Need Help Deciding What To Do With The 3 Cats Living In My Home?

[atp0726]

I will try and keep this post as short as possible as it would be extremely easy to make it very long.
I have had 2 male kittens for a few months, they were on their way to being feral but I trapped them at around 9 wks. One has socialized amazingly well and is part of the family. The has bonded with me, he jumps into my lap, is very affectionate, lets me cut his nails but with anyone else he will hide and and on occasion hiss if approached. They have both been neutered and had their vaccines.

A few weeks ago I finally trapped the mother to be spayed. I was under the assumption she was probably feral and had made arrangement to bring her to a farm. After dropping her off for her spay appt I got a call saying what a sweet cat she was. They were absolutely right and she is now in my home doing well waiting to be adopted as in indoor cat.

My dilemma is my family really likes the super outgoing male and the mother. They haven't been able to bond with the other male for the reasons stated above. I dont want to split them up as they are buddies, however, I dont know if I will be able to convince my family to keep him. In a perfect world I would keep the outgoing male and his mother. I am guessing the mother and son will not remember each other and this point so I would have to introduce them as strangers (living on different floors dont have any contact currently)

Looking for suggestion what to do? Do I split up the brothers, keep them together and hope the reserved kitten comes out of his shell? Keep the mother and son, keep the mother and adopt out the brothers (I like this idea the least as I spend all day with kittens an I am attached at this point)?

All I ever hear when talking about splitting up the kittens is how much better they do together, that they are less destructive, better adjusted etc. Ideally, I would like to keep them together but do the advantages really outweigh some of the challenges I am having with the shy male?

 

[Darkwave]

Well... I say keep all three! (the basic rule being that the proper number of cats to have is N+1, where N=the number of cats you currently have.)

[I am half-joking - I'm guessing that doing so may not be an option for you.]

I would also be worried about the reserved kitten having more difficulty finding a happy home - it's always the affectionate outgoing ones that get snapped up first. I'll defer to the experts here as to whether he'll be missing out on important socialization if he's moved at this age.

How bonded are the two males?

A big question for me (perhaps the same one you're wrestling with) - would moving the shy male to a new home give him an opportunity to come out of his shell? Or just add stress?

 

[Mamanyt1953]

I'm inclined to give the shy boy a home with you and his brother and just be patient. He has shown that he is capable of bonding with a human, and just needs more time to transition from feral (and at the age you got them, they were feral) to housecat. He may never be the lovebug that his brother has become, but he can certainly become a happy, relaxed if somewhat aloof member of the family.

 

[atp0726]

Well... I say keep all three! (the basic rule being that the proper number of cats to have is N+1, where N=the number of cats you currently have.)

[I am half-joking - I'm guessing that doing so may not be an option for you.]

I would also be worried about the reserved kitten having more difficulty finding a happy home - it's always the affectionate outgoing ones that get snapped up first. I'll defer to the experts here as to whether he'll be missing out on important socialization if he's moved at this age.

How bonded are the two males?

A big question for me (perhaps the same one you're wrestling with) - would moving the shy male to a new home give him an opportunity to come out of his shell? Or just add stress?

haha, yes if it were up to me I would probably keep all three. I am the animal lover in the family for sure. At this point I should be happy that at least one has been agreed to.

I have relatives that have already said they will most likely take one of the cats whichever we decide. They have older kids and no other pets in the house currently. Right, now they are planning on taking the mother cat but have said they would take the shy kitten.

I would say they are as bonded as they get. Play all day together, sleep together. Rarely, can they be found apart.

 

[atp0726]

I'm inclined to give the shy boy a home with you and his brother and just be patient. He has shown that he is capable of bonding with a human, and just needs more time to transition from feral (and at the age you got them, they were feral) to housecat. He may never be the lovebug that his brother has become, but he can certainly become a happy, relaxed if somewhat aloof member of the family.

That is what i have been hoping. He hissed at my wife today which through me off, I thought we had made more progress. In the last few weeks we have opened the whole upstairs of the house to them and he is much different in the new space than in the "safe room"(guest bedroom they have been in since we got them). He will even run from me when I am walking around the newer space and in the safe room i can walk over and pick him up.So, I am wondering if things will be different when he gets more comfortable with the space.
I think i started to question keeping him more when I saw how sweet the mother is, how she craves attention wants to be pet constantly and doesnt run and hide at all. Both kittens get a lot of attention throughout the day because they live in my home office where I work, perhaps if they didnt get so much interaction they would be more like their mother. The mother on the other hand is currently in our basement (dog on the first floor) where there is limited contact and she was living on her own with no real human interaction for 4-6mths.

 

[Mamanyt1953]

Keep in mind that cats are as individual as people, and that your little anti-social boy might have had something happen to him and him alone during those feral weeks. Also, a hiss that isn't followed up by an attack is just saying, "You scared me!" But I think that he will slowly progress if you can just manage to be patient for a bit longer. He is beginning to trust your home, and it worries me that moving him to a new home at this point might set him all the way back again. I know, I DO know, how frustrating this can be. I have just spent the better part of 5 months getting a kitten to allow me to even touch him.