Cat Chat Feline Forum

Hi all,

TLDR: new kitten suddenly pounced on my face in the middle of the night after being very calm, leaving me with a cut eye.

So I’m no stranger to cats however it’s been 14 years since I’ve had a kitten at the age of 9 and so don’t remember everything but have done my fair share of research.

I adopted a kitten who was approximately 10 weeks old when he was taken away from his mother, this was about a week ago. So far he’s been happy and playful, not shy at all and hasn’t been hiding. Overall seems to have adapted really well to his new environment. However there’s 2 questions I’m hoping someone might be able to help me out with.

1. Since my last cat was mute I don’t have much intuition as to what a cats meowing means. In the middle of petting him, he sometimes lets out a single mew. Is this normal? Does this mean he’s distressed?

2. In the middle of the night I woke up to him on my bed being very calm, purring and brushing his head up against my hands to be stroked. However he very suddenly swapped into play mode and pounced straight at my face, this has left me with a rather nasty cut on my eye. I’ve since shut him out of the bedroom for nighttime so that this doesn’t happen again, however I don’t believe this is a long term solution.

Usually when playing he’s very good with not having his claws out when touching my skin but does have the tendency to try and pounce at my face. This is the only time I haven’t seen it coming and been able to divert his attention elsewhere. I know he’s only a kitten but I feel like this is the sort of thing you’d want to train a kitten not to do. Is there anything in particular I might be able to do to discourage this in the future?

Any help is greatly appreciated!
Thanks

He is still very young and learning, good on you for wanting to teach him and not seeing shutting him out of the bedroom as a long term solution. He will learn and calm down, and you're starting immediately not thinking oh but he's only a baby, teaching good manners starts the day they come home with us.

Very likely especially in the dark he saw a movement, maybe your eye blinking, and his brain went oo something moved I have to pounce! Also we are very big to them and a hand or head poking out from under the covers doesn't look like a whole human, more like a toy or at least something to test out to see if it is a toy. As for claws, they have to learn that humans aren't covered in protective fur so they have to be more careful of our bare skin than they would of their furry littermates. Do you snuggle him with your face at all? You might need to back off from doing that for a while so that faces are not something he gets too close to, but if he does try to pounce remove him, put him on the floor and walk away, playtime over, it will quickly become a boring game and he should quit.

It's been well over 30 years since I last had a kitten so I totally sympathise with forgetting how we handled things before or what's normal. I think I did a gentle but firm No and ended playtime, but don't be tempted to hold up a finger when saying no as this definitely looks like a fun game to them. Or a noise like a sharp Ah-ah seems to be a natural stop signal, it sounds a lot like a mother cat telling them to stop which is a very sharp Ack sound. Here is a reasonable example though as kittens get older there is less of the purring/trilling part and it gets very short and sharp https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTQVDzFItLs I once had the privilege of my cat out on a walk with me trying to teach me to hunt - roles reversed, she was the mamma and I was her kitten for a moment - but being only human of course the little bird spotted me and flew off, so Misha gave me a very sharp Ack! to tell me off.

Mewing - yes very very normal as cats naturally only mew as kittens, the adults in our lives only use a mew with us, never each other. You have stepped into your kitten's mother's shoes and he would have mewed sometimes when she washed him. You are copying her washing licking behaviour with your hand, and he is responding. Cats and humans develop an individual bond and individual communication. It's not so much what does a meow mean, more like the kitten working out what sounds and behaviours will get the response he wants from you. In time the pair of you will develop your own unique language that only you both understand. Relax, you're both figuring it out together. Some things will be obvious, like feed me or let me out. Other things are more subtle but he will learn how to get some quite abstract and complex ideas over to you - my Molly tells me when she wants me to fetch her a handful of grass from outside, for example.

Enjoy this magical time, I am so envious of you with your fluffy bundle right now!

I've got no advice, but it's hilarious to imagine this happening!