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Help with scratching
Sherlock has always been really good about scratching in the right place. Since his last vet visit (a little less than a month ago) he hasn't been scratching his post at all. Not once. Now he only scratches our chairs. Luckily the chairs in the dining room are microfiber so he doesn't ruin it, but my nice cloth chair upstairs is now entirely destroyed.
He knows he isn't supposed to. He has such a guilty look when he does it and stops immediately when I yell. When I even walk into the upstairs room with the chair he has demolished, he hides under it and looks at me like he knows he's going to get yelled at.
Previously he loved his post and it was pretty expensive. We have several others of various different types that he doesn't use either, but the expensive one he used to love.
How do I get him to use it again? I've tried spray cat nip, but he won't go near it. I tried to trick him into using it by putting the laser pointer on it. He would go after the laser pointer but wouldn't continue scratching. It's only a few feet from the chairs he scratches on the main level, so when possible we will yell "NO!" and put him by the post and tell him that good boys scratch the post... But that doesn't do anything either.
As for the upstairs chair, that door had been previously closed off to him, but with really high heating bills the last two months, we thought that was the cause and left the door open. Now he's locked out of the room again.
Re: Help with scratching
Feliway spray? I think Feliway was originally designed to fix inappropriate scratching (check out the website).
Do you have other types of posts? Maybe his preference has changed?
I could never get KittyCat to leave a couple pieces of furniture alone, which is how I ended up being a Soft Paws convert... so there's always that.
)
Thanks I didn't know that! Do you spray where you don't want them to scratch or where they do scratch?
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Does he scratch on the corners of the furniture? Our vet suggested making a scratching post that is similar to whatever they are scratching, specifically if the cats are scratching corners. Cover a 4 by 4 with whatever material he likes and see if that helps. Cats can be so frustrating!
Also, is the "expensive" post near the furniture he is scratching? I would make sure it is a very available alternative and not in another room, ect.