When it comes to the aggressive behavior of cats the root cause of the problem should be isolated first. You can’t stop or work on the issue unless you find out what started it.
It can be brought on by many different problems. When you’re experiencing bad behavior in your own cat, the first thing to do is to take them for a Veterinarian visit and ask for a full comprehensive checkup.
Especially if it’s a year or more since your last vet appointment. Aggression can sometimes be attributed to medical conditions. If they don’t feel good or have an ailment that causes pain such as arthritis, a nerve condition or other pain related problems this can lead to defensive aggression. They might even lash out at the hand that feeds them.
Diagnosing Cat Behavior Problems
In the best case scenario everything checks out medically so we know it’s not a reaction to a physical problem. So now we can move on and try to find out the root cause of the aggressiveness. With physical eliminated we are now talking about something inside the felines head. Yes a mental issue.
A quick story about our family pet Riley a 25 pound domestic tabby that over thinks everything. It takes her 30 minutes to decide what water bowl to drink from. She always carefully weighs all her options before making any decisions. When we moved into our new house we knew Reilly was upset.
She would run around and look out all of the windows in a frantic manner and this is just not her style. You could see by the look on her face that she was upset with her new environment. Riley had moved many times before and we never had a problem. When we approached her in an effort to calm her down, she would turn and swat at us or hiss.
I backed off and decided to study what she was looking at. I would gently get behind her and look over the top of her head to look where she was looking. Our new development had a lot of outside cats that would roam the street and this was what she was focusing on.
For the first time our little girl was looking at other cats outside. This coupled with her new environment caused the aggressive behavior. What we did to defuse the situation was close all the blinds and window shades, and even taped them securely shut.
This stopped her from looking outside and allowed her to get comfortable with the inside of the new home. Hitting her with two new environments inside and out at the same time was overwhelming. After about a month we released one shade and let her look out one window.
Solving the Aggressive Behavior of Cats
Looking out this one window she would only catch a glimpse of a neighborhood cat once in a while. This allowed for a slower less stressed acclimation period that allowed her to absorb the new surroundings, plus familiarize herself with other animals just outside of her territory.
Now Riley only had to worry about one window instead of eight. She still gets upset once in a while and when she does we back off and give her the space that she requires.
When studying a felines aggression you have to put yourself in their shoes or in this case cute furry paws, and try to think like a cat. See what they see as they would see it. When you identify the root cause of the aggressive behavior work to improve or isolate your cat from this problem.
For the good of everyone involved you would be best served to address the aggressive behavior of cats in a timely fashion. The longer you let this poor behavior go the harder the condition will be to correct.
Felines are creatures of habit. They like to do the same things day after day at the same time of day even. They like the predictability and stability of a permanent schedule. Once something is included in the routine it can be difficult to remove it. substitution is a good strategy to use when breaking habits.
When they start to do something undesirable you distract them with substituting something else. This could be the cat treat game where you put snacks in a rolling ball or opening a door that was closed to allow a new area to investigate. The good part is that once this condition is addressed and corrected the cat will most likely retain and learn from this lesson.
Got a scared cat? Some cats panic every time the smallest change occurs. Learn how to stop the and they’ll become less nervous in any situation. A guide presented by Paula Robb.
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