As the title say I’m mostly a dog person, even if I enjoy the company of cats when I visit friends who have one or more.
A couple of months ago my wife and I found a homeless puppy on the road on a rainy night (a dog). We took care of him for a couple of weeks until we found a proper home where he can enjoy the company of other dogs.
What we learned from that is:
a) With our current schedule of: wake up at 6/6.30am , go to work, back home around 6pm the puppy was not very happy. He would go crazy (in a happy way) when I was finally home in the late afternoon, but the 11+ hours all by himself were not nice for a young puppy.
b) We’d really like to have a pet.
Even if I’d prefer a dog it looks like we’re not in a good situation to get one. Our apartment is pretty large but we don’t feel like leaving a puppy home alone for such a long period. I have many friends who have a long history with cats and they all tell me that a cat is fine to spend the whole day by himself sleeping, as long as we can spend time with him in the morning and after work.
Since I have 0 experience with cats, what would you guys suggest? I’d be happy to prepare a “cat walkway” around the house with shelves, luckily the apartment is very big and it would be easy to create walking paths and nap-areas using some shelves.
As for the house breaking: if I get a cat while my wife is not home (she’ll be away from Taiwan for 1 month and a half), would it be easy for the cat to “accept” her? I think it would be a nice surprise to get a cat, train him/her to behave well at home and then when my wife will come back she won’t have to worry too much.
Would it be better to get the cat before/after she leaves for her work trip, instead of during it?
We’d get a cat from our local shelter, so a young kitten is what we’re looking for. WOuld it be better to get a slightly older cat (1 year+), so that it may be more easy going and already socialized?
Better get two. They get company when you are not there and entertain themselves with others, socializing better.
Get cat after. All pets thrive on a stable routine, a schedule. They do not like changes -a new place is big change enough.
Cats need playtime. Their schedule is play-feed-clean themselves-nap-rinse/repeat. They need play interaction with you to bond with you. You also need brushing and moderate petting to bond with them.
Get all basics ready: bowls -ceramic, not plastic-, bed, brush, pet carrier -for cats, not dogs, yes, there is a difference, cats are handier at opening things-, hairball paste, liter and litterbox, dry and wet food, snacks on moderation. Get a vet you trust to lend a hand and have his/her contact for emergencies/routine checkups.
One last thing: since you are so busy, maybe a kitten would be not that advisable. please consider an adult/young adult cat. Yes, they are very playful -you’ll know at 2am.
If you’re talking about unwanted pet kittens that have had human contact from birth, you will have an easy ride.
But if you’re talking about picking up a feral kitten from the shelter, you are in for a tough time.
A feral kitten is basically a wild animal. Under 1 month old and it’ll probably bond with you if your take over the mother’s feeding role.But after about 2 months of age, it gets increasingly harder (takes longer) to socialize. A feral will spend the first few weeks hissing at you and hiding under the bed. You’re gonna need gauntlets just to touch it, and even then it could put a claw in your eye faster than you could blink.
The way to fast-forward the socialization process is to restrict the cat to an almost empty room for the first few weeks, or even better, put it in a big cage so you can spoon-feed and stay close to it. It might take weeks until the cat even lets you touch it, and maybe a lot longer until it’s comfortable with being picked up.
It’ll take a lot of time patience, and probably a bit of blood too.
[quote=“Icon”]Better get two. They get company when you are not there and entertain themselves with others, socializing better.
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That makes sense. So a couple of cats wouldn’t mind to stay home by themselves during the daytime? Any suggestion in the combination Male/Male, Female/Male, Female/Female? Or is it just random and depends on each cat’s character?
[quote=“Icon”]
One last thing: since you are so busy, maybe a kitten would be not that advisable. please consider an adult/young adult cat. Yes, they are very playful -you’ll know at 2am.[/quote]
Yeah, we noticed that a dog puppy can require a lot of attention, so I’d be happy to consider a young cat rather than a kitty,
Talking about “cat nights”: my wife and I usually sleep with the door of our room closed to avoid mosquitoes and enjoy the A/C. Do cats prefer to sleep by themselves or would they try to sneak in our room? Since they’re often active during the night, would a cat or a couple of cats be a pain in the a$$ if kept in our room when we go to sleep?
I have both combinations: one male and female -started with those- then two male siblings -who invited themselves in. Female rules over them all.
So I guess you could look for two that are already together. Both shelters and foster homes have these cases where they have two kitties that get along and it breaks their heart if they get adopted separately. So an existing pair is ideal, no matter gender or age.
As to the door:
There are these Japanese screen curtains that you can put on the door threshold to keep mosquitos at bay and kitty in and out. Kitties probably will go to sleep when you do, then get up in the middle of the night for “inspections”. And they want in and out. Plus access to kitty litter, water, etc.
BTW, water fountains are an awesome invention. Get the cheapest, the expensive ones are too complicated, a 600 to 800nt model is already plenty enough. The simpler, the better.
On having one cat versus two: we got our second cat in large part because the first was simply too happy when we came home - a little I suppose like the puppy that you took care of for a while, and we started to feel guilty about how bored and/or lonely she seemed to be. Now they keep each other entertained quite a bit, and the female no longer seems to have quite the "OH THANK GOD THE TIME OF MISERY IS OVER! reaction when we get home, which is a little sad but also somewhat reassuring.
Gender: our first was female, our second male. The male, despite lacking the necessary body parts, does seem to, um, well, torment the female more than he should. My wife wants us to only have female cats in future, but I’m really not sure how much gender matters as opposed to personality. I definitely agree that getting a pair that already know each other (litter mates?) would be better - when we got the second cat, there were all kinds of odd little quarantine procedures we followed to get them gradually used to each other.
On the cats in the bedroom: when we just had one cat, she was allowed in the bedroom. When the second arrived, that stopped - the second cat (a) sheds a lot, and more importantly (b) is absolutely awful at curling up in a quiet and sweet way. He’s lots of fun, but he’ll insist on sucking clothes or kneading on fabric. Some cats are suited for the bedroom, and some aren’t, but I’m not sure if there’s a way to judge ahead of time!
I would definitely encourage you to get an older cat. Kittens are a pain in the arse care-wise (I tend to think that about all baby animals though) and in my experience, kittens from the shelter often die (watched a couple of friends go through this- pretty heart-wrenching to get an animal home only to have it die within a week) if you get an adult cat, you’ll be able to get some idea about its temperament at the shelter. Look for a cat that comes to the front of the cage when you approach and seems to be relaxed/calm when you try to pet it.
Another option would be an older dog- there are so many great older dogs at the shelter that no one takes because they want puppies (again, why!?! cuteness aside, baby animals are so hard to care for!) A dog might be harder to house-train especially if it has been kept in cages either at its previous home or at the shelter (and expected to urinate and defecate in the cage- this is abuse in itself as it goes against the animals instincts). If going for a dog, might be better to find an abandoned one on the street, or one from a shelter that is a very recent addition. Better yet, get a dog from an individual who does rescue- those dogs have usually been socialized better and possibly house-trained.
On a more personal note, I went to the shelter looking for a kitten and walked out with my cat, who was 2-3 years old at the time. I took her home because she was by far the ugliest thing there and my thought was, “nobody can love this cat but me.” Ugliness aside, she was really sweet and friendly and cuddly and came straight to me when they opened the cage.
turns out she had a skin infection and they’d shaved her, including her head (that’s why she was looking pretty ugly) and this is her now:
(I still shave her body in the summer- whoever imported her to Taiwan was a bit cruel, with all that fluffy hair)
She has brought so much joy to my life, I really love her. Despite her age when I adopted her, she’s really bonded to me. She often runs to me meowing when I come home.
Oh, and while a water fountain is good for health, perhaps the greatest toy in a cat’s world is an empty box. Again and again we’ve foolishly bought toys we thought they’d like - and they do, for a while. But an iHerb or Amazon box provides days and days of fun. Or weeks, actually, if you’re prepared to deal with the little pieces of shredded box that will spread across your home.
I’ve had cats for forty years. Now I have only six cats. Four feral kittens and two pedigree Bengals that I got at three years of age. The ferals are so much more friendly, but that’s just a breed temperament of the Bengals. Mixed breeds and British or American short hairs tend to be the most cuddly cats.
Look for tabby mongrel short hairs for excellent cats for an apartment. A pair of two year old friends that are pre neutered and fully vetted up are a good bet, and should be easy to find in a shelter. Tabbies tend to be hardy and generally friendly. Pedigree breeds like Siamese or sphinx or scotch folds are harder to find and less friendly in general.
Expect to look after a two year old cat for the next fifteen years, although the last five years are very slow… Much more sleeping than running around. The last two years are particularly heartbreaking of course, with kidney failure and brain problems most damaging. Yes I’ve seen that too many times.
Well, the breed we’ll be looking for is probably going to be “whatever they have at the shelter” xD
I’ve seen quite a few pure breed animals at the local shelters, both cats and dogs, but my wife and I don’t really care. I mean, if we walk by a cage with a couple of random-breed cats who look friendly to each other and enjoy people’s company, we’re pretty much set.
We still have plenty of boxes at home, we filled a truck with cardboard when we moved to Yilan. A couple of boxes placed strategically in the spare room and some shelves where they can climb should be a pretty cool setup for a couple of cats.
We fed our puppy on a raw diet (+ some veggies here and there) and in no time he went from slightly skinny to well fed and healthy. What do cats eat? I have an uncles who lives in the middle of nowhere on the mountains in Italy and he almost never feeds his 4+ cats, they catch their own food.
What about apartment cats? Fish/meat/veggies? Or cat specific food? I have access to free fish so that will probably be a good chunk of their diet.
Fish is not good. Fish is not really naturally on their diet, they are more like small rodents and birds and such. Too much fish will accumulate bad stuff in their kidneys. Mostly poultry better then, no milk, no cheese -fat is bad for them. If you can get them into raw, awesome. I can give you some recipes. It is quite different from dog diet, as a matter of fact, dog food can harm cats.
I buy the most nutritious canned food I can find, the Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s brand. It is not the best for them, but they did not like raw. But then they won’t even catch lizards and use the occasional stray bird as toys -last one they didn’t even catch, BTW, I had to do it myself.
urodacus, Where did you get the bengals from in Taiwan? Ive been raising bengals for the last 6 years and currently have 3 male marble bengals. They are super friendly and awesome cats but have sensitive stomachs. I definitely recommend males if you get 2 cats since I have had about 10 cats in the last 20 years and the females have always been less friendly and reserved while the males are more outgoing.
Hmm. I adopted a pair from the US here in Okinawa. military mother who had to fly too much.
Females! Very fussy and aloof.
So, for healthy cats I used to feed my cats as much fresh raw meat as possible. My previous two boys in Australia, both since dead at 18 and 19 years grew to 9 and 10 kilos of muscle on a diet of chicken necks, kangaroo mince, livers, hearts and eggs. Sometimes a chicken frame but you had to watch the rib bones. Unfortunately my brood of six at the moment are too varied to all accept the BARF diet so they eat a mix of good quality canned and dry food (one with no corn meal and minimum other grain).
Mr Natural at 10 kilos would once a month or so catch a pigeon overnight and eat the entire thing leaving only a beak, feet, a dozen flight feathers and sometimes the skull under the dining table. Good cat! Pigeons are rats and he was doing a good thing.
on the other hand, I have no qualms about shooting cats in the wild in Australia. Foxes and goats too. Damn pests. But cats eating pigeons in a city are great. You should train your apartment cat to hunt the feral birds that coo and shit on your AC machine overnight.
Cats are the Dogs of Apartment living. I treat my cat much like a dog. He walks on a harness and the other day he actually approached a neighbor’s dog and nose to nosed him and also went around and smelled his butt ! I was surprised.
The thing is, don’t think that cats don’t need attention. They may need slightly less then a dog because they spend much of the day asleep and walks may not be compulsory if they are indoor cats. But cats NEED a lot of attention too. My cat whopper certainly needs a lot of attention and appreciates it. I don’t think he needs one iota less attention then a similar sized dog.
I got mine one like that tree and it actually depends on the location. But they got tired of it, wouldn’t use it, so I gave it to someone else.
I am telling you, you are the cat’s best toy. Do stop at toe attacks in the middle of the night, but undercover mouse game is awesome. So is chasing the red dot. Those feather thinghies I fear they will strangle themselves and anyways, mine figured they could get the thing if they attacked the hand that was holding it…
Other favorite toys of my cats included my underwear -until I locked the stuff up-, but now it is mostly socks, clean ones, not dirty ones.
