Sisters fighting

[ChayP1]

Hi there. Can someone help me or offer me some advise? My wife and I bought 2 sister kittens (Boo and Suki) about a year and a half ago. Because of the location that we lived in at the time being right on a main road the kittens were only kept indoors. Now the kittens are cats and we've since move to a little cottage down a very quiet private country road. I've installed a cat flap and the cats can now go in and out as they please. However now we have a problem. They've been going out for around a month now. They were always so close as sisters. Playing with each other, cuddling and eating together and getting on so well, but since they've been going out things have changed. Boo keeps growling and hissing at Suki. She won't go anywhere near her and if she does she attacks Suki. In the evening when we shut the cat flap so their in the house Boo will stay in one room and Suki will Stay in another. They've stopped eating together and interacting together in anyway. Boo has even been different with us too. She seems constantly scared of everything. Suki has never attacked Boo and by the looks of things trys to keep herself to herself. She hasn't changed. I have asked my wife to keep them indoors today with the idea that we'll keep them in the house for a while to see if this helps. Has anyone else had this problem? Can anyone help please. I don't want them to hurt eachother and would like them to just get along like they used to. Thank you.
ChayP1

[OHWS]

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[Crewella]

Same as OHWS, no real idea here either! Yes, it would be worth knowing how long you kept them in at the new place, and I'm wondering if it's possible that they've met another cat in the garden and this could be transferred aggression caused by confrontations with another cat or cats? I agree that it might be worth keeping them in again for a while to see if things calm down again, and below is a link to the Cat Chat advice page that includes transferred aggression in case anything on there helps. Good luck.

http://www.catchat.org/cat_aggression.html

[ChayP1]

Hi ya. Thank you for the link and your thoughts. Suki and Boo where kept indoors while we worked on the property for around 8 months before we let them out. There's a lot of cats down our road and they've all been there for quite sometime and I would say that they've claimed my garden as their territory. I do tend to try and chase them off if I see them in my garden to give Suki and Boo a chance to claim our land as their's. My wife did say that she saw Boo being bullied by the cat next door the other day.

[lilynmitz]

I suspect this is referred aggression - Boo probably got beaten up outside and is taking out her stress on Suki. I'd keep them in for a good while and give them a chance to get used to each other in a familiar environment again. Give both of them individually lots of reassurance, specially Boo who sounds very upset, and try gradually reintroducing them again. This link might offer some useful tips.

http://www.catchat.org/hierarchies.html

Get some feliway in as well, that might help. Keep the house calm for them, spend time with each of them individually, and I think you'll find they'll eventually come round again. Then you need to decide how to handle the outdoors situation. If you can cat-proof your garden, or create a pen for them, so that they can enjoy being outside without competing with the rest of the feline population, that might be a good compromise.