both 2 years old. She doesn't attack the older one; but first she started attacking my 5 year old cat Stella and then it was one of the twins, Betty. But now she started attacking the other twin. Just now I had to break up the fight. After I broke up the fight and put the younger cat in my room, Charlie started to stalk the other twin. It looked like she was getting ready to attack her, while the other cat was just minding it's own business.
I am getting worried that eventually it's going to get really violent and she might injure one of the cats. They all have their claws except my older cat. But she doesn't attack the older one. I think it might be a territorial thing, because the house she came from the other cats used to dominate over her.

Anyways, I think I might have to eventually take her to my sisters. The only problem is she has four dogs already and a baby. So the cat would be forced to stay in the basement the whole time. So I am really worried about what I should do about her. Should I take her to my sisters or just leave them be? I just don't want it to get out of hand?

In my experience, I would have put Charlie (the aggressor) in the room and not the younger one. And while doing so, telling Charlie NO with a hiss. This will tell her that her behavior is not tolerated.

Not sure if you posted any earlier threads on this, so I may have missed if you have already tried other solutions like feliway?

I've reccomended trying a calming collar (works similiar to feliway) to a few people and it has helped with a variety of different problems. Maybe try putting one on Charlie and see if that helps curb her aggression?

A couple of questions. How old is Charlie? How long have you had Charlie? So you have four other female cats and Charlie is the fifth female cat then? When was she spayed, two days ago or two weeks ago or longer? I wonder if introductions were done properly here. Charlie may need her own safe room for a little bit. I would start there by letting her have her own space for the moment, a week or so. For some reason, and other's here might agree, female cats take a bit longer to warm up to other girls. It has taken Perla three months to accept Magilla, and I still hear a hiss out of her once in awhile. But all in all they get along quite well now. Anyway, taking her to your sisters doesn't sound like an ideal situation for her with the dogs, kids and being forced to stay in the basement.... I would try to take things a bit slower with her and your other girls and make introductions start all over again.

I think I do need to reintroduce them again. For now I have been keeping them separate, especially at night time. I will give the calming collar and feliway a try as well if I can find them at petsmart.

For now I keep charlie in a bedroom at night and let my other cats roam around the house, and then during the day I let charlie roam around the house and keep the other cats in my room.
Charlie was spayed on March 4th. It's been a week or so since she was spayed and she has become more aggressive since she came back. So I probably should have kept her in a separate room. Charlie is also about 3 years old.

She likely needs more time to calm down - it can take up to 2 months for the hormones to get out of her system. Are the other cats spayed? If not you're likely to have the aggressive behavior continue.

She may also be more defensive because she's had surgery, she doesn't want to be perceived as "weaker" while recovering.

All my cats are spayed and nurtured. Charlie was the last one that needed to be spayed. I just got back from the store and bought her the calming collar. So I am hoping it will work. I think I need to wait a while for it to take effect. The only problem is, even if it calms Charlie down, the younger cats are still uncomfortable around her and hiss and growl whenever they get close to her. So they might provoke Charlie anyways?

I might have to get them collars too if this collar works on Charlie. I hope it will. One thing I don't like about the collar is the powder it releases, there's so much of it. Very messy.
But It shouldn't be dangerous if she tries to chew on the collar or if the powder falls into the cat food while she eats it? Should be okay?

Sudden change in behavior, aggression is a big one, is generally a sign that your aggressive cat is in pain, or may have another underlying medical issue that is causing her pain.

I would definitely take her back to the Vet - perhaps her Spay didn't go as cleanly as was meant to, and/or perhaps by doing the Spay, it brought up other medical problems that occurred since the spay.

For sure, i would call the vet and ask what to do. Sudden change in behavior is usually always a sign of illness or severe pain.

First-hand experience from live-in pet-sitting situation; owners did not listen when one of their dogs became dog-aggressive, I said he needs the vet asap as this is generally a sign of illness. Instead, he kicked this beautiful dog around and put him in the dank garage with very little light. Cold and alone, never to see his buddies again.

When he started throwing up foam, they finally took him to the vet (never listening to me who has studied this stuff), and "Simon" the beautiful dog died soon thereafter from Leukemia. This happened with one of their cats as well, plus, this is in all sorts of studies.

Please call your vet and at least ask if your cat should be seen as she is having sudden behavior change in the form of cat-agression.

Wishing you luck that she is well.

Warmly,

Julie O'

I have a vet appointment for her on Tuesday for a checkup to see how she is healing from her spay. I will ask them and check to see if she could have Leukemia.
I did call my vet a few days ago and told them about her aggression but they didn't have many answers for me. They just agreed with my mom that it could be redirected anger?

Maybe I should get them to run some test on her to make sure she does not have any serious medical problems?

Oh, oh, oh, oh, I'm so sorry I wasn't clear!! Truly sorry!

It could be any number of medical issues; My thought is with the sudden aggressive behavior change after her spay, she is having some pain - it could be as simple as pain from the Spay, and maybe they can give her meds for that.

I just wanted to explain that often, when there is sudden behavior change (of any time, i.e., aggression, lethargy, not eating, etc.), a vet should be consulted and all details given to him/her. Better safe than sorry, I always say.

Again, sorry that I wasn't clear. :'-(

So happy to hear she's going back to the vet!

Warmly,

Julie O'