My little feline family is doing better every day. The white kitty, Yang, has always been the bravest of the 3. She’ll run in front of me to go sit by the gate to look at Yoda. I think they have just about nearly touched noses there. The black kitty, Yin, still darts away from me if I walk in the living-room and she is on the couch. Mama Cat, has just plain hid from day one.
I started opening up a can of wet cat food in the evening and offering it to them. (They get dry food as their regular diet.) I am now at the point where Yang will take the wet food from my hand, She has been letting me run my finger under her chin the last 2 days. Yesterday she let me touch her ruff. Tonight she allowed me to run my hand along her jaw, on her neck and along her back. Whoo hoo!
She even stopped eating from one of my hands and licked the other hand. So she is doing marvelously.
Yin has taken wet food from my hand tonight for the first time. Yay! It will, most likely, take another few days before I can run my finger under her chin. I shall persevere!
How I do this, by the way, is: I hold the bowl with my left hand with my pointer held up. I feed the cats from my right hand with my hand held right over the top of the bowl. Once they are comfortable and involved in eating I slowly start touching under the cats jaw. They flinch at first, but they really love the wet food. It is really a form of positive reinforcement. Let me touch and kitty gets good food.
Now…Mama Cat… Because I have been feeding the kitties first, she has to wait under the armchair smelling the food. She always gets hers whether or not she comes out to me. Tonight she actually started eating from the bowl, (I put it behind the armchair so she feels safe back there.) WHILE MY HAND WAS STILL TOUCHING THE BOWL! I really didn’t expect that. Who knows? Maybe she really will start to tame.
As of tonight I have very good feelings about my feline houseguests. I had every intention of having them here as long as it was still cold. Now it looks like they may be able to be real housecats and not strays. I certainly hope so.
As I write this the 2 little ones are running like mad things, bursting with energy. They are flying back and forth from the gate at one end of the living-room, through the hallway and into the little room under the stairs.
Progress In Catland!
Linear Mode
