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Category: happy cats
Do You Have A Harmonious Multiple-Cat Household?
ForbesAdvisor.com reports that of 86.9 million U.S. cat-owning households, more than 46.5 million own more than one cat. These multiple-cat households must have learned that to achieve feline harmony in their homes, they must make sure that there are enough resources and space for their cats. If your cats know they have options on where they can eat, sleep, play, and use the litter box, all the better. If the cats have only one option, expect territorial disputes and added stress among them.
Here are a few pointers on how to create and keep harmony in your multiple-cat household:
- The first introduction of cats to each other should be gradual and free from stress. If possible, keep the new cat in a separate living area of your home, with their food, litter box, and toys. Your “incumbent cat(s)” will know about the new cat, but not have the stress of direct contact. After a few days, gradually allow your “incumbent” cat(s) to approach the new cat, keeping their contacts short and sweet. After a few more days, you will have achieved a successful introduction.
- Our strongest recommendation: invest in vertical play spaces. Cat trees, shelves and window perches are ideal ways to give your cats privacy in an off-the-ground location. Cats like height, so vertical options are a purr-fect solution.
- Your cats need outlets for exercising and scratching. Leave plenty of scratching devices around your home. Whether they are horizontal, vertical or slanted pads, they will protect your furniture as well as your sanity!
- Give each of your cats a separate food bowl! If you have common water bowls, have several in different areas. A water fountain designed for multiple cats is a great way of managing this. Just make sure to keep the fountain and the water it holds both clean and fresh.
- Keep as many litter boxes in your home as the number of cats then add one! One of the worst problems can arise when cats have to use the same box. Territorial issues may arise, causing them to “spray” the litter box, which signals to the other cats to stay away. No one needs to have cats using undesignated areas of the house. Once that “out-of-box” behavior starts, it’s hard to stop.
- Finally, watch your cats’ interactions. Observe body language and catch an early warning signal so that you can diffuse any tension and avoid an out-and-out battle. One great technique for diffusing attention is to introduce a stimulating wand toy to immediately redirect their attention away from one another and onto the moving object at the end of the wand.
Congratulations on your growing feline family! May you and your cats enjoy many harmonious and joyous moments together throughout their nine lives!
Unleash Your Indoor Cat’s “inner kitten” With These Easy Tips
Cats are intelligent, active creatures that need daily stimulation just as we do. Helping your cats tackle boredom can keep unwelcome behaviors to a minimum.
Constant, compelling meows, scratching furniture, and urinating outside the litter box may be symptoms of medical issues that should be treated by a veterinarian. In healthy cats, those behaviors can be avoided by keeping your feline companions entertained throughout the day.
Try these solutions:
- Here’s a simple way to entertain your cats for hours at a time. Place a sturdy, multiple-tiered cat tree with a good scratching surface such as sisal next to a window with an exciting view! They’ll ogle at birds, passing cars, and anyone walking by.
- Before you leave your cat home alone, turn on calming music or nature sounds to soothe and comfort him. Go a step further to delight your furbaby by finding a compelling video for him to watch on “Cat TV”, a television channel created specifically for cats.
- If you have empty wall space, quench your cat’s need to climb by installing perch wall units which create safe pathways for him to launch to tops of bookshelves and other high places.
- Indulge the natural hunting instincts in your cat by hiding treats or dry kibble in your home. Use a kitty food puzzle that will provide your cats with a stimulating activity. The challenging activity appeals to the natural love of hunting and will stimulate them both mentally and physically. Change the locations frequently to keep things interesting and encourage your kitty to embrace his inner stalker!
- Shake things up by surprising your cat with new toys to sniff, play with, and explore. Catnip toys, puzzle toys, teaser toys and tunnels all make wise investments that will go a long way toward keeping your cat healthy and happy.
- Introduce your indoor cats to one of many attractive models of secure cat enclosures for the yard. They allow your kitties to enjoy some of the perks of being outdoors without any of the risks! Enclosures that can be folded up for easy travel are a bonus!
- Treat your cats to quality one-on-one playtime and cuddle time as often as possible. It is as good for you as it is for them!
Since your cats have a distinct personality just like you do, experiment with several of these entertainment options, then pick and stick to the ones they like best! You’re sure to find just the right options for your cat at MyThreeCats.com.
No blarney! Find Patrick the Cat in our CatHaven Tree for a chance to win a $25 gift certificate!
It’s easy to enter!
- Find Patrick the Cat in our CatHaven Tree, pictured below
- Click here to place an order with us, any order store wide (no minimum).
- When you receive your email order confirmation, click Reply, and tell us where Patrick is located on the CatHaven Tree.
- The winner will be randomly selected from the correct entries posted by March 31, 2019.
- We’ll notify the winner via email on April 1, 2019.
Now, have fun shopping with us, and may you have the luck of the Irish!
I Want to Celebrate Cats!
I have loved cats since infancy. Or so my Mom used to say. My first cat was a jet black, sleek looking cat named Ebony. There’s a faded picture of my Mom lowering Ebony into the cradle to take a better look at me. I don’t know if Ebony was that impressed, but I’m sure that I was!
Since then, after years of living with Ebonys, Taffys, Lilys, Bogeys and Chesters, with countless moments of joy and of sadness (at their eventual loss), I am still crazy about cats. I was crazy about cats long before the internet’s love affair with them. In fact, I even opened a cat shop in 1998 and appointed a newly adopted tuxedo boy named Bogey as our official shop cat. (now, you can shop at my website, MyThreeCats.com)
My heart has expanded with each cat experience. So much so, that I couldn’t help sharing the passion. Today, I serve on the Board at FosterCat, Inc., a Pittsburgh based network of foster homes and volunteers who rescue and save cats’ lives every day.
Cats are so tuned into us that they know when we are energetic, happy, stressed, sick, exhausted or grieving. How many of you have experienced the comforting feeling of a cat tending to you while you lay in bed, sick or hurting? It’s pretty special, whether they decide to catnap beside you, or tap your face with their little paw to say, OK, I’m here. (Of course, LOL, they also use techniques to wake you up.)
The daily care giving time I have invested in my cats has been rewarded many times over with their unconditional companionship and affection. Only those who have owned cats (or should I say, have experienced being owned by them) will understand this.
Anatole France made this observation: “Until one has loved an animal a part of one’s soul remained unawakened.” I wholeheartedly agree.