HELP 9/10 month old male rescue cat 'attacking' daughter

[Graham]

Hi.

We could really do with some urgent advice.

4 weeks ago we got a rescue cat, he was a stray. He's very friendly and has a very confident and likes people, he has an outgoing nature however since we've had him he's shown tendencies to pounce on us when excited. At first it was fine, he's young and we thought that once he's going outside he'd calm down. He has his second jabs this Friday so he hasn't been able to go out yet but he's getting out of control, he does it to all of us but he's especially keen on pouncing on our 4 year old daughter.

It's getting to the stage where he's actively pursuing her. I've been defending him to my wife who's really not impressed but it's getting indefensible now. Earlier today our daughter was in the kitchen on the floor minding her own business and we both saw the cat, in NO state of playful excitement, walk over to her, climbe on her back and bite her bear shoulder. He doesn't do it hard and he rarely leaves any mark on her at all so it's not aggression. It's now at the stage where it's any time she gets up to move around or turns her back on him.

It's almost as if he's learnt that she's scared of him and plays on it. She's loosing confidence in him now and screams as soon as she spots him staring at her. She does love him to pieces and we've talked about re homing him but she gets upset at the idea so all is not lost yet.

The bottom line is that we will not have her scared in her own home so we need to try an nip this in the bud now.

We've tried wearing him out by playing with him but it's almost impossible to tire him. We are going to get him some more new toys tomorrow as he's trashed what his favourites. I did try the water spraying trick on him but he seemed to become scared of us after only a couple of times and didn't want him to feel frightened of us so stopped it. Maybe we should have carried on with it however it is hard to have it to hand and be following them both around all the time.

Any ideas are gratefully received.

Thanks.

[Grace56]

The thing you must remember when spraying water at the cat to stop bad habits is....don't let him see it's you doing it. He must associate the sudden jet of water with what he's doing, not with you.
Because, as you've seen, he is now scared of, and associates it with you.
As to his attacks on your daughter, I think he senses that she is young and wants to play as he would with other young cats. A bit rough admittedly, but not with the intention of hurting her.

Make sure he has plenty of toys where ever your daughter is, and let her throw a ball or some screwed up paper for him when he's around her. Trail some string for him or play with a 'fishing rod' toy. It could turn into a good game for both of them.

I hope that's given you some ideas, Graham. I think some of our other cat lovers will be along to offer more advice.

Good luck and best wishes,
Grace.

[Crewella]

If you're going to try and teach him some manners, you must remember to be entirely consistent or you just confuse things. The best way to stop undesirable behaviour is to withdraw attention and ignore him the moment he starts to play too rough - push him off or away, say NO firmly and walk away, ignoring him completely. And it has to be the precise moment he's being naughty - no point in telling him off afterwards as he won't remember what it was he was doing. Every time. Then equally reward good, desirable behaviour with lots of fuss. Good luck!