Sierra my 6 month old can’t leave our one kitty (Missy) alone as she is continuously chasing her throughout the house. She learned early on from our other cat (Max) to stay clear of him as he gave her a swat when she was new to our house. She keep her distance from him but Missy is a different story. I’ve tried different approaches to teaching Sierra to leave the cat along, everything from verbal commands of “leave it” and “no” to scolding her and then banishing her to the outside each time she goes after the cat. Nothing seems to work thus far she just can seem to help herself. Any suggesting would be greatly appreciated.
Hi and welcome, I unfortunately don't have cats at the moment so can't really offer advice apart from teaching a general 'stop' behaviour but this wouldn't be an instant fix and will take time proofing. There are other members on the forum who have cats and I'm sure they will be along soon with great advice to offer you.
When feeding the cat try and make Sierra sit and wait. This is what we do with poppy if she sits nicely she gets some cat meat. After I have put the food down. Also when I have meat eg chicken that I am going to use for training . I make sure that the cats get some to. Poppy only get hers if she is sitting and looking at me. Therefore I believe that when poppy is around the cats she will believe good things happen. It is a long process I hope this will help. Like you I have 1 cat who gives Poppy a Wack and Poppy loves her. But Poor old Tizzy hasn't done that yet. But treating them together is working. Cream cheese works well too. Good Luck
It was similar at our house. We put up gates so the cats could escape, and two of the gates kept puppy Oban from falling down stairs. All the gates had cat sized holes in them. So any chase would be brief. Still, one cat pretty well hid for a whole year. The other two put in appearances and when they had to they whacked the pup's nose, claws trimmed short and always in anyway. At about Oban's one year of age the third cat began to come around but by then Oban had finally learned cats were not wind up toys and didn't chase them anyway. REgarding treats, I think something a trainer told us really helped. She said if we had two dogs and were training puppy, if puppy was too slow to comply or goofing off, treat the other dog instead, none for puppy. I used one of the cats. It helped immensely with training and the cats were viewed, not as unworthy competitors for food as I feared, but with awe. I think it helped both parties, puppy and cat. I swear, if there had been a thought bubble over puppy Oban's head the first time I treated the cat when he did not Sit it would have said, "Wow, how did you DO that?" And he sat so quickly the next time his little black bum smacked the floor.
Milo my 11 week old plays very rough with my cat too, everytime he goes to bite him/jump on him I just pick him (milo) up and plonk him in his pen for 10 seconds. To start with i was doing it constantly but very quickly milo realised what was happening and hesitates and so now occasionally he tries it but most of the time he gets close to harry and then turns to look at me which i then mark with a 'good' and a treat if I have one to hand. Obviously this is a little easier for me as Milo is only 11 weeks and not 6 months but i think once Sierra realises that she is isolated immediately when she chases the cat she will begin to stop. Its important that as well as the 'punishment' of isolating for a few seconds, you use positive reinforcement everytime she makes a better decision - maybe she looks at the cat and then glances at you so then quickly mark that. I literally had this conversation with the trainer from my puppy class on saturday! good luck!
