Hello everyone,
I've been obsessively reading posts going back years on introducing cats, and have read the many guides on the ultimate introductions, introducing cats to cats, kittens to cats, dealing with unsuccessful introductions, non-recognition & redirected aggression. I've also read up about the differences between play fighting and actual fighting, and what to do in the latter situation.
That being said, I've got some videos from trying to introduce my 7 year old resident cat, Nizu, to a new rescue cat Naayu, with unknown history; and I'd really appreciate any thoughts on next steps. This post is very long, sorry!
To give a some background, Nizu just turned 7. He's a Russian Blue, and I brought him over to our home when he was 13 weeks old and the rest is history. He's our first pet and besides being quite jumpy at sounds and not liking strangers and running away, he's the absolute baby of the house and loves his human slaves.
He's not really been with other cats except his breeders cats and kittens when he was young, and for a two week stint back at hers when my family had to travel away for an emergency.
He doesn't normally like change and gets stressed with random things like people going on holiday. He tends to withdraw to one of the many rooms in the house, and his eating reduces a bit but that's it. He's not really vocal except when he's talking to us e.g. he got locked in our bathroom a few times and just doesn't make any sounds.
We have tried to put him on different calming supplements like YuCalm and Zylkene to varying degrees. He's okay and we've kind of accepted that he will always be jumpy but he's certainly not as anxious as my cousins cat who is actually on gabapentin (Nizu has only had it for a long car journey / staycation).
Then you have Naayu, a new rescue cat that came into our lives a month ago. She was hanging around in our neighbourhood for around a week and was fed by different neighbours before some kids took her in, before leaving her out two days later. She's been hiding underneath our car apparently and one weekend when we were coming home from the shopping, I saw her and made kissing sounds towards her and she ran to me and jumped into my porch. I petted her a bit and tried to put her back but she kept crying / meowing at me and jumping back into the porch so I ended up taking her in.
She looked like a Persian mix and was very heavily matted but also super friendly and social, so I thought she must have gotten lost. We took her in and fed her some food before putting her in Nizu's carrier (thankfully he was sleeping upstairs). We took her to the vets but unfortunately she wasn't chipped so we ended up bringing her back that evening at least for the day / weekend while we figured out where she came from.
We rang around and posted on Lost & Found groups in our area, and spoke to some neighbours. No one seemed to be missing a cat. In the meantime, I took her to a local rescue lady to get checked for a microchip again, and to get some flea treatment, and we ended up leaving her there that evening as we thought that would be best - for the rescue lady to get her checked at the vets to see if she was spayed, and to get rid of the severe mats that had been pulling at her skin and getting ripped in some parts
Well, I couldn't stop crying since I left her as she was such a sweetheart and I ended up bonding with her in two days. The rescue also thought she was likely neglected and abandoned and that just broke my heart. So after the rescue couldn't find her a home, we officially adopted her and got her back 30 March and she's been here since.
She's a super loveable, confident and assertive cat. I set up her in a spare room in the annex but she's been crying to be let out since day one and has been roaming around the house like she owns the place (while Nizu has been locked away in whichever too on hes been sleeping in).
I've been following different steps for the introduction so I'd really appreciate any thoughts on what I should do next. I'll use the next post to set out what I've done so far and how they've reacted to each other.
I've been obsessively reading posts going back years on introducing cats, and have read the many guides on the ultimate introductions, introducing cats to cats, kittens to cats, dealing with unsuccessful introductions, non-recognition & redirected aggression. I've also read up about the differences between play fighting and actual fighting, and what to do in the latter situation.
That being said, I've got some videos from trying to introduce my 7 year old resident cat, Nizu, to a new rescue cat Naayu, with unknown history; and I'd really appreciate any thoughts on next steps. This post is very long, sorry!
To give a some background, Nizu just turned 7. He's a Russian Blue, and I brought him over to our home when he was 13 weeks old and the rest is history. He's our first pet and besides being quite jumpy at sounds and not liking strangers and running away, he's the absolute baby of the house and loves his human slaves.
He's not really been with other cats except his breeders cats and kittens when he was young, and for a two week stint back at hers when my family had to travel away for an emergency.
He doesn't normally like change and gets stressed with random things like people going on holiday. He tends to withdraw to one of the many rooms in the house, and his eating reduces a bit but that's it. He's not really vocal except when he's talking to us e.g. he got locked in our bathroom a few times and just doesn't make any sounds.
We have tried to put him on different calming supplements like YuCalm and Zylkene to varying degrees. He's okay and we've kind of accepted that he will always be jumpy but he's certainly not as anxious as my cousins cat who is actually on gabapentin (Nizu has only had it for a long car journey / staycation).
Then you have Naayu, a new rescue cat that came into our lives a month ago. She was hanging around in our neighbourhood for around a week and was fed by different neighbours before some kids took her in, before leaving her out two days later. She's been hiding underneath our car apparently and one weekend when we were coming home from the shopping, I saw her and made kissing sounds towards her and she ran to me and jumped into my porch. I petted her a bit and tried to put her back but she kept crying / meowing at me and jumping back into the porch so I ended up taking her in.
She looked like a Persian mix and was very heavily matted but also super friendly and social, so I thought she must have gotten lost. We took her in and fed her some food before putting her in Nizu's carrier (thankfully he was sleeping upstairs). We took her to the vets but unfortunately she wasn't chipped so we ended up bringing her back that evening at least for the day / weekend while we figured out where she came from.
We rang around and posted on Lost & Found groups in our area, and spoke to some neighbours. No one seemed to be missing a cat. In the meantime, I took her to a local rescue lady to get checked for a microchip again, and to get some flea treatment, and we ended up leaving her there that evening as we thought that would be best - for the rescue lady to get her checked at the vets to see if she was spayed, and to get rid of the severe mats that had been pulling at her skin and getting ripped in some parts
Well, I couldn't stop crying since I left her as she was such a sweetheart and I ended up bonding with her in two days. The rescue also thought she was likely neglected and abandoned and that just broke my heart. So after the rescue couldn't find her a home, we officially adopted her and got her back 30 March and she's been here since.
She's a super loveable, confident and assertive cat. I set up her in a spare room in the annex but she's been crying to be let out since day one and has been roaming around the house like she owns the place (while Nizu has been locked away in whichever too on hes been sleeping in).
I've been following different steps for the introduction so I'd really appreciate any thoughts on what I should do next. I'll use the next post to set out what I've done so far and how they've reacted to each other.