Queen Bee

I have three cats at my house: a four year old female, a three year old male, and a one and a half year old male. All are fixed. We adopted the female at one year old along with one of the males at 5months old and they got along great. When the female was two and half years old we "adopted" a kitten from a litter of feral kittens that we socialized and took care of until they were ready to be put up for adoption. The new kitten was very affectionate with the male cat already in the house and tried very hard to be affectionate with the female, but she was not having it. She would hiss, and growl if he approached her. Well it's been a year and half and the two boys are getting along great however the female is getting much worse with her behavior toward the youngest male. She will growl, hiss, and swat if he gets near her, even if it is just to pass through the hallway. He does not provoke this behavior from her from what I can tell. She will not allow him on the bed by growling and chasing him off if he tries. The female's attitude is getting much worse and I really need some ideas on how to help there two get along well enough to coexist in the same house peacefully. Any help would be wonderful, I'm getting tired of the constant stress so I can't imagine how the kitties feel. Thank you!

A couple things you can try that will definately help;

1) Feliway Plug-in, from PetSmart or PetCo or similar pet store. Works really well for this type of thing and any problems your cats may have.

2) Pure Vanilla Extract- put on all the cats necks and base of tail. Helps all cats to smell the same. Only use PURE vanilla extract.

How are they set up in the house? Are there cat condos and cat ramps? Levels where they can get off the floor and up on different heights? How many litter pans? Do they share toys? Food bowls? They shouldn't share anything, and they need to have places where they can just go. Mulit-cat households are tough (I have 14 cats that live in the house as well as in the enclosure that is connected to the house. There are occassionally territorial disputes but they are mild. Sometimes, where there is hissing and swatting, the cat getting hissed at is ill in some fashion. Even a parasitic infection can offset the normal scent of another cat.

We have a two story house and the cats are allowed access to every room. We have a cat condo with four levels on it. The female is always on top and she doesn't mind if the older male cat is on the level below her at all, but if the youngest male is on the structure (even the floor of it) she will start with the growling. The cats are given seperate food dishes when they have their wet food, but share a dry food bowl for snacks during the day (rarely are they at the dry food bowl at the same time). We have two litter boxes, one upstairs and one downstairs. We have a basket of cat toys and each cat likes a different type of toy. Help!