[music playing] Kelly: You and your furry feline are getting in some play time, but all of a sudden your cat gets aggressive.

There are many reasons why cats suddenly attack their owners and we'll look into that issue on today's episode of The Paw Report with animal behaviorist, Dr. Sally Foote.

Stay with us.

[music playing] Rameen: The Paw Report on WEIU is supported by Rural King, America's farm and home store, livestock feed, farm equipment, pet supplies and more.

You can find your store and more information regarding Rural King at ruralking.com.

Rob: Dave's Decorating Center is a proud supporter of The Paw Report on WEIU.

Dave's Decorating Center features the Mohawk Smartstrand Silk Forever Clean carpet.

Dave's Decorating Center, authorized Mohawk color center in Charleston.

Kelly: Thank you for joining us for this episode of The Paw Report.

I'm your host, Kelly Goodwin, and joining us today is veteran of The Paw Report Show, Dr. Sally Foote, she's an animal behaviorist and we've got a great topic to talk about today because I think a lot of times when people get a pet, they think, Oh, Fluffy or Fido would never do something like this to me because I'm their owner.

But we are going to talk about why cats suddenly kind of turn on their owners and we say attack, but they really could attack their owners.

So is it normal for cats to be aggressive?

Sally: So first of all, aggression, aggression is a normal behavior.

So aggression is defined as threatening body language, threatening actions to have a threat go away to make the threat go away.

So for the cat, there's something happening in that moment, something in the space around them that to that cat is a threat.

Now, it may not seem like a threat to us, but it is to the cat.

It could be, and cats are more sensitive, their hearing is more sensitive and their vision is more sensitive.

So that's why noises, noises startle the cat and startle aggression.

So to aggress against something that suddenly startles them is somewhat of a normal behavior.

To back it off, what is this?

What just happened around me?

Okay, so startle, aggression, and the movement or the motion, like something that moves really quickly, that's when we can get into what's called predatory play that they want to chase after grab it and kill it.

Kelly: Right?

Sally: Because basically all the play behaviors and cats, cats are based on them wanting to kill something.

I have an old saying that a happy cat's a cat who thinks he killed something every day.

So yes, in the sense it is normal for any cat to aggress.

Now some cats will go to aggression, go to aggressing on whether it's another cat, a person in the home is a response to noise or things like this more quickly as compared to others.

And there can be some factors involved in that.

Kelly: What are some of the other reasons?

You mentioned noise and sight things, but in doing some research for today's discussion, I was kind of taken aback that even petting.

Sally: Yes, touch.

Kelly: Touch, I was like, petting your own cat and it's going to turn on you.

Sally: Right.

Kelly: That's a possibility.

Sally: Right?

So touch how it can be a trigger, meaning the stimulus that may have the cat suddenly turned to bite comes from a couple of things.

First of all, socialization means for an animal to have experienced anything, any noise, any touch, any movement when they're young and they don't have any fear about it and something good has happened in the moment of it.

So in the case of touch, some cats, they were raised without a lot of handling, without a lot of petting and touch.

A cat was maybe raised in a barn, right?

A more totally straight outside cat.

And the socialization period for kitten is from three to nine weeks of age after that, and this is natural.

The cat has more, they're more on the lookout in life, more vigilance.

They have a higher level of... their brain kind of chemistry.

And what they need to do in life is to always be on the lookout for what might come and hurt me.

Because the cat is both the predator and the prey.

They predate on, they kill things that are littler than them and they're killed by things that are bigger than them.

So when it comes to the petting, if say a kitten didn't get a lot of petting as a young kitten and now they're coming into the home at 10 weeks of age or 12 weeks of age, this is where they may flinch away from it or they actually turn and they go to grabbing on the hand like, oh, I want to kill your hand.

Because at 12 weeks of age, 16 weeks of age is when the kitten is really refining those skills for hunting and killing.

And if they don't have another toy that you toss or something else to kind of vent those behaviors on, then the action of touching is kind of stimulating to the body that they turn and bite on the hands.

Now that we also have our mature cats, our cats over the age of eight or nine, many of which have arthritis developing in the lower back or in the elbow.

So touching the skin is stimulating, you know what I mean?

It's the touch, the stimulation on the skin and the musculature, which now maybe like, oh, that's irritating.

And the cats do not show their body language of stop at avoidance as boldly whatever, if you want to use that word as obviously as say, compared to a dog.

So what the cat does is they hold real still, they kind of hunker down and then they'll go up and bite after the third or fourth pet.

So my guidance for all, anybody pet owners, whatever, veterinary staff, shelter people, is you can pet most cats, they kind of also have kind of a map on their body.

What part do I want to be petted on or not?

So in general, most cats are okay being petted from the right here on the head's about the back of the neck because that's where cats will co-groom each other.

Two strokes and you stop.

And then the cat, if he wants more petting, he's going to head bump you, which is how he takes his little head and he bumps against you, which is a cat's way of marking you, okay, I'll pet you again.

Now if he doesn't, what he said was, thank you, that was enough.

And then that's fine.

Kelly: When we talk about cat aggression, I mean we shouldn't take it lightly.

I think we do because I think people think, oh dogs, a dog that's more aggressive is a lot more scarier.

But cats have teeth and they have claws.

Sally: And they have bacteria in their mouth, the bacteria in the mouth of a cat.

I was just at the Pennsylvania Veterinary Medical Association meeting and an MD in public health was giving a great talk about what we call the diseases between animals and man.

And veterinarians have all known this, that the bacteria in the cat's mouth is highly inflaming and highly infectious.

Which is why when people or even cat to cat, the cat bites, within 24 hours, the whole arm make it swollen, cat scratch fever, that's part of this.

It becomes a very deep infection within anywhere as short as four to six hours on a person and that's where they may need IV antibiotics, et cetera.

And cats don't go to biting until the cat really feels like I've got nothing else left.

They're actually highly, highly anxious, highly, they really feel very much threatened.

There's no way to stop this but to bite at you.

Kelly: What are some of the other signs of aggression that we should look for in a cat that's feeling intimidated?

Sally: So this is my feline ladder of aggression.

I've published this, it's on my website.

And so aggression is always about what, like I said, the cat is now fighting off what they find as a threat.

So it's actually based on first signs that they're going to show are trying to avoid or they're being anxious about it.

And this is what we miss.

So we don't realize it's brewing and it's building.

So when it's brewing and building, you always want to think of, hey, whatever's going around my cat, let's get the cat away from it or it away from the cat to prevent going to aggression.

But the signs are things like the cat has dilated pupils.

That's a big one.

When a cat's pupils are dilated, see they're already about a level three, that's when their first... and that's an adrenaline response to the eye is to allow more light into the eye.

Because normally cat's pupils should be slits.

They're kind of like almonds.

If they're round, it's like, okay, he's actually kind of nervous.

Hair slightly raised over the back.

That's what I call kind of like you're just a little poofy.

I am not talking about the Halloween cat.

The Halloween cat is full on.

I am at the end of my rope.

I am doing every posturing and everything I can to say, get away from me right now or I will bite you.

I'm not up to bite yet.

I'm talking about the cat where it's just kind of, they kind of have a little bit of the hair raised.

As they sit down the back, their legs are drawn close to their body, their tail is wrapped around their body, they're making... they're really collapsing their body down, they're making themselves small.

When the cat is hiding, as you can see the cat that's already almost two thirds of the way up this chart.

When the cat is underneath the bed in the back corner behind the recliner, underneath the coffee table, in the cat tree, in the box, the cat is hiding his way of saying, okay, I just want to stay away from the world.

If nobody sees me, everything is way better, okay.

Then the cat, their ears will be turned back as when there's someone keeps reaching for them or maybe keep petting them.

Then as they shift to the aggression and that's when they go to stare and staring in cats is very subtle.

Staring in the dog is much more obvious.

People can tell the hard eye in the dog, I'm doing it to you right now.

Okay, what's staring in the cat.

See that it was a lot less intense, but that's staring in the cat.

So cats may stare at each other or say you're petting and then you put your hand down and then cats and looking at your hand, he's staring at your hand.

So he is actually, because he's saying, okay, hand you going to touch me again.

And if you do again, then the cat may swat as a way of stop it and then go to bite.

And then cats bite differently than dogs.

Cats will go into multiple bites, meaning they bite, bite, bite up your arm, bite, bite, bite up your leg or your body.

A dog bites it hangs on and really wants to do intense damage that way.

So the difference is yes, dogs, dogs do a lot more, let's say physical damage.

Really severe physical damage, intense damage.

And dogs are actually faster to go up to bite as compared to the cat, in this situation.

Kelly: I was watching some cat videos before our interview and the one that really stuck out to me, there was this cat that was on a flight of steps and a person was trying to go down the steps and the cat was all of these signs.

And also to the point of talking like.

And I mean literally was talking and the gentleman couldn't get down the steps and he threw a towel at it and that didn't work.

And he was petrified to go past the cat because the cat was swatting and the claws were out and roaring.

Sally: If he advanced any closer, he knew I'm coming closer and she's going to go up to attacking me.

Kelly: What do you do?

Sally: Okay, so what do you do?

First of all, what's tricky in that moment is that yes, the cat's already so intense.

Even the motion... Kelly: Oh it's burning, be red on that chart.

Sally: Even in the movement of the feet to retreat away, because to get away from the cat, increase the distance away, he's the trigger, his feet moving is the trigger.

So if we can get his feet farther away from her, that would decrease her escalation.

And again, like the dog, they've got to get down to kind of a level here before they'll even want to follow a positive reward like tossing food to get her to move further down the stairs.

Like Kitty, you stay six feet ahead of me and don't even look at my feet because if you don't look at my feet, you don't see the trigger.

And this is how I can get you ahead of me and away from me without me being attacked.

But she's got to be down to here before she can take the food or anything like that.

So setups, right?

So that cat, what I would say, first of all, there's a lot more to it, she may need like, she may have chronic pain and the pain triggered aggression is very common in our cats.

And getting them on a pain reliever can help tremendously.

But then the second thing is, anytime he's needing to walk around the house, we're tossing her food to get her to learn to move away from me in a positive way.

In that moment.

Yeah, he's trying.

Now maybe she's had a towel thrown over her where somebody picked her up in the towel.

So now she thinks that she's, and that was very agitating.

So now she says, I hate the towels.

That's how come the towel might have been a problem.

It is a first good thought cover the cat.

So the cat can't see me and come after me as I go past.

But it is a tough situation.

And basically the best thing would be something to just don't let the cat see you get away and wait for the cat to calm down.

And then maybe from 10 feet away you throw tuna down the stairs to get the cat to move ahead of you and away from you.

And then try to get... again, lure the cat in a room, close the cat in the room with no stimulus.

Cats take about four to six times longer to calm down as compared to a dog.

So if the cat's been agitated for half an hour, you could be looking at four hours for them to really calm down before they could be around.

But definitely, definitely, definitely contact your veterinarian immediately and let them know and then contact contacted behaviorist like myself to help you.

Because oftentimes, or maybe like I said, sometimes as simple as getting them on a pain relief and then we can retrain the cat for a lot of this typical noise and movement stimuli in the home that can help them out.

We can help cats with behavior.

Sometimes people think that cats are a lost cause with behavior and it's sad, but they're not.

Kelly: There is something called re directive or redirected aggression too, which I thought was very interesting.

Explain to us what that is.

And I'm sure that's pretty typical.

Sally: Yeah, we see it in both dogs and cats, any species, but especially in the cats.

So redirected aggression is, here's a typical scenario, cat sitting by the patio door looking outside and here comes the neighborhood cat.

And that neighborhood cat is walking right across my deck and it's right in front of me.

And I don't like you cat, I want you, I want you off my deck, right?

So the cat inside the house has this glass barrier.

He can't get to the cat.

He's hissing, he's staring, he's growling.

The other cat's like, yeah, it's a cool day in June I think I'll hang out on your porch because he knows you can't get to me.

I got that door there.

Kelly: Right.

Sally: Now the kitty inside the house see he's up and he's actually, he's growling, he's staring, he wants to bite but he can't get to the cat and nonchalantly, here comes housemate cat just walking by.

So cat who's now building an aggression turns on housemate cat because he redirects onto the housemate cat because he can get to and it's the movement that was just that added little stimulus of you're there.

So because he can get to this one because he can't get to that one.

Or you happen to walk by to move the curtains, what's going on outside and he bites you because you came, you were right next to your cat and he redirected on you.

So, when the cat's that agitated everybody stay away.

Kelly: Is there a way to console the cat?

Like oh buddy, it's okay, he's just... Sally: Any touch, remember, right?

Touch, noise and movement are all added triggers.

So the best thing is don't touch him, don't talk to him, don't say or do anything.

Just try to get the other cat like the cat he sees outside away or just stay away from the cat.

Whether the cat moves away.

Give the one who was upset a good half an hour or an hour to calm down.

Then get the frosted glass film to put on the bottom of your patio door so we can't see these other cats outside.

Do not feed stray cats where your cats can see them close to your patios and things.

I tell clients to do this too, get one of those bazooka water pistols.

So if you have a stray cat or other wildlife that are bothering your house cats that you squirt at the outside cats.

So now you're making an unfriendly to come on my back porch and then put the cat food in another side of the house, the cats don't see them.

I'm going to make it friendly over here and unfriendly here.

Kelly: What about, let's go back to kittens for a minute because you said there's a period of time for a kitten that's very impressionable.

Does that where we start to try to train our cats not to be aggressive and is there playtime that helps in this development?

Sally: Right?

So the kitten, what we call the sensory period of socialization, meaning that their senses for hearing touch and vision are not so acutely, so sharply developed so that it's easy for them to accept touch, handling, noises, anything that moves around and be like, oh that's okay.

And mother cat is so important because she is teaching these kittens what to ignore.

It's kind of like the kittens are living, cats are living in a world with a volume cranked up really high and they've got to learn how to ignore a lot of this background noise.

And it comes from mother because if mother's ignoring it or still goes on with grooming them in the midst of it, that's how the kittens are like, okay, don't respond to it everything's okay?

So with little kittens, yes it's important to pick them up and handle them, hold them, pet them and give them a small bit of tuna or a treat or reward.

For humans to play with them.

But do not play the games for them to grab onto your arm, bite on your hand or grab onto your sleeve or your foot because then you're teaching them to grab on an attack your hand or your foot like it was something to grab onto.

So then when they get their adult teeth, they're going to be doing more biting and after that then that predatory play develops.

Kelly: So how do you react to that playful, attacky behavior that a cat... Sally: Get a substitute?

Okay, so I have a couple of handouts on my website.

One is called Kill the Bear.

Remember I said a happy cat is a cat who thinks he killed something every day.

And yes, American Association Feline Practitioner also recommended stop feeding our cats out of one bowl.

We should put either small dishes we hide on shelves to get the cats up at hunting for it.

Secondly, I'm a firm believer in you're going to get a kitty workout.

What's that?

I'm going to take this little dish of dry food in the morning when I'm having my breakfast, I'm going to toss the nugget of food on the floor.

So you have to scan, and especially if you have hard flooring and if you don't they could do it on a carpet but maybe set down like a tarp or something that they can see the nugget of food.

You want the nugget of food to skittle across the floor like a cockroach for the cat to pounce on it and grab it and eat it.

Now he thinks he killed his food.

So he's getting the outlet for the predatory play.

He's playing, he's scampering and running around the house and he's having fun with you.

So then he's vented it and that's what makes him less likely want to grab on your arm, the kill the bear is you take a stuffed animal and you tie a heavy string on it and you drag it across the ground.

It was a little big rat and you're enticing.

You want the cat to pounce on it in, they've got to go through the whole predatory sequence.

What's that?

They grab it and they pounce on it.

They put their paws around it, they bite it and they tread it with their back feet.

Don't interrupt them in that pattern.

They need to vent the whole pattern.

That's how they kill their prey.

Isn't it wonderful talking about these things Kelly?

Kelly: Yeah.

Wow.

Okay, I'm going to kind of shift gears just a little bit because we've been talking a lot about the cat and what owners can do.

I agree to cat sit for a friend and my friend is going to be gone for an extended period of time, let's say two weeks.

So I go over to my friend's house day one and the cat loves me.

Oh, I'm so happy to see you, you can feed me, you can do whatever.

Day two or three, when I go over there, the cat's a little bit more standoffish, doesn't want me around.

Day six or seven, it gets a little worse and by the end of my babysitting time or cat sitting time, this cat is aggressive towards me, doesn't want me in the house, doesn't want me by their bowl, won't allow me to feed it.

What do I do?

Sally: Okay, so yeah.

So any pet sitter is, if you haven't done a few visits or whatever, never have been around this pet before, this cat before.

The cats have to get their scent on you in order for them to feel like you're a part of their world.

And the first visit, usually it goes more the opposite, typically the cat doesn't want anything to do with you until you've been there a few times like if you're coming every day.

And then you've picked up the smells of the home, which then the cat wants to rub up it in you.

But let's say it goes more on the scenario you described.

It might have been a cat who was a little more confident and curious, so he rubbed up against you and he marked you.

But depending on what other scents you picked up and you brought in the home, cats are very scent sensitive.

So maybe you have another cat at home, maybe you had a scrub out a garage that had... no really, you had a scrub out of a garage that you had to use some chemicals that were still had the smell on your clothing and the cat was like, oh, that's offensive.

Then the cat associates that with you.

So I always think it's best for two things.

There is a product called Feliway, Feliway is a feline pheromone spray.

All cat sitters, definitely.

Spray it on your lower legs, just a little spritz on your pants and on your forearms because to the cat they feel like they've already marked you and it contains what's called a feline friend pheromone.

Ooh, I met you Kelly, I like you.

Secondly, when you walk in the house, have whatever, whether it's some kind of treat like temptations, dry food's kind of nice because again you're getting into that predatory play, right?

You're going to toss that treat on the floor if the cat comes out for them to scamper after and to eat because now they're, oh, it's actually kind of fun that Kelly comes here.

Thirdly, be aware of whatever noises you are making in cleaning up.

Some people may tend to not be aware of the dropping, like a dropping broom, right?

Or they're sweeping up the litter that got scattered all over and the cat was kind of watching you like, what are you doing in my house?

But the sweeping motion was a part of the cat getting agitated.

Then they relate that to you and that's why the aggression is building up.

So having this, and again think of have it around the house and for pet cat sitters, they're like, well if the cat's showing any of these signs, think of can I get the cat away from what I'm doing or get what I'm doing away from the cat.

If you're sweeping up the litter and you need to sweep up the litter, let's like toss a handful of food or let's sort of get the cat out of the room, close the door and then sweep up the litter so it doesn't see you doing the sweeping.

Kelly: When is it time to call in somebody like you or to seek advice from of a vet?

Because like you said, early on in our discussion, there could be something medical going on with the cat and... Sally: Brewing, brewing, heart disease, kidney disease, arthritis.

Oh yeah.

Kelly: Something like that and they can't tell us.

And so you let this behavior continue and continue and continue when it really could be something that could be treated.

Sally: Right.

Okay, any change in behavior or just any sign of your pet?

Any kind of body hunched with the head down.

A lot of times people miss this in the cats.

Okay, because it is more subtle.

So if you see your cat laying around, this is kind of how they look when their head is down or hunched down or looking like that or any kind of hiding, that's when the stress level is running high for the cat.

It could be environmental, it could be chronic pain, it could also be some of these rising health conditions.

Definitely get your cat in for vet exam.

Now it's sometimes as stressful and hard for the cats to get in for vet exam.

So look for veterinarian, a veterinarian clinic that follows either the fear free, the low stress handling or cat friendly practice principles call around and ask.

There are also tips I have.

I have my YouTube channel with 170 videos and I'll say you can use a pillowcase as a cat carrier.

A lot of cats hate being put on the carrier.

I get that.

And if a cat is sick, I can't do the training, I need to get them in today.

Right?

Okay.

So how you can use a pillow case as a carrier for your cat that's a lot less stressful for your cat because reducing the travel stress to get to the vet helps the vet visit be a lot better for the cat and everybody so that they can do the exam or an x-ray to check for a spine, if there's arthritis in the spine or blood work, et cetera.

Kelly: Good advice as always, Dr. Sally Foote veterinarian animal behaviorist and, I don't know, your resume is super long.

Thank you as always for joining us here on The Paw Report.

Sally: Thank you for having me.

Kelly: We've loved having you for the last 12 years here.

Sally: I love being here too.

Kelly: Thank you so much.

And thank you our viewers for joining us on this episode of The Paw Report.

We'll see you next time.

Rob: Dave's Decorating Center is a proud supporter of The Paw Report on WEIU.

Dave's Decorating Center features the Mohawk Smartstrand Silk Forever Clean carpet.

Dave's Decorating Center, authorized Mohawk color center in Charleston.

Rameen: The Paw Report on WEIU is supported by Rural King, America's farm and home store, livestock feed, farm equipment, pet supplies and more.

You can find your store and more information regarding Rural King at ruralking.com.

Additional support for The Paw Report provided from Soggie Paws of Mattoon.

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