Feline aggravations - help, anyone?
Mister Miles is not making himself popular at present.
He's a large, hefty cat and always has had a tendency to jump up onto high surfaces. Up until recently he's been really good about being soft-footed with it, and not knocking anything off - which in some cases has been an astonishing feat. But not lately. Recently he's become a bit of a destructo-cat, and not always by accident.
For example, I was (until recently) attempting to grow rushes in the smaller of my aquariums (the one with locally-collected critters in). Miles decided that clearly the rushes were there for his benefit, and he repeatedly clambered up, navigated around the roadblocks I'd set up there to prevent him, and pulled the rushes out with his teeth, dropping them on the floor next to the tank. It wasn't a wanting-more-greens-in-his-diet thing either, since he cheerfully shredded an old lettuce I put out for him, distributing it in small pieces all over the kitchen floor but not eating any of it. *sigh*
Yesterday he excelled himself. That aquarium I was trying to grow rushes in was a re-purposed terrarium, with a big fancy cover shaped like a hipped roof. This is not a small or light object. I had removed it from the tank and it was sitting on top of the big aquarium nearby, where it had sat quite happily for the last few weeks. Somehow Miles managed to push it off. I don't know how, since I was in another room at the time. The first I knew was a godalmighty CRASH!!! and I came in to see that fancy glass lid shattered in a zillion pieces on the floor, and Miles (obviously culpable) scampering off in the other direction.
If he was just damaging the occasional item (which could, I suppose, be accidental) I could live with it. I'd be annoyed, but I could shrug it off and just come up with new and creative cat-proofing techniques. But recently he's started getting aggressive to Shansu as well, and I'm really not happy with that.
There's no obvious trigger for it. Shansu and Miles have never been best of friends the way she and Ivan are, but they've always gotten on ok. No trouble, just companionable existing in the same space without hassle. Not now. Miles growls at her. He bails her up in corners. He chases her down the hallway. He's started coming into my bedroom, which is definitely Shansu Territory and a place he never normally visits. This morning I saw him actually beating her up. This is Not Acceptable.
I've been dealing with Miles's bad attitude (on the occasions that I actually catch him at it) by grabbing him by the scruff of the neck, yelling at him, then picking him up and bunging him in the bathroom for a Time Out for an hour or so (which gives me a chance to cool off before interacting with him again also). Yesterday, when we let him out of the bathroom a while after the Smashed Glass Incident, he hopped straight up onto my lap while I was watchcing TV (which he NEVER normally does) and was downright solicitous. Martindale thought he might be apologising feline-style; my impression was that he knew he was in Deep Shit and was grovelling at me (which I suppose is much the same thing, for a cat).
At any rate, this behaviour is Not Acceptable. I don't know if the destructive-toward-objects behaviour is at all related to Miles's recent aggression toward little Shansu, but I guess it might be. I'm baffled as to why cats that have got on quite companionably for a couple of years are suddenly starting to have difficulties like this. Is there anyone out there who has suggestions as to what might be going on here, and/or how I might productively deal with Miles's aggression before Miles stars in his very own special episode of Will It Blend?
He's a large, hefty cat and always has had a tendency to jump up onto high surfaces. Up until recently he's been really good about being soft-footed with it, and not knocking anything off - which in some cases has been an astonishing feat. But not lately. Recently he's become a bit of a destructo-cat, and not always by accident.
For example, I was (until recently) attempting to grow rushes in the smaller of my aquariums (the one with locally-collected critters in). Miles decided that clearly the rushes were there for his benefit, and he repeatedly clambered up, navigated around the roadblocks I'd set up there to prevent him, and pulled the rushes out with his teeth, dropping them on the floor next to the tank. It wasn't a wanting-more-greens-in-his-diet thing either, since he cheerfully shredded an old lettuce I put out for him, distributing it in small pieces all over the kitchen floor but not eating any of it. *sigh*
Yesterday he excelled himself. That aquarium I was trying to grow rushes in was a re-purposed terrarium, with a big fancy cover shaped like a hipped roof. This is not a small or light object. I had removed it from the tank and it was sitting on top of the big aquarium nearby, where it had sat quite happily for the last few weeks. Somehow Miles managed to push it off. I don't know how, since I was in another room at the time. The first I knew was a godalmighty CRASH!!! and I came in to see that fancy glass lid shattered in a zillion pieces on the floor, and Miles (obviously culpable) scampering off in the other direction.
If he was just damaging the occasional item (which could, I suppose, be accidental) I could live with it. I'd be annoyed, but I could shrug it off and just come up with new and creative cat-proofing techniques. But recently he's started getting aggressive to Shansu as well, and I'm really not happy with that.
There's no obvious trigger for it. Shansu and Miles have never been best of friends the way she and Ivan are, but they've always gotten on ok. No trouble, just companionable existing in the same space without hassle. Not now. Miles growls at her. He bails her up in corners. He chases her down the hallway. He's started coming into my bedroom, which is definitely Shansu Territory and a place he never normally visits. This morning I saw him actually beating her up. This is Not Acceptable.
I've been dealing with Miles's bad attitude (on the occasions that I actually catch him at it) by grabbing him by the scruff of the neck, yelling at him, then picking him up and bunging him in the bathroom for a Time Out for an hour or so (which gives me a chance to cool off before interacting with him again also). Yesterday, when we let him out of the bathroom a while after the Smashed Glass Incident, he hopped straight up onto my lap while I was watchcing TV (which he NEVER normally does) and was downright solicitous. Martindale thought he might be apologising feline-style; my impression was that he knew he was in Deep Shit and was grovelling at me (which I suppose is much the same thing, for a cat).
At any rate, this behaviour is Not Acceptable. I don't know if the destructive-toward-objects behaviour is at all related to Miles's recent aggression toward little Shansu, but I guess it might be. I'm baffled as to why cats that have got on quite companionably for a couple of years are suddenly starting to have difficulties like this. Is there anyone out there who has suggestions as to what might be going on here, and/or how I might productively deal with Miles's aggression before Miles stars in his very own special episode of Will It Blend?