1.5yr old Shikoku and a kitten? is it possible?
Hi Everyone,
It's been quite a long time since I last posted about Panda on the forum, so let me do a mini update and intro
My name's Tara and I live in Reno NV. I recently got married so I've been quite busy for the last few months. Anyways, I have a female 1.5 yr old Shikoku named Panda. She's doing really well. She's really turned into a very well behaved little girl (30lbs) and she's mellowed out so much since her crazy puppyhood. Some of you might remember that I was asking lots of questions about leash training a while back and socialization . . . etc.
Well now I have a new question. I've been thinking about adopting a kitten from the shelter, so I've been reading through some old forum discussions about how Kai, Shikoku, Akitas, and Shibas, do with cats. It sounds like from these posts that Shikoku/Kai (with high prey drive, especially if not raised with them) have the hardest time coexisting peacefully with cats, understandably. Panda hasn't really had any socialization with cats. I really wanted to adopt a kitten when Panda was a pup, but my Fiance (Now my husband!) was strongly against cats at the time, so I never did. Now my husband is OK with the idea of adopting a kitten, but I'm afraid it's too late to safely add a kitten to the family.
To describe Panda's behavior with cats (the little contact that she has had): On walks whenever she sees a cat she wants to chase it of course, but she's always on leash, so she usually just wines and tugs a little and then gives up and we continue on our walk. She has pretty high prey drive and definitely wants to chase my parents cats when we're visiting, but luckily she's never been able to because we have dog gates up or she has a leash on.
Should I just plan on keeping them totally separate? Does anyone have any advice for how to introduce them to each other? Am I just asking for trouble by considering adding a kitten to a household with an adult high prey drive dog??
It's been quite a long time since I last posted about Panda on the forum, so let me do a mini update and intro
My name's Tara and I live in Reno NV. I recently got married so I've been quite busy for the last few months. Anyways, I have a female 1.5 yr old Shikoku named Panda. She's doing really well. She's really turned into a very well behaved little girl (30lbs) and she's mellowed out so much since her crazy puppyhood. Some of you might remember that I was asking lots of questions about leash training a while back and socialization . . . etc.
Well now I have a new question. I've been thinking about adopting a kitten from the shelter, so I've been reading through some old forum discussions about how Kai, Shikoku, Akitas, and Shibas, do with cats. It sounds like from these posts that Shikoku/Kai (with high prey drive, especially if not raised with them) have the hardest time coexisting peacefully with cats, understandably. Panda hasn't really had any socialization with cats. I really wanted to adopt a kitten when Panda was a pup, but my Fiance (Now my husband!) was strongly against cats at the time, so I never did. Now my husband is OK with the idea of adopting a kitten, but I'm afraid it's too late to safely add a kitten to the family.
To describe Panda's behavior with cats (the little contact that she has had): On walks whenever she sees a cat she wants to chase it of course, but she's always on leash, so she usually just wines and tugs a little and then gives up and we continue on our walk. She has pretty high prey drive and definitely wants to chase my parents cats when we're visiting, but luckily she's never been able to because we have dog gates up or she has a leash on.
Should I just plan on keeping them totally separate? Does anyone have any advice for how to introduce them to each other? Am I just asking for trouble by considering adding a kitten to a household with an adult high prey drive dog??
Comments
I am confident many people will share differing opinions. And that is awesome. But in my personal experience, I do not enjoy having to tell Miko to stop chewing on the cat ALL THE TIME.
I'm sorry about your older kitties:(
I'm pretty sure that Panda would behave similarly to Miko
But I think alot of it has to do with the cats personality some cats even if they've been around dogs since kitten hood will still kinda cling to the edges of the room and go under the nearest couch whenever a dog enters the room. Others don't seem to be bothered by anything, when Quincy was a kitten Kira would carry him around and clean him and he actually enjoyed it.
I'd say adding a cat will be a bad and stressful thing to do. Kittens sound amazingly like squeaky toys, and can really get the prey drive going with their fluffiness and quick movement. Depending on the older cat, they could be the same way or they could be like my cat who will sit there and squat them instead of running (which is actually the smarter thing to do for a cat).
Miyu is constantly bugging the cats whenever she sees them, and gets even more excited when they react/swat. She is, for the most part, pretty gentle with the cats and basically pushes them with her nose. But even that is stressful for the cats. Oddly enough, my one cat will go up to Miyu and start rubbing her, but doesn't like it when Miyu moves. And a few bops in the face just excites Miyu more, even when one of the cat's claws gets stuck and I have to pin them both down so I can remove the claw out of Miyu's skin (and one time the tongue).
But, if you adopted an older cat with a bolder type of personality, I think that you could possibly make it work. That being said, my 2 shikoku were raised from puppies with cats (all of whom were over 6 months of age when they met the puppy). Currently, we live with 5 house cats and we have 5 outdoor barn cats who - for the most part - stay outside the fenced yard. Inside my dogs are VERY good with the cats, generally ignoring them completely. Outside in the yard, they do like the patrol the fence line (barn cats love to come right up and tease the dogs). They also are generally okay with the indoor/outdoor house cats coming and going from the house to outside the fence. But the cats do know that they need to hustle to get to the outside of the fence.
So - yes, at first, I would expect that you might have to constantly remind Panda to leave the cat (because I do think you need an older cat and not a kitten) alone. But, if she is like her half sister - she will try to be obedient and listen to you. Sachi is very good with the cats - one of them even comes up and pets herself on Sachi by circling under her belly and rearing up and pushing her head on Sachi's jaw. Unfortunately I realize I don't have any photos of her with our cats, but do have some with Kuma
Tara - if you really want a cat, I think you can manage teaching Panda to live with her in peace. And if you adopt a cat with dog experience, I think it would be much less stressful to the cat. I know that both Corina and I do have cats and have had good luck with teaching our shikoku to live with them. But I wouldn't do it with a kitten....
@Kris- thanks for the pics
@Calia- I'll have some pics coming as soon as possible
It totally makes sense that an older dog friendly cat would be the best choice . . . . I just love that kitten phase though
I agree that it's not fair to get a kitten and have it be super stressed when I could adopt a adult cat that's already used to dogs. The only thing is that I already saw the kitten that I would want to adopt . . . its so hard to let go of that. Must have will power!
Kittens like to play and make a ruckus when you are sleeping and trying to get work done. Kittens like to pee on your stuff. Nature made kittens cute so we wouldn't eat them even though they are the DEVIL.
Our youngest is 1 1/2 years and so far he has chewed through about 5 different electric cords (all 12 volt so he doesn't get shocked). Our electronic picture frame, the accounting calculator, the cell phone charger, the humidity gauge.....Those things cost a lot to replace if my husband wasn't so handy and could rewire some of the devices.
The best cat for dogs I've ever seen was our cat Ridley. He died at a very young age, and we really miss him, because he fit in really well into our family. He was a feral kitten from a litter we found. We took them in and tamed them and Ridley was the smallest of the four, but he totally ran the show. He always got the food first (and being feral, they were really excited about food) and tamed the quickest. When he met the dogs, he pretty much sized them up and stood his ground. He didn't get much guff, even as a little kitten. He'd even steal food from the dogs (actually, he'd steal food from us, too; he had to be crated while we were eating) and would snuggle with and groom the dogs all the time.
The worst for dogs was Oskar. Oskar was my sister's cat, who she asked me to take. He was an outdoor cat and I tried to make him an indoor cat, but that just amounted to him sitting behind the microwave and hissing at everyone he saw. We never did get him to use the litter box, and I was pregnant at the time, so I really wasn't supposed to be in contact with cat waste. Then he peed on the kitchen counter and that was pretty much it. I decided that if he wanted to be outside so bad, then good riddance. The dogs were really good with him, and he never changed his mind about hating them. I remember him sitting in the hallway, hissing, spitting, and swatting at Tojo as he walked by, and Tojo just looked at him like, "sheesh, you're loud," and kept walking. Even Rakka would just stare at him and whine. But after he got kicked out, everything changed. Suddenly, Oskar was like everyone's worst enemy. They all turned on him and would freak out if he showed his face. Everyone was in on it, but Rakka was definitely the ring leader. At one point, she actually caught him, and picked him up and shook him. We were right there, so we grabbed him and checked him over. Rakka was definitely holding back, because Oskar wasn't. If she had bitten full force, he'd have been dead, and the situation was escalating. I was trying to figure out what I would do with Oskar that would keep him safe, but before I could rehome him, he went missing and I have no idea what happened to him to this day.
So, you can see that the cat I didn't choose (Oskar) was a complete disaster in our home. I took him thinking I was helping him, not because I thought he fit in, and that was my mistake. Ridley was chosen for his attitude, and he really was great. We had just moved to the country and there were bucket loads of feral kittens that we took in and rehomed through rescues, but we kept him because we liked his attitude so much.
Maybe you could do a "foster to adopt" program. Just don't tell them you're doing it to test whether or not your dog eats cats.
I should add that all of our cats (the 5 house cats and the 5 barn cats) are the bolder type of personality. Many are related, at least distantly, to each other. All have a very friendly, dog-like, personality and most do not turn and run scared very easily - preferring or knowing that standing up to the dogs and not running is a better way to keep the dogs at bay.
We also have multiple of these cats that we "rescued" from feral mothers as young kittens, fed them milk, and raised them up. As in Heidi's case, these cats became very friendly, bold, and into "their" food. To this day, "their" food sometimes includes the dog's fish-based kibble. The dogs, while they do not like the cats eating their kibble, generally just stand and watch helpless as the cat eats their dog food (all the house cats like the dog's kibble).
And Tara, in case you didn't see this earlier as it was buried in another post, I am reposting. And please note that this really is very controlled and the dogs most certainly are being gentle with the cat (and it is always supervised and the dogs are easily controlled by voice commands:
"And BTW, actually shikoku can learn to herd - at least cats. :-) My Kuma realized by watching us when we sit on the porch that we didn't want our one house cat to wander away. We would go and pick up the cat and bring him back to the porch when he wandered. So one day, Kuma tested out whether he could try and "herd" him back. We praised him thinking he was trying to herd. The next day, the cat left the porch and Kuma brought him back, we praised again.
Now, if the cat leaves the porch area, we just say "Kuma go get Chester" and Kuma will run up and herd Chester back to the porch (with tiny nips or small nose nudges - very gently). Sachi picked it up from watching Kuma and she will do it too. They will also herd the other house cat if we tell them too (they clearly know each of the house cat's names). And now the cat Chester will start heading back to the porch when he hears us give the command"
@Edgewood- Wow! hmmm, I wonder if Panda has any herding instinct in her. Very cute herding story by the way
I also need to confess that I was already waiting for approval to adopt the kitten when I started this post. In fact after hearing about the unlikelyhood that a little kitten could coexist with a Shikoku, I decided to introduce Panda to the kitten and then tell them that it wouldn't work (after Panda tries to eat/traumatizes the kitten). Well, that didn't happen. When Panda met the kitten she didn't try to eat it. They just sniffed noses. Panda wagged her tail and just looked at the kitten (mind you the kitten wasn't running away). The kitten hissed a little at Panda, but he seemed really interested in Panda and kept on walking up to her. The kitten was purring the whole time. We were giving Panda treats and praising her for being such a good girl. They did this for about 10min. I have to say I was completely surprised by how well the introduction went. Panda seemed a little scared when I brought her into the little room to do the intro. I think she thought she was at the vet at first. Maybe that's why she was so well behaved. Anyways, with such a good introduction, I couldn't tell the adoption people that the kitten wouldn't work. . . . so I ended up taking the kitten home
Right now he's in a separate room and I'm not planning to do another intro until he settles in more.
Maybe I'm crazy, but I hope this works.
Inu would harass Eeyore and Frannie regularly until we brought Kagome home. Now he doesn't bother them as much. I have noticed Inu is a different dog when he goes after neighborhood cats, very aggressive predator like. So even if he does bother Eeyore and Frannie, I have realized that it is for play and that he knows they are family. Eeyore has a knack for sleeping in Inu's crate and a few times has spend the night with Inu.
Recently I had to foster a 4/5 week kitten. Inu was really gentle with him. Kitty was very feisty with no fear. He would try to cuddle with Kagome and Inu, but the dogs didn't like it cause he would climb on them using his claws. Kitty liked going after their tails.
@the_november_rain - Jessika, can I steal your cats? They are just too pretty (I would steal Inu too - but he looks too much like Sachi and I would get confused). Kagome is adorable too -- but that is a lot of fur to keep brushing!
Right now I'm trying to just let them see each other. I think I'll have to gate Panda in the kitchen while the kitten (Cohen) is in the living room. The dynamic has definitely changed a bit now that we're home (Panda's more excited and Cohen's more skittish). When I did another introduction in the living room, Panda was very very excited. She wanted to play with Cohen. She did a play bow, which I think is a good sign, but she was so excited she scared the kitten and when he started to back away it looked like she might want to eat him. So, I'm going to be very careful.
Cohen will have his own room and the part of the house that's gated off/dog free, so if he doesn't want to socialize/be eaten by Panda he doesn't have too. So, I'm going to try not to stress too much about this.
Jessika and Kris - I love your cats! So cute! I know this is a dog forum but I swear we need more kitty pictures here.
Shoushuu and Kotomi are great with the cats! Shuran, on the other hand, has a higher prey drive and has been "borderline" on wanting to play versus wanting to eat the cats. It *might* just be because he hasn't learned bite inhibition just yet -shrugs-. I don't trust him unsupervised around my kittys. He seems to be getting better as he matures though but he is still kinda "reckless" whereas my other Shikoku are gentle with my cats.
( @okiron ) More kitty photos can be arranged!
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150745507590564.725099.678035563&l=9dff6407cc&type=1
P.S. @ShikokuSpirit- I love the video of Shoushuu and Aislyn walking on leash together.
This isn't the best quality pic, but here's Panda looking though the dog gate for Cohen.
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150751366310564.726806.678035563&l=ced3505a55&type=1
And here's a few videos:
Mei would have already hunted the kitten down.
My Border Collie "herds" my cats to the doors so I will let them outside. She only does this when she sees them trying to eat her food; otherwise she usually leaves them alone unless the cats get one another hyped up.