Dominance behaviour and indiscriminate plopping!

[Essie]

I have two shy cats, got them as feral kittens, they're now friendly and sociable with me. The big red male is usually fine with people. The little black female is still very nervous and seldom socialises with anyone but me. They're about ten years old and siblings.

My big grandson, who lives with me, then got two cats from the shelter: a big black furball who is lovely, and a skimpy furry lunatic. This latest cat, informally known as The Rasher because of his long skinny flat shape, is just over a year old now.

All four of the cats lived with us at my old flat. My two cats lived downstairs with me, with their own litter trays, food bowls etc, and the other two lived upstairs with the grandson and his en-suite litter box. Apart from them bullying my little cat into staying under the bed, (where she seemed quite content), there were no problems with the pecking order. Big Red Cat (mine) was clearly the boss. Then came Black Furball (grandson's) who had priority by being there first, then The Rasher and then my Little Girl

A few months ago we moved to a new flat.
Grandson has downstairs with ensuite facilities as before. I have upstairs with cat litter tray outside my bedroom door. All the cats are fed in their own specific areas.
All was fine for a few weeks. All cats were littering properly, and for once in their lives, they now had safe outdoor access which The Rasher made good use of although none of the others use the garden as a latrine.

Then the Rasher took to coming upstairs whenever he heard me changing the litter in my cats' tray, and he would go straight in and plop in it first! That wasn't so bad. It didn't put my cats off using their tray.

He then decided he liked my room. He wanted that room and he wanted to lie about on my bed all day being King of the World, even though he doesn't like me much. I didn't mind, as long as he stopped pouncing on my little cat - who tends to hang out in the wardrobe now.

Then he figured that plopping in the litter tray just wasn't enough to establish his Empire. He would deliberately plop outside the litter tray - just inches away from it in fact - right in front of my bedroom door. I put down that plastic stuff like giant Sellotape that the decorators use to protect carpet. Good job I did, I'd have no carpet otherwise.

Nothing we did made him stop. We locked him in grandson's room. That made no difference to him - he just ate and drank and plopped as any normal cat would do. And then went upstairs and plopped outside my bedroom as soon as he was allowed out.

We got Feliway spray and diffuser. The Rasher got calmer and plopped upstairs less frequently, but would still do it once a week.

Grandson took him to the vet, who confirmed it was dominance behaviour and recommended more Feliway diffusers for my room plus spray to remove the smell from where he'd been plopping.

By now there was such an amount of Feliway in the air that the other cats were lying about with their feet up, saying 'Eeezy now ...' and generally being off their heads.

All was fine for a couple of weeks.

This week The Rasher started plopping with a vengeance. Every single day he's done it, in the exact same spot, outside my bedroom. I water him with the plant sprayer if I catch him. My grandson has caught him hunching up for a good evacuation and shouted at him to stop. The Rasher had no intention of stopping and had to be physically removed - thankfully before the plopping started. But he's that defiant.

We let him out - we keep him in - we leave the doors and windows open so he can do whatever the Hell he likes. He is Bossing the lot of us. And still the infernal plopping goes on!

It's not fear or anxiety that's making him do this - he's a very confident, over-bearing animal who also lays claim to my computer chair and won't get off unless I physically remove him.

He just wants to have my room as his own and this is his way of laying claim to it.
Well I'm not living in the cardboard box in my grandson's room to accommodate him

All the cats were neutered as small beasts. No, he doesn't fight with any of them - he used to rough and tumble with the Big Red Chap when he was small but has given that up now. He very occasionally chases my Little Girl but she's stopped running away from him because of the Feliway and so he gets no fun out of chasing a static cat.
Does anyone have any clue what we else can do about this over-assertive lunatic of a beast before we come home to find he's changed the locks and taken over completely?

[Lilith]

Hi Essie and welcome - NOT a funny situation but love your post and the way you write - I thought I'd known some pretty quirky cats but The Rasher beats them all.

I once had a cat called The Leopard with a spraying problem (she was a neutered female.) And no, she never changed her spots (sorry!) When you're up against it every damn day, the fouling and cleaning and the smell, it's soul destroying. There's an advice page on here -

http://www.catchat.org/index.php/cat-to ... ay-indoors

There's also a page on hierarchies which I can't find but others will know and hopefully post.

My first instinct would be to shut him out of your bedroom entirely - that's YOUR room, not his. I'd even go so far as to be unfriendly - hissing and lifting him out - if you found him in there and in general behaving like territorial boss cat. Then tell him what a good boy he is when he finds himself outside the door. But of course Little Girl's in there (is he competing with her for the room?) although perhaps if there was room for another tray for her she wouldn't mind a closed door?...I realise this sort of thing can get out of hand though. And not knowing the layout of your flat, I've no idea how feasible this could be. He will, of course, go on doing it outside the door if you shut him out...he sounds a tough customer.

Ooops edit - I'd got the notion he was doing it IN your room as well!

But I'd still ban him your room and make it plain you don't want him near the door. If he sees you, as dominant boss cat, warning him off the territory, it might still start to make him change his ideas. Tinfoil is good as well - they hate standing on tinfoil.

A few weeks back I fitted a new bathroom carpet and my youngest cat started to wet and mess on it, despite a tray being provided. So I kept the door closed and - touch wood - she's stopped, even though she's got access to the bathroom again. Paws crossed! I've had episodes like this with her in the past, even though, like The Rasher, she thinks of herself as Dominant Cat, and I probably will have trouble again. That is just how she is. When I do trays, even if it's not her contribution, or see her using a tray, I tell her what a good girl she is, and always try to give her lots of love, talk to her...one of her nicknames is Gangsta Moll, but underneath she's pretty insecure and I wonder if this could be the case with The Rasher?

I'm sorry there are no easy answers in a case like this but there will be plenty of other members to advise you, and more knowledgeable too. So I hope we manage to help, all the very best and good luck with a truly horrible situation x

[Lilith]

Sorry - I got it wrong, thought he was using your room as well (have edited) but I would still be fierce about YOUR territory and then be nice to him when he doesn't come near it. Good luck and all paws here crossed!

[Ruth B]

It horrendous when you have to constantly be cleaning up after them and constantly on watch for them doing something they shouldn't. I had a similar problem several years ago. We had two cats, a mother and daughter pair and the mother became diabetic. At that time insulin treatment for diabetic cats was more complicated than it is now and after consulting with the vets we decided to just let her go on as long as she had left untreated. As her daughter was young I decided to get another young cat as a playmate in hope she would let her mother have some peace.

Things quickly went wrong. They were never aggressive to each other, but the dominance struggle was real. The new cat started spraying and plopping everywhere and then the mother cat started as well trying to show her who was top cat. Finally the daughter started. The house stank of Feliway, cleaning fluids and cat urine. Three months after getting her I was close to breaking down and the decission was made, I contacted the charity she came from and they came to collect her. I heard afterwards that they had kept her alone for a week and she had never failed to use the litter tray then rehomed her again as an only pet.

For years I thought I had failed her, then I got hold of some cat behaviour books and suddenly realised that I had done the best thing possible for her. i know this tale isn't what you want to hear, but if the problem does spead and all the other cats are becoming stressed then it might be something you have to think about.

It does sound like he is trying to excise his dominance and marking territory is one of the main ways. You might also want to ask if your vet has a behavior expert they can recommend as they might be able to give proffesional advise as well.

One last one to mention, and this may sound so simple to be daft. Have you tried changing his cat litter. We are all assuming the worst, but it could just be that he has taken a dislike to his litter, maybe if it is the wood based pellet type, the size of the pellets can hurt their paws, so he is looking elsewhere to go.

I really hope you manage to find a solution, before the situation becomes too bad to bear.

[Essie]

Sorry - I got it wrong, thought he was using your room as well (have edited) but I would still be fierce about YOUR territory and then be nice to him when he doesn't come near it. Good luck and all paws here crossed!

You sound like a Fellow Traveller down the Plop-littered Hall Carpet of Life, Lilith and I shall take your advice to heart. From now on I am Fluffy G, the ferocious hissing Granny cat. And the tinfoil's coming out...

[Essie]

Thank you Ruth B. The cat litter question is something I raised with my grandson as he gets the wood pellets for his trays whereas I get clay and those green crystal things. The Rasher has no problems at all with the pellets. He's just doing it in my cats' tray because he can.
I tried bringing the tray into my bedroom - he plopped on the bedroom floor instead of the landing.

Grandson and his girlfriend used to bring the two younger cats out walking on leads. The fluffy one was fine - walked over to her house and made himself at home with their menagerie of cat dog rabbit and lizard. The Rasher turned up for the first time and immediately plopped on the couch. And beat the poor dog about the head.

This is the Ghengis Khan of north London - nothing short of complete world domination will suit him.

If he doesn't respond to my Top Cat hissing routine we may have to think about where to go next.

[Lilith]

Sorry - I got it wrong, thought he was using your room as well (have edited) but I would still be fierce about YOUR territory and then be nice to him when he doesn't come near it. Good luck and all paws here crossed!

You sound like a Fellow Traveller down the Plop-littered Hall Carpet of Life, Lilith and I shall take your advice to heart. From now on I am Fluffy G, the ferocious hissing Granny cat. And the tinfoil's coming out...

LOL

I confess I tried lining my bath with tinfoil after Molly insisted on going in there and she just scraped it aside and...went This from a cat who had the vapours about setting a paw on my new duck-feather duvet because it was crunchy...still, if tinfoil doesn't deter The Rasher, you have an instant airtight wrap for the misdemeanour!

The bath crime got cured by a replacement shower cubicle. A shower cubicle has doors... She hasn't yet sussed out how to climb over them. Yet.

Yes, I think The Rasher can stand a Ferocious Granny Cat approach by the sound of him. If I'm fierce with Molly the little devil turns on the charm and comes and purrs...they know, you know! I've had cats who I wouldn't dream of scolding, and other cats who have known damn well that they're pushing their luck, and who have responded to a bit of toughness, bless them...well, for five minutes or so lol. Good luck!

[Crewella]

I've not had the soiling issues, but I have had a dominant cat that I've had to exert my dominance over, though in a slightly different way. Only one in a long list of cats that I wouldn't dream of even shouting at, but this one was a ****. After a year of pussyfooting round him playing nice, and getting bitten and scratched if I tried to pill him or do a spot on, I started hissing at him and then scruffed him to prove my point - we had a couple of days of struggle and then he backed down and took it like a lamb. He's curled up on my lap purring his head off as I type, and whilst he's still a touchy, grumpy little git a lot of the time (and he still swipes me if I open the door to let him out and it's raining!) he's never gone back to the levels of aggression I saw in that first year. He seems happier in himself and more settled, and I've often wondered if he was relieved to find that he didn't have to be the scariest, meanest thing in the house and was glad to have found his 'place'.

It's really, really unusual to need to go to those lengths, and you need to back it up with lots of praise and fuss when they do the right thing, and it also needs to be very controlled and well timed - you want respect and not fear from them. Get it wrong and you can easily end up making the problem worse, so do make sure to to up the fuss and praise when he's good as well as the toughness.