Last night at around 1am we were woken by an unholy racket coming from the kitchen. Scuffling noises and then screaming kittehs.
We dashed into the kitchen thinking one of them was injured (or they were killing a burgler) and there they were, posturing, growling, screaming and all puffed up. Screaming! My little darlings were screaming at each other.
They are litter mates, both neutered and sleep together, groom each other, play together and dammit, they DO like each other! You've seen photographic evidence!
My theory is that our girl kitteh Lyx, while engaged in her usual night time hobby of trying to escape from the (reinforced portcullis) cat flap, and was surprised by Sketch, our boy kitteh. Ensuing freakiness, staring, puffed upiness, growling posturing and yelling. Just a theory.
Anyway. After consulting Dr Google we are becoming feline psychologists and we WILL sort these silly kittehs out. The cats have been separated for much of the day and we are trying a "parenting" technique. Hissing at the cats for being mean and then "scruffing" them. Which means gently pushing them down by the scruff of the neck until they "submit" or roll over and relax. The posturing has stopped but the freaky nervous growly behaviour hasn't.
These two are my therapy cats. They came to us just before George's due date last year and have sat beside me and listened to me snivel and weep without judgement for over a year. It breaks my heart that they suddenly can't tolerate to be next to each other.
If any of you kitteh lovers out there can offer any other advice it would be much appreciated.
We had two desexed males that were best friends (groomed each other and so on). But they'd do this sometimes - like they hated each other. We never interfered and they'd soon be friends again.
ReplyDeleteMy two kitties are going on 11 years old (not litter mates but a week apart and have been together since they were about 8 weeks old)and did this for the first time about a month ago. I never did figure out why but it didn't last too long (less than a week)and they are fine now. I thought maybe one of them just wasn't in the mood to be bothered or wasn't feeling well and decided to make it known - who knows...
ReplyDeleteHopefully this will pass for your kitties as well, good luck!!
No advice- I'm just a people therapist- just love and wishes for a quick return to kitteh normalcy.
ReplyDeleteWe had three burmese cats (we are now done to one). They are very vocal and can sound like an old woman screaming in the middle of the night. The two that were litter mates were the same way. All would be good licking, cuddling and snoozing together in a "cat ball" and then all of the sudden the bottom would drop out. We just figured they were trying to stir up a little excitement in their life:)
ReplyDeleteMy two girls are litter mates. They were lovely and snuggly with each other up until year 2. Now one of them is an outright bitch to the other. They tolerate each other now but wont sleep near each other and only just tolerate eating together. I think sometimes they just grow up and develop personalities that are different to that of when they are kitties. It was dissapointing when they started going separate ways. :(
ReplyDeleteHope your kitties reconnect. xx
Barb, Our two kittehs are the best of friends, and yet once or twice a week they have a raging battle with each other - hair puffed, growls and hisses, swats and bites...just seems like they need to get out that negative energy on each other. When its all over they go back to being friends. We sometimes try to break it up by spraying them both with a water bottle, but usually it just resolves itself, and at least so far, no one has lost an eye!
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