Ive got two cats. Ones a hunter that’ll chase anything the other is a defender that will growl when someone’s at the door.
They found a mouse a month ago and all they did was tap at it, no claws, and follow and just watch it. Zero interest in taking care of it.
Eventually I just picked it up and put it outside. Ive never been so disappointed in my life lol
Follow up:
Alt text: Now she’s looking at me like this, like it’s my fault I lost it. I tore the whole bed apart. She caught it, and I have to sleep with it, but that’s my fault, obviously.
Yeah, she was definitely trying to teach you to hunt (some cats seem to consider their owners just gigantic incompetent cats). She’s probably saying something like “I even brought it right to you and you still couldn’t catch it?!”
I think you’re totally right. She’s a really good mouser, and normally kills what she catches – until this week. I live in a 140 year old house, and the mice like to come inside for warmth in winter. This will only be the second winter she’s lived here with me, and she’s brought me 2 live mice this month – but only one into my bed. She may be getting frustrated that I don’t kill and eat them like I’m supposed to.
e: it kinda seems she’s trying to make it as easy as possible.
I love my cat. One month after I adopted her and brought her home, the entire rat infestation is gone, zero mice, it’s been like 2 years since, I still haven’t seen any mice.
My primary reason was for companionship, but second reason to get a cat is hoping to get rid of all the mice, and it worked! Sadly the roach problems are still here… cats don’t really deal with roaches… 😓
I once had a beagle that was a voracious insect killer. She would play with spiders, cockroaches, ants, etc. the same way people talk about cats playing with mice. Eventually, she would always make a mistake of pressing too hard when trapping the insect and pulling it back, and we’d have another little squish spot by the back door that needed to be cleaned.
Had a mouser cat drop a live mouse in my bed once. It ran up my leg. Haunted.
I cured her of the desire to bring me mice by trying to take them from her while she was still playing. I lost mouse privileges :(
Drag is afraid of cats because drag doesn’t know how to say no in a way a cat can understand.
Depends what you’re teaching them. They’re biting? Move away so they know playtime’s over if they bite. Be consistent, because they won’t get it the first time. Don’t scratch that? Put a scratchable surface in front of it, and when they use it, reward them with positive attention. Etc.
How do you tell a strange cat on the street that you don’t want it to go near you?
That’s tough, because street cats that do that have been socialized to be super pro human (strange humans give them snacks?)
I guess if it was me and I was visiting someone allergic, I’d do something silly like put on hand sanitizer and let them sniff my hand. Or hiss at them, if I didn’t see people around. Walk loud. Unfortunately, a lot of “i’m scared go away” body language can come across as 'I’m not threatening! Say hi!!" to a friendly cat. What’s the specific situation drag is in?
No specificity. Drag just wants to be able to communicate better with cats, especially when drag isn’t in a mood to expand drag’s horizons by confronting a scary stimulus.
Hissing at strange cats won’t provoke them into a fight? Getting into a fight with a cat would be the worst outcome, that won’t happen?
I can’t guarentee anything, but hissing is usually ‘knock it off’ and growling is ‘fuck off i’ll bite.’ You could try being generally loud first, though, since your human hiss might not get parsed the same as a cat hiss if you don’t do it right at first. Say ‘no!’ very loud. Clap your hands. If it’s far, stomp and go “hey!!!” Some cats pick up weird socialization and I’m not a cat expert, so take what i say with a grain of salt, tho.
When I see my cat scratch the wrong thing I go “Hey!!” and thump the table and she’ll stop what she’s doing. Then when she scratches the right thing, I go “Oh, good job, kitty!” in a much softer, gentle voice. She doesn’t really get it. She hears the loud tone, stops scratching, and jumps up on the couch. She doesn’t get it’s ‘stop,’ but she stops, so it’s good enough for me. They don’t like loud noises or certain smells, so you can use those to make them not want to be around you without hurting them.
https://www.reddit.com/r/CatAdvice/comments/13oclp7/how_do_i_get_over_my_fear_of_cats
I like the advice here on how to reduce a cat phobia. If you spend time with some very chill cats who will only be aggressive in extreme cases, you’ll learn their body language and signals and have an easier time signalling to them. It’s easier to “get” cats when you understand how little they understand us.
I wish I could help more. I remember being terrified of dogs as a kid, until I met a neighbor’s tiny elderly guy, who was so gentle and hard to fear, I slowly overcame it. Good luck! Sorry about the rambling.
You’re being very helpful, thank you. Drag is a big dog lover. A lot of people on the internet say dragons are big cats, but drag disagrees. Dragons are very socially intelligent and responsive to human forms of communication. Like dogs. Drag has read a lot about cats. Like how meowing is usually only used by kittens to talk to adult cats, but cats started meowing as adults to talk to humans, because humans don’t understand normal cat language very well. Drag grew up with dogs and speaks dog almost as fluently as english. Drag hasn’t had very much cat exposure at all. Drag’s only ever gotten to know one cat, and we never reached the stage of actually communicating. We were able to play, but not to communicate. Internet memes seem to indicate that cats are perfectly comfortable living in a house with humans they can’t communicate with, and some humans feel the same way. Drag doesn’t feel that way. Drag needs to be able to communicate with any intelligent creature for whom interaction is expected and violence is discouraged. Drag doesn’t want to use violence on cats, that sounds horrible. Thus, drag needs a way to solve problems without violence. Dogs are so much easier. If you call a dog a bad dog, it understands instantly. Dogs put in an effort to listen and to make themselves understood, and they put in an effort to get along. Cats seem perfectly comfortable completely ignoring communication. Which, drag hears, can lead to live mice being dropped in your bed.
Weird because usually when I see a strange cat on the street I’m trying to get it to come over to me.
Lol that was my thought exactly.
And fyi, food is the only thing I’ve found so far that works.
Drag is afraid of cats because drag doesn’t know how to say no in a way a cat can understand. Drag would feel much better about exploring friendships with cats if drag felt able to say no.
I remember a time when my cat found a mouse in our cottage. Everyone was asleep or trying to sleep while the cat was looking for the mouse. For some reason, I looked at the bed’s edge and saw tiny whiskers and a tiny nose. The mouse had sandwiched itself between the edge of the bed and the mattress, trying to hide from our cat. I think it got away, too. Made me feel good especially considering our cat was constantly bringing in mice it had killed.
