Congratulations! Your hard work has paid off, and Kitty no longer fears the carrier and handles the car ride with almost no signs of fear, anxiety or stress. Kitty purrs and cheek-bonks the veterinary technicians and barely notices the doctor’s exam through all the petting and tasty treats. But as soon as you get home, Kitty’s former feline friends snub him, or worse. Why do cats fight after vet visits? What’s up with all the cat bashing?
Creating a fear free experience for cats doesn’t stop after the veterinary visit. Fear, stress and anxiety often develop when a cat leaves home, and then returns. That’s upsetting and hurtful to pet parents and the returning cat, as well as the whole clowder. You can reduce the chance of cat bashing, though, with these tips.
Why Cat Bashing and Cat Fights After Vet Visits Happen
Friendly cats identify each other by sharing a common communal scent. By sleeping together and grooming each other, their individual scent-ID intermingles. That familiar smell acts like a club membership that says, “I belong to the family, I’m safe.”
A long absence, or even brief handling by strangers, changes the scent identification. That can lead to cat friends acting out with aggression. All those technicians and doctor pets leave foreign smells on the fur, and medications also may change the aroma. So when the absent Kitty returns, the other cat-friends don’t recognize him and react to the weird smells as though a strange cat has trespassed into the home turf. So they do their best to chase the interloper away.
Meanwhile, the returning Kitty reacts defensively to the cat bashing. And as long as the former friends remain aggressive, they can’t get close enough to share family scent and return to normal friendly status. The stress, anxiety and fear build and become worse, the longer they’re allowed to continue. Cats being treated for illness that travel back and forth to the vet may repeat this cycle repeatedly. Here’s how to address after vet visit cat bashing.
Stop After Vet Visit Cat Fights Bashing
One easy way to reduce the chance of cat bashing is to take all your cats to the clinic at the same time. That way, they all smell the same when they return home.
If you can’t take all the cats at once, give the returning Kitty some alone time upon returning home. A half day shut in the guest bedroom gives him time to lick-lick-lick away the weird hospital smell, and lets you pet-pet-pet him to reestablish your familiar smell. A time out also lets him calm down from the excitement of the carrier/car/clinic combo, so he’s less defensive.
You can re-share the “family scent” more quickly, using a dry clean hand towel. Rub it over the other cats, especially Kitty’s best-friend companion, and pay particular attention to the cheeks. That picks up the friendly-cat pheromones, which can then be rubbed over the returning Kitty to help reestablish communal family scent.
It also may help to apply a pleasant, strong-smelling scent to all the cats in the home. That makes them smell the same and helps distract them from being aggressive or defensive. Perhaps use a bit of chicken broth or water from the tuna can. Rub it on your hands and then pet each cat’s neck. That also means they can’t reach the spot to groom it off, and need the help of other buddy-kitties to mutually groom—and refresh the communal safe scent they recognize. Find more tips in my book MY CAT HATES THE VET.
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Stay up to date with the latest book giveaways and appearances related to my September Day pet-centric THRILLERS WITH BITE! Amy Shojai, CABC is a certified cat & dog behavior consultant, a consultant to the pet industry, and the award-winning author of 35+ pet-centric books and Thrillers with Bite! Oh, and she loves bling!
Do you know how do you find pet behavior help? As a certified animal behavior consultant for cats and dogs, I receive many requests for pet behavior help. Solving cat behavior problems and bad dog behavior can be a challenge. Some of these I address with articles explaining cat behavior (how to stop meowing, for example, or dealing with cat aggression), as well as puppy and dog behavior issues like noise phobias and separation behaviors.
Some pet behavior challenges have solutions through reading books and articles, others via phone call advice, and more serious issues (dog aggression, for example) need one-on-one help. But how do the behavior experts receive training?
Dog hot spots often happen during both the spring and fall shedding season and are the bane of many dogs’ existence. Some develop hot spots all year long, especially those with very thick, wooly coats. Have your dogs ever suffered from hot spots?
Fortunately, hot spots are not a problem for cats. Kitties, though, do have their own issues with shedding and hairballs. Bathing cats can help with that.
When dog hot spots are a chronic problem, it can be aggravating and frustrating for pet owners. And painful for the dog! While severe problems need veterinary attention, home remedies for dog hot spots often help enormously. Here’s what you need to know.
Memorial Day honors the American men and women who have lost their lives while serving in the military. It originally honored those who died in the Civil War, and now honors those who died in any war. It is also known as Decoration Day. This holiday differs from Veterans’ Day which honors all those who served in the military.
There is no Memorial Day for the brave military K9s who served and lost their lives, often heroically saving their human partners. I can’t imagine the bond that must exist between the soldier and his or her war dog—they share things and stand against danger to protect the rest of us against horrors we don’t want to think about. And because of them, we don’t have to worry about such things. Thank you.
I’m eternally grateful to those who sacrifice for our freedom. Losing a beloved animal companion anytime cuts deep. It must be horrific to lose a comrade-in-arms, including those with four feet and fur.
And since I focus on pet issues, I want to shine a light on the dogs of the military. There is a National K9s Veteran’s Day on March 13, too. But here’s an excerpt from my book DOG LIFE to shine a light on military dogs through the ages.
Have your pets ever choked on something they chew? Shadow-Pup loves to chew up inedible objects, no matter how much we supervise. Learn how to administer the pet Heimlich to save a life!
When Karma-Kat came to live with us, that put lots of cat toys within Magical-Dawg’s reach. Seren had never been too keen on such things and she was already nine years old when Magic came as a puppy. He loved to swipe Seren’s “sparkle-balls” and ended up with sparkly poop. Once Karma’s toys added to the kitty quotient, the big ol’ dog had a field day seeing how many cat toys he could stuff into his jaws.
Bravo played with rocks. And the new puppy Shadow loves to chew sticks. He’s already got one caught in the roof of his mouth. That’s the perfect opportunity for choking, and a need for the pet Heimlich. I hope that we’ll never need it, though. In case you do, read on!
Do you have a dog fence? Magical-Dawg used to take off after “critters” every so often, racing around the 13-acre spread (or beyond). We eventually trained him to stay with us, even when off-leash. It would have devastated me if Magic disappeared. He was microchipped, but folks would need to catch him first.
Bravo was a very different dog. He was so good off-leash during most morning rambles and didn’t want to go too far away from us. He’d chase and play with his “big-ball” in the field, and baptize every tree and grass tussock. And once he lost his leg, he couldn’t get out the back fenced area even if he’d wanted to.
Shadow-Pup, though, takes after Magical-Dawg. He’s so small, not even the fenced back area keeps him contained. He also likes to dig, so we needed to address possible escapes. A fence is a dog’s best friend!
How do you stop a cat fight? And how do you know if the cat fighting turns serious—rather than just kitten play? Shadow-Pup thinks it’s great fun to chase and wrestle with Karma-Kat. We supervise, of course, and interrupt the play should one or the other object.
There are many kinds of cat aggression, and many are perfectly normal behaviors. Certainly, it’s not fair to you or the cats to allow cats to fight. Learn how to recognize the potential and reasons behind cat aggression and fighting cats, and what you can do.
A dog vomits more easily than nearly any other creature. So why in the world would a pet parent want to make pets vomit? When dogs or cats eat the wrong thing that could cause harm, you can save your pets’ lives by inducing vomiting.
Pets vomit for all kinds of reasons. Sometimes it’s because of illness, while other times the dog vomiting or cat hairball upchuck is more innocuous. Some pets eat grass to induce vomiting, or they get into dangerous candy that makes them sick. However, sometimes making pets vomit means life or death. That means you need to know how to make pets vomit.
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