I was out walking Molly on her leash today and another small dog attacked her. It got some fur but no skin thankfully. This is the second time this year she has been attacked by another dog, not under its owner's control. I am getting fed up with this. The owner came running over and said, "I am so sorry we don't know why she does this every time she sees another dog." "She won't bite you she is fine with people." I asked why she was not on a leash? The owner said, "We were just going out the door to our car, not taking her for a walk."
There doesn't seem to be any awareness on the owners part that they are responsible and could take their dog to obedience classes to change its behaviour. A true apology means taking some responsibility for the dog's behaviour.
My Dad was walking alongside the creek at the back of our place when a dog came running at him. "Don't worry, it doesn't bite," yelled the owner.
Those cats sound lovely @ChastMastr. I'd like a cat or two, but I really don't think I could put up with litter trays and rescuing small animals and birds.
Oh, they are totally indoor cats, and I have one of those automatic cat litter boxes that you don’t have to clean except once every two weeks replace the tray.
So we’ve had our calico and grey-and-white for 3 weeks now and they are starting to settle in. The calico is still painfully shy around the humans but she has found her favourite places on the cat tree by our window and is no longer in danger of losing out on dinner time because her brother would start in on her food before she worked up the courage to show up in the kitchen… In other respects her brother is a good influence, and will hopefully eventually persuade her that free back rubs from the humans is worth working up her courage for…
It’s really hard to play a game on your iPad while a cat is sat on your shoulder and lying down the whole length of your dominant arm. It’s even harder to type.
Still at least she has settled in well after 2 months from rescue.
Molly has a dog door to get out to my patio. She has used it for 2 years with no problems. This week she has taken to going out the dog door on her own, but now stands on the patio and barks for me to open the door and let her in. I have no idea what that is all about but it is annoying because if I do not have my hearing aids in and am in the front of the house I do not always hear her right away at the back and I am afraid it is going to annoy the neighbors. I also no longer want to leave the house with her dog door open as I am afraid she will go out there a bark for a long time.
Yikes! We (sort of) trained our dog out of the inappropriate barking by use of a water spray bottle. But then, I'm not sure you want to do that here, because if for any reason she really couldn't get in, you'd want her to bark.
It seems as if she's discovered she can get a reward (your attention) by barking at the door. And of course, the longer she barks (and you eventually give in), the more strongly you train her that the price of your attention is x number of minutes barking.
Is there perhaps a way you can respond to the barking with something that she dislikes (not absolutely hates; for our dog it would be pulling out the dremel tool to go over her claws) immediately after you respond? Something that would be bad enough in her eyes to make her wish to avoid it by sneaking into the house quietly in normal cases, but not so bad that she'd refuse to bark in a really serious situation.
It might also help to come up with some behavior you prefer and training her to do THAT to get your attention, at a different time of day so she doesn't associate it with the dog door kerfuffle but still learns to get what she wants. I'm thinking a gentle headbutt or something?
That way she still gets what she ultimately wants but through a more agreeable method.
(clutches head) these dogs are so difficult... (stares at my own)
Molly has a dog door to get out to my patio. She has used it for 2 years with no problems. This week she has taken to going out the dog door on her own, but now stands on the patio and barks for me to open the door and let her in. I have no idea what that is all about but it is annoying because if I do not have my hearing aids in and am in the front of the house I do not always hear her right away at the back and I am afraid it is going to annoy the neighbors. I also no longer want to leave the house with her dog door open as I am afraid she will go out there a bark for a long time.
Could the door need its hinges cleaning ? That can make them a bit stiffer and harder to push with your nose.
Knowing I was reinforcing her behavior by opening the door, today I called her from inside the house and she came in through her door once. She is still going out and barking and not wanting her to annoy my neighbors I still opened the door the times she would not come in through her door after I tried that first.
Aargh pets, some days I think they train us more than we train them!! I've been in and appropriately distributed the cat treats this morning and husband is obediently at his desk, so cats are both happy!
Elizabeth now gets a monthly Solensia injection instead of Metacam for her arthritis. She gets a quick check up at the same time and at her January appointment the vet picked up a heart murmur. She's had follow up blood tests which confirmed heart disease. So she's about to go onto medication for that. She's already on Thyronorm, so that'll be two daily medications, plus the monthly injection.
She seems fine to us - still enjoying her food, and her snuggles, still outraged if she sees another cat in our garden, and her weight is stable - but she's definitely becoming an "old cat."
I'm a bit concerned that, as we see her every day, we're not really aware of the slow decline. I suspect if we could put 15 year old Elizabeth next to the Elizabeth of five years ago it would come as a shock to see the then-and-now.
There are many kinds of barking, it is how dogs communicate.
The most common is ‘alert’ barking and it is the easiest to deal with. You calmly thank the dog for alerting you then distract them with a toy/game. Ted now just ‘huffs’ rather than bark when he sees a bird/frog/helicopter or other dastardly thing I need to know about.
Other barking is harder to deal with unless you start with a tiny pup. Attention barking is one. If you always ignore a pup’s attention barking then they simply don’t do it. But once it’s learned it’s a long, patient job to get them out of it.
Anxious barking is harder still as much work needs to be done on general anxiety levels when the feared object person isn’t there, then help them feel comfortable when they are - a longer, even more patient job.
Any aversives do work in the moment, but are usually counter productive as they increase anxiety and give the dog the impression that there must be a threat as you are also reacting to it.
The dog at the house on the corner rushes up to the fence when I pass. If I'm wearing a sunhat or a mask she gives a volley of barks, if I'm bareheaded and barefaced it's just one bark to acknowledge my greeting.
I think we are making progress. Molly was still barking but would now come in through her door when I called her. Today I warned my understanding neighbors and just let her bark. When she came in I gave her a treat. The next time she went out she barked way less. Again when she came into the living room where I was I greeted her but did not offer a treat. As I do not want her to expect a treat every time she comes in. She stayed in and took a nap. I will see what tomorrow brings. She never barks I am told when I am not home??????
I have a cat burglar. Spooky (aka Carmen, the black cat from along the road) has been sneaking into the house and ripping into the bag of dried cat food which I store in the bathroom cupboard. She has even reached into the tin which I use to store the plastic snack bags of kibble I've weighed ready for use, hooked them out and shredded them so she can eat the contents.
I like Spooky, but I'm not willing to feed her the vet prescribed (and expensive) food that Aroha needs, so I have steps to prevent this happening again. I've put the packet of food in a plastic storage box and found the lid for the tin the snack bags are stored in.
Simple really and I probably should have done it before. I wasn't allowing for Spooky's superior burgaring skills.
@Huia, am I right to think that Spooky/Carmen has owners that are looking out for her? I know some cats can be greedy! One here turns his nose up at things regularly and eats the other cat's food. The other cat will eat all day long if allowed. They are funny creatures!!
Our new cats are settling in after 3 months - I think it’s fair to say our grey-and-white has well and truly settled in and is happily sharing the couch and often our laps with us. Calico is still very nervous around people - we wonder if she had some truly nasty experience at some point that her brother somehow escaped - but wants to be social and will sometimes consent to being scritched at the back of her head and around the ears. In other respects she is quite fearless including stealing kibble from her brother (used to be the other way around) and even our food if left on the table unattended (which we *really* wish she would stop trying to do - sigh…).
I think her problem is that she started as the much loved only pet of an elderly woman. When she first appeared in my garden crying under a tree I took her to the vet to check for a microchip. She wasn't chipped so I leafletted the street and received a phone call from the owner. I caged her and carried her to her home. She was obviously well loved by her owner. She kept coming to visit, despite the late Georgie-Porgy fat'n'fluffy running her off, she even turned up when I was burying G-P and scared the hell out of me by jumping through a window and climbing into my bed that night. I thanked her for the visit and put her out.
As her original owner got older, family moved home to provide care for her, bringing various other cats and a dog. Spooky's visits became more frequent. She is obviously well looked after as I noted she had been treated for bald patches (probably a flea allergy). I think she just likes the fact that it's quieter, plus the possibility of stealing extra food. She is currently sleeping in the laundry with an open window between her and the outside and 3 closed doors and cupboard door and plastic box between her and the food.
I noticed her drooling on Wednesday. She becomes very distressed if she spots one of her enemy cats in our garden, and so I assumed that I'd somehow failed to hear the yowling and claws-against-glass scrabbling of a sighting of her enemy and had just caught the aftermath.
She had another episode of drooling on Friday - I made the same assumption.
On Saturday she started drooling again so I booked her in for the earliest vet check up available - tomorrow morning.
Google suggests either dental or kidney issues. Either are possible. The vet has already remarked that one of her teeth looks bad, but said that if it wasn't bothering Elizabeth, then she wouldn't put her through the trauma of a G.A. and extraction. And she swapped medication from Metacam to Solensia because the Metacam was starting to impact on her kidneys.
Apparently it can also be a sign of heatstroke, but I can rule that out. We had hailstones this morning.
She's eating normally, is her usual snuggly self, and isn't flinching when we stroke and groom her. But there's clearly something amiss.
@North East Quine, I hope the vet can work out what is ailing Elizabeth and she gets better very soon.
Husband had to do an emergency stop for cat treats last evening. We only had a couple left in the tub. Unfortunately, Cheery fluffy cat races to the room where the treats are kept, several times a day. This morning I managed to distract him with a walk outside on his lead. It seemed to work, as afterwards he found a sunny spot for a snooze and hasn't hassled me since.
I am anticipating that a second request for treats will be made the minute cheery husband gets in from work. I think I will make myself scarce cooking the dinner.
Just back from the vet. It looks like a bad tooth affecting her gum. However, due to her existing health issues, they're doing bloods before a GA and dental work.
She gets weighed monthly when she gets her Solensia injection; she's usually between 3 and 3.2 kg, and she was 3kg last time, which was less than three weeks ago. Today she was 2.76kg. She's on a special diet for her kidneys, but the vet told me to forget that and focus on tempting her with delicacies today.
Yep, vet bills can be costly but them’s the breaks; as cats ( and dogs) age they become expensive. I don’t begrudge Lily the Pink and Stan the Man: they are lovely companions and much nicer than most hoomans.
Elizabeth came to us when she was about ten and already suffering from arthritis on the site of a previous injury. It didn't seem possible to get insurance, especially as her age was just a best guess.
Loving hearing about these beautiful cat companions. We have one that is snuggly but not too bright (Marcie) and Monet who is smart as paint and not only has us worked out, but has us all around his little paw.
Really special moment with Monet last night. He is not a lap cat, in fact for years we've been trying to tempt him to sit on the lounge with us, he still does this rarely, but has recently shown a preference for velvety type throws and will snuggle on those. Last night he jumped up onto the lounge, walked across to me and stood in my lap, he then proceeded to give me the long eye blink and then pressed his head against my forehead. It was such a rare event that I wanted to call the others to come and look, but knew that would scare him away.
He has come a long way from the shelter cat who hid from us and still runs from visitors. I am hoping that one day he'll sit in our lap and purr, I guess we'll have to wait and see!
Elizabeth's thyroid levels were too high for a general anaesthetic yesterday. So they sent her home with antibiotics, painkillers, and an increase in her Thyronorm prescription. She goes back for the extraction in a fortnight.
She might be a dainty wee thing, but she can clamp her mouth shut with surprising strength when the antibiotic is due.
Elizabeth seems distressed this morning. She is pacing and drinking a lot. She's doing something we've never seen her doing before - batting her drinking water with her paw. Back to the vet at 11.30.
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When they are so tiny, it is always a bit scary but they should be scampering around in no time.
My Dad was walking alongside the creek at the back of our place when a dog came running at him. "Don't worry, it doesn't bite," yelled the owner.
"But I do", Dad called back.
And we've just come across this thread. Over the years, we've always been devastated when the current dog died and send out sympathies to you
Oh, they are totally indoor cats, and I have one of those automatic cat litter boxes that you don’t have to clean except once every two weeks replace the tray.
Huge hugs!! Prayers for them to be in Jesus’ arms.
Thanks, @ChastMastr.
Still at least she has settled in well after 2 months from rescue.
It seems as if she's discovered she can get a reward (your attention) by barking at the door. And of course, the longer she barks (and you eventually give in), the more strongly you train her that the price of your attention is x number of minutes barking.
Is there perhaps a way you can respond to the barking with something that she dislikes (not absolutely hates; for our dog it would be pulling out the dremel tool to go over her claws) immediately after you respond? Something that would be bad enough in her eyes to make her wish to avoid it by sneaking into the house quietly in normal cases, but not so bad that she'd refuse to bark in a really serious situation.
It might also help to come up with some behavior you prefer and training her to do THAT to get your attention, at a different time of day so she doesn't associate it with the dog door kerfuffle but still learns to get what she wants. I'm thinking a gentle headbutt or something?
That way she still gets what she ultimately wants but through a more agreeable method.
(clutches head) these dogs are so difficult... (stares at my own)
Could the door need its hinges cleaning ? That can make them a bit stiffer and harder to push with your nose.
Thanks for the suggestion all are most welcome.
She seems fine to us - still enjoying her food, and her snuggles, still outraged if she sees another cat in our garden, and her weight is stable - but she's definitely becoming an "old cat."
I'm a bit concerned that, as we see her every day, we're not really aware of the slow decline. I suspect if we could put 15 year old Elizabeth next to the Elizabeth of five years ago it would come as a shock to see the then-and-now.
The most common is ‘alert’ barking and it is the easiest to deal with. You calmly thank the dog for alerting you then distract them with a toy/game. Ted now just ‘huffs’ rather than bark when he sees a bird/frog/helicopter or other dastardly thing I need to know about.
Other barking is harder to deal with unless you start with a tiny pup. Attention barking is one. If you always ignore a pup’s attention barking then they simply don’t do it. But once it’s learned it’s a long, patient job to get them out of it.
Anxious barking is harder still as much work needs to be done on general anxiety levels when the feared object person isn’t there, then help them feel comfortable when they are - a longer, even more patient job.
Any aversives do work in the moment, but are usually counter productive as they increase anxiety and give the dog the impression that there must be a threat as you are also reacting to it.
I like Spooky, but I'm not willing to feed her the vet prescribed (and expensive) food that Aroha needs, so I have steps to prevent this happening again. I've put the packet of food in a plastic storage box and found the lid for the tin the snack bags are stored in.
Simple really and I probably should have done it before. I wasn't allowing for Spooky's superior burgaring skills.
As her original owner got older, family moved home to provide care for her, bringing various other cats and a dog. Spooky's visits became more frequent. She is obviously well looked after as I noted she had been treated for bald patches (probably a flea allergy). I think she just likes the fact that it's quieter, plus the possibility of stealing extra food. She is currently sleeping in the laundry with an open window between her and the outside and 3 closed doors and cupboard door and plastic box between her and the food.
I noticed her drooling on Wednesday. She becomes very distressed if she spots one of her enemy cats in our garden, and so I assumed that I'd somehow failed to hear the yowling and claws-against-glass scrabbling of a sighting of her enemy and had just caught the aftermath.
She had another episode of drooling on Friday - I made the same assumption.
On Saturday she started drooling again so I booked her in for the earliest vet check up available - tomorrow morning.
Google suggests either dental or kidney issues. Either are possible. The vet has already remarked that one of her teeth looks bad, but said that if it wasn't bothering Elizabeth, then she wouldn't put her through the trauma of a G.A. and extraction. And she swapped medication from Metacam to Solensia because the Metacam was starting to impact on her kidneys.
Apparently it can also be a sign of heatstroke, but I can rule that out. We had hailstones this morning.
She's eating normally, is her usual snuggly self, and isn't flinching when we stroke and groom her. But there's clearly something amiss.
Husband had to do an emergency stop for cat treats last evening. We only had a couple left in the tub. Unfortunately, Cheery fluffy cat races to the room where the treats are kept, several times a day. This morning I managed to distract him with a walk outside on his lead. It seemed to work, as afterwards he found a sunny spot for a snooze and hasn't hassled me since.
I am anticipating that a second request for treats will be made the minute cheery husband gets in from work. I think I will make myself scarce cooking the dinner.
She gets weighed monthly when she gets her Solensia injection; she's usually between 3 and 3.2 kg, and she was 3kg last time, which was less than three weeks ago. Today she was 2.76kg. She's on a special diet for her kidneys, but the vet told me to forget that and focus on tempting her with delicacies today.
Back to the vet tomorrow.
One of my 2 lost some weight and ended up being hyperthyroid; common in elderly cats but she was 7 and a half at diagnosis.
Doing much better on antithyroid medication.
Her brother of the bad teeth has had multiple extractions but never lost an ounce🙀😂
Every time I pay for another check up, or treatment, or prescription, I give thanks for the NHS and that we don't have to pay for human treatment.
Sounds like my Stan; not a lap cat like Lily ( who is as sharp as a tack and pushes him around) but very much the bed boy for snuggles.
Really special moment with Monet last night. He is not a lap cat, in fact for years we've been trying to tempt him to sit on the lounge with us, he still does this rarely, but has recently shown a preference for velvety type throws and will snuggle on those. Last night he jumped up onto the lounge, walked across to me and stood in my lap, he then proceeded to give me the long eye blink and then pressed his head against my forehead. It was such a rare event that I wanted to call the others to come and look, but knew that would scare him away.
He has come a long way from the shelter cat who hid from us and still runs from visitors. I am hoping that one day he'll sit in our lap and purr, I guess we'll have to wait and see!
She might be a dainty wee thing, but she can clamp her mouth shut with surprising strength when the antibiotic is due.
She's had a good sleep and seems happier now.
Sadly, the vet discovered an aggressive tumour.
We have her back home for a couple of days of cuddles and spoiling, but we will be saying goodbye some time later this week.
She really is the sweetest, most affectionate little calico girl. We have been very lucky to have had her in our lives.