Dissatisfied teenage kitty on a tear

yettigram

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Hi everybody :)

I'm hoping you can help my fiancé and I, and our nine month old Siamese-mix, Hannibal, handle some teenage angst.

We adopted him in October and then, Hyde, who's younger, a couple months later. They became inseparable after a few minutes of pouting and haven't had any obvious problem since. Seriously, their friendship is like Rocky and Bullwinkle awesome.

Everything was peaceful (as can be in a one bedroom apartment with two little crazies) until Hannibal began yowling. It started with pacing and a yell or two during the day, like he was looking for something lost, and has escalated to frequent (frequent, FREQUENT) episodes, day and night.

Both kittens were fixed before we adopted them and have had all their vet stuff taken care of (shots, de-worming, check ups, the whole nine). They eat wet food morning and night and have access to dry food in between (they seemed insatiably hungry without the dry, so we added that). Hyde doesn't really do anything like the crying, he's generally uncomplicated and happy. He's kind of a basic bro in the best way possible.

Hannibal's an oddball and we love him for it: He carries the same stuffed toy to bed every night, touches our faces with his paw, opens the dishwasher, scoops food off our dinner plates (maybe not so cute, we try to be vigilant) and recently found the meaning of life in our ceiling fans.

I messed up last weekend by lifting him and letting him grab the light cord (the fan was off- he'd been staring at it with the odd meow and I thought maybe we'd end the curiosity). It seemed innocent enough (yes, I'm an idiot, no, he's not *as* spoiled as it sounds) and that's added to the yowling problem as now he's obsessed and sits under the fan, reaching up and crying. He woke us up last night doing the same thing and if we shut them out of the bedroom he screams every half hour or so. I've been ignoring morning meows from him for months so the ignoring thing doesn't seem to work.

This has been a super long explanation but the tl;drtl;dr is that Hannibal loves his pal and plays with him all the time, is on a good feeding schedule, is healthy, gets a lot of attention/ human playtime, and still acts like something's missing. He's definitely a smarty so boredom might be a factor, but I'm not sure what else we can do. And he's not yowling at the door, so I don't think it's a LET ME OUT kind of thing.

Is this normal? A phase? Something any of you have dealt with? We'd be super grateful for any thoughts/advice!


(Fan worship)
 

ravenclaw

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First of all, just how weird is Hannibal's behavior? If it seems compulsive or out of control, he should be seen by a vet. If on the other hand he is just a normal, high-energy teenage kitty, the best thing to do in my opinion would be to tolerate his antics during the day but wear him out totally at bedtime.

Boredom could easily be a factor, so buy him a number of tricky interactive feeders in addition to fishing-pole type toys. He can have wet food from a bowl, but make him work hard for all kibble.
 

ravenclaw

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And don't forget the cat furniture. A really tall climbing tree would be great, and some raceways if you can afford to really go to town.
 

wermy

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If he likes batting at cords, maybe suspending a teaser toy in the air or even a mobile sort of toy somewhere just within his reach will keep him entertained. It's possible that he hears insects scuttling around in the ceiling and just wants to hunt.
 
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