Introducing a new kitten. I think we messed up bad.

[ebod]

Hi

We have a 10 years old cat (Sombra) and adopted a 9 weeks kitten (Kai) from a local shelter about 2 weeks ago.

Sombra has been really stressed throughout all the introduction and we always waited for her to calm down a bit to go into the next step. We placed Kai into our room with his bowls,  litterbox, bed,  toys and everything he'd need and fed them on both sides of the door. Sombra didn't like that and stopped eating or tried eating whenever she felt Kai wasn't near, so we changed our strategy and moved her main bowl back to where it was with some dry food there and started giving her treats and some wet food near the door. It took a couple of days but  that worked and she started prefering hanging around the door than going back to her bowl and had no problem accepting treats. When it was meal time she actually went to the door's bowl instead of hers and didn't mind if Kai was at the other side.
During all this time Sombra never hissed or growled at Kai, not even when she didn't want to eat there.

Around a week later we changed both cat's blankets. She didn't have any problem with that either and was sleeping on it as soon as we gave it to her. She even sleeps there with her belly up. Seeing this we start letting them see each other while eating. Again, no hisses or growls from any of them. Sombra didn't want to get very close but she's reasonably close (like 50cm) so all seems good.

Seeing this we let Kai roam around the house for a bit and he loved it. Now he tries to escape his room everytime we open the door and he's FAST. He managed to escape a couple of times but Sombra didn't really seem to care untill he went into her room. Then she hissed at him and hid under the bed. Before this escape we had also let Sombra go into our room once (without Kai inside), and all she did was sniff around, hid under our bed for a while and leave.

Now, since they seemed like they were fine seeing each other during mealtimes we decided to try supervised interaction and all hell broke loose. Kai tries to approach Sombra ALL THE TIME and she hisses and growls at him whenever he gets close, and she gets so stressed that she refuses to play or eat anything. Kai will back out and will try again when she seems more relaxed, starting the cycle again. During all this Sombra won't  take a single treat and will ignore every attempt to play with her. He follows her everywhere, he even tried to enter a box she was in and even tried to follow her to her litterbox. Still, they wouldn't fight, just hisses and growls from her.

A couple of days back she plainly refused to eat for 8 hours and spent all the day on the same spot not reacting to anything; we were really worried but as soon as we went to bed she went to eat and the next day she was back to normal. Then that day Kai tried to play with her while she was seating on the couch and was met again with more hisses and growls, he insisted and she got really scared and hissed while she threw her paw at him. She didn't use her nails and didn't harm him, basically she slapped him. After that she was even more nervous around him.

Seeing that, we cut again to shared mealtimes and letting Kai roam around for a bit when she's in her room so he leaves his smell in the living room. Now she started accepting some wet food IF she sees Kai is eating too or we're holding him (he tries to eat her food and the hisses/ growls start again and she refuses to eat and leaves) but she won't even finish it. Kai after that slap changed his ways and does not try to approach her as much, but she still gets very nervous.

Maybe we hurried it but it seemed it was going fine. Now we don't really know how to continue from here. She doesn't mind sleeping on the same spot Kai has been sleeping or playing before, but as soon as she sees him "free" near her she hisses and growls, and remains nervous for a while after Kai went to his room. Right now I went to leave Kai some dry food and cuddled him a bit, and went to cuddle her and she hissed at me. It's the first time she does this and I'm afraid she'll never get used to him.

We placed a Feliway Friends diffuser on the living room 4 days ago but it doesn't really seem to effect them and ordered a cat tree so she can escape from him to a place where he can't reach her (it should arrive in a couple of days). We also make a point to give Sombra attention and playtime so she doesn't feel left out and keep all the routines we had with her, but she will only play if it's been hours without any contact with Kai

 

[benny13]

I just adopted a 10 week old neutered male kitten from our local shelter. I have a 2 year old female German Shepherd dog at home and everyone told me I was crazy to bring home such a young cat. Anyway, I brought the kitten home in his carrier...let the dog sniff safely and watched her every move for a good while. I didn't force anything, but did give my dog a lot of praise and attention. It took over 2 hours before the little guy even tried to come out of the carrier (which was on our couch right beside me). I took a few days off work in order to supervise. During this time, the kitten stayed off the floor (except to use his litter box). His bowls were put on an end table beside my couch so everything was in easy reach for him. As the days passed and he got a little bigger...he also got braver. It's been over 2 weeks now and they are the best of buds...our dog seems to think the kitten is her baby and playmate. They clean each other.....eat side by side and sleep at the same time. He (the kitten) follows her everwhere...except outside...he stays inside. I guess what I'm trying to say is try not to interfere too much...don't change your regular routine because it causes confusion for the pets already in the home and let them figure it out on thier own....it will take time...how much time is anyone's guess. Some animals are more accepting then others. Don't worry....they wil get used to each other. Goog luck to you and your furbabies. :-)

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[ebod]

Thank you for answering.

I really hope they'll get along. Today Sombra woke up asking for her morning bath (she loves watching my SO take a shower and pet her with his hands still wet for some reason xD) and for a play session. We changed the blankets again yesterday (it's been a week since the last change) and she's been sleeping on Kai's blanket with her belly upside untill now. Now she just brought me her toy to play with me for a little while and went back to nap after we finished.

I really can't figure out what's going through her mind, because she really doesn't mind that stuff around the house smells like Kai. She doesn't even mind that much seeing him eating or on our lap. It's like she has control issues and freaks out whenever she can't predict what he's going to do on his own and she copes with that trying to scare him into leaving her alone, because she doesn't even want to hurt him.

I don't know, maybe we're doing it worse and only reinforce her that she can only relax when he's not free to do whatever he wants? I can't figure out how to proceed from here :/

 

[bonepicker]

Unfortunately I can not commingle my cats she hates him and he attacks her, he is 3 Times her size. I gave up trying. I rotate them to keep the peace, is she is 8 and he is 6. He comes out of his room when she goes into garage. He hurt her too many times so I conceded. She came first, so I honor her wishes. They both loved my dogs but NOT each other! If they were equally matched I might have kept trying, but he is a behemoth! Good luck with your two, mine were both former ferals.

 

[NewYork1303]

Feliway diffusers take a while before they actually start working well, I think the packaging says one week. This may just be a mismatch in ages. An older cat hardly ever warms up to a new kitten addition (we see so many older cats at our shelter because of this). Kittens are high strung, energetic, and just bug older cats overall. If you keep at it with introductions, they could get to a point where they are tolerant of one another. Make sure that you spend a lot of time playing with the kitten to get his energy out. If he is more calm and sleepy when the older cat meets him, she is more likely to warm up to him. 

 

[ebod]

 
Feliway diffusers take a while before they actually start working well, I think the packaging says one week. This may just be a mismatch in ages. An older cat hardly ever warms up to a new kitten addition (we see so many older cats at our shelter because of this). Kittens are high strung, energetic, and just bug older cats overall. If you keep at it with introductions, they could get to a point where they are tolerant of one another. Make sure that you spend a lot of time playing with the kitten to get his energy out. If he is more calm and sleepy when the older cat meets him, she is more likely to warm up to him. 

Thank you so much!

Yes we're seeing that now. Sombra has her fair share of issues due to her upbringing and thus we thought she'd be better with a kitten because she would'nt see him as a threat. Oh how wrong we were.

We've started to give him treats when Sombra is near and he's calm and doesn't try to hunt her. That (alongside that slap she gave him) actually seems to work and he's a lot calmer when she's around. Just now he went near her when she was on her blanket and just sit there outside the blanket, she just ignored him and happily ate her treats  We took him to the living room and she came a couple of minutes later and both ate a bit of wet food (Kai on my lap) while seeing each other. She finished her bit and even came near the couch where we were with Kai on our laps and then left with her tail pointed up to sniff around Kai's room. She just got back, looked outside the window near us, left (again with her tail up) and we called it a day and put Kai again in his room.

No hisses or growls at all, so that was wonderful! She still didn't want to take treats when she was near the couch but I think it went pretty well.

 

[NewYork1303]

 
Thank you so much!

Yes we're seeing that now. Sombra has her fair share of issues due to her upbringing and thus we thought she'd be better with a kitten because she would'nt see him as a threat. Oh how wrong we were.

We've started to give him treats when Sombra is near and he's calm and doesn't try to hunt her. That (alongside that slap she gave him) actually seems to work and he's a lot calmer when she's around. Just now he went near her when she was on her blanket and just sit there outside the blanket, she just ignored him and happily ate her treats  We took him to the living room and she came a couple of minutes later and both ate a bit of wet food (Kai on my lap) while seeing each other. She finished her bit and even came near the couch where we were with Kai on our laps and then left with her tail pointed up to sniff around Kai's room. She just got back, looked outside the window near us, left (again with her tail up) and we called it a day and put Kai again in his room.

No hisses or growls at all, so that was wonderful! She still didn't want to take treats when she was near the couch but I think it went pretty well.

Sounds good to me! Hopefully, it continues to go well.

 

[tobilei]

I'm glad to hear there's been a change. Mine have been together for a year and there's still bad days and good one's. My male is rather territorial and sometimes Tilly being somewhere he considers exclusively his area will cause an issue for a day or two. I have a feliway difuser going in one room and on the bad days I will often rotate them being in that room to give them some relaxing time out. I occasionally strap a sentry calming collar on my boy if he's really bad. For the most part this works. Just keep persisting. It seems to be going okay so far Being younger there will be times he annoys her and she may react with a hiss, a growl or a bit of a swipe. Unless there's all out brawling they'll work it out between themselves in time as well.

 

[ebod]

Thank you!

Yesterday night they met again and it was awful. He wouldn't stop chasing her around and it ended with Sombra slapping him again.

However, today they were both free to roam around the house (supervised of course) for a while. At the morning she hid in the bathtub and hissed a couple of times at him from there, but overall just kept watching him. Now she was sleeping at her room (on the bed) while Kai was with us at the living room and he decided to pay her a visit. She opened an eye to watch him but remained lying on her side, he got under the bed, lied there for a couple of minutes and she went back to sleep. For a couple of minutes both were resting less than 50cm from each other, no growls or hisses.  Tomorrow the cat tree we ordered should arrive and I hope something like this happens again.

But, and here's the big problem, she stopped eating again Yesterday she ate like 15g out of the 40g of dry food she has to eat everyday plus a little bit of wet food. She asked for a lot of cuddles this morning and went to eat but I had to pick some clothes from our room and Kai managed to escape as soon as I opened the door and went straight to Sombra's bowl before I could catch him. She hissed at him, he left, but she still hasn't eaten since then I hope she'll eat throughout the afternoon / evening.