Pets
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Introducing a dog into a house with cats.....
in Pets
has anyone had any luck introducing a dog into a house with cats that are territorial? I have 4 cats, one who things he is a "lion". I dog-sat this weekend and had to keep the dog and cats separated because one of the cats wanted to "kill" the dog. He was spitting and attacking the door the dog was behind. When I spent time with the dog the cat would not stop "crying". For several reason, I think this dog may need a permanent home in the future. I would love to have her in my house but I would never do that if it meant keeping them separated at all times or cause constant stress to the cats. The dog grew up with cats and will go up to cats for a sniff but has never attacked. Any ideas that would make this work? TIA
Re: Introducing a dog into a house with cats.....
The key would be very slow/gradual introductions and ensuring the cats have a dog-free zone.
We introduced our pup into our cat-only household this past summer. There was inappropriate peeing and pooping on the part of the cats, but the peeing was resolved when I set up a cat-only room with litter box, scratching post, toys, and food/water bowls, and we resolved the pooping further down the line with the addition of Cat Attract litter to the box that was getting pooped next to (yeah, right next to it, but not in it, weird!).
You can add a few Feliway diffusers around the house a few weeks before the dog would come live with you, because it takes up to a month for it to start really working effectively. Rescue Remedy in everyone's water bowls could help calm them down, too, though I found it had very limited effect on my crew.
You're going to want to limit the dog's access to the house at first anyway, so he/she can slowly adjust to the environment, and this would let the cats go away from wherever the dog happened to be if they needed/wanted to.
It's been about 6 months since we brought our pup home, and while the cats (particularly the one on the right in my siggy) will still run away from Zoey if she's being particularly hyper/playful, they have gotten to the point of coming up and all lying down together with us on a few rare occasions. Just know that it can take a loooooong time for the cats to adjust; don't lose hope!
If you're worried about your "lion-cat" scratching the dog in the meantime, try putting Soft Claws caps on his front claws so he can't do any damage.
B/w 1/8: betas 17,345, progesterone 25.6
We have a cat who is hell bent on proving his dominance over any and all dogs in the house by attacking them. Once he learned the resident dog won't even acknowledge his presence, he left that dog alone. Now he stalks the foster dog.
We always have cat only space set up, and a system of babygates. When the resident dog met the cats he was crated so the cats could approach him, but he couldn't approach them. This allowed them to sniff him, etc. in a way where they didn't feel threatened. Everyone got treats for being around one another with good behavior. rescue Remedy and Feliway can also help here.