We were going to be bringing home our new kitten soon, and I wanted to be prepared. I don’t know much about cat behavior, so I started researching how to introduce a new cat to a household with two other cats. I wasn’t sure if it was like a puppy – just bring them home basically….Turns out I was wrong about that!
How to introduce your new kitten to a multi-cat household:
Allow no face to face interaction when you first bring home the new cat.
Put the new cat in a separate room and close the door. Have a litter box, food, water, bed and toys available for them.
There will be some hissing, and posturing around the door by all the cats. This is normal. Let them do it. They need to get used to each other’s scent.
Try to feed the cats near the door, so that they start to associate the new cat with something good: food. Give them treats by the door as well.
Rub a towel on the new cat, and then rub that towel on the existing cats as well. This helps them become accustomed to the new scent. Place blankets or towels that have the new cat’s scent around the home.
Put the existing cats in the new cat’s room, and let the new cat out to roam around the house for awhile. This continues to enforce the new cat’s scent around the house, and the other cats can take time to get used to it in the room.
Once most of the hissing has stopped (how long this takes depends on your cats), you can carefully introduce the new cats. I found it best to do this with food & treats.
Now, all of this sounds well and good….but when we brought our new kitten home; we thought she was so sweet and cute, how could the other cats not love her too? So, we ignored all the rules we had learned and just plopped her down in the living room.
What ensued was not in the best interests of any cats! Hissing, screaming, growling, howling, puffed up kitties! I had no idea they all had it in them! We quickly scooped up the kitten and sequestered her in the office, happy to get her away without injury.
Three days later, after adhering to all the “rules”, we had three happy cats all laying on the bed purring and sleeping all day. There is still a hiss here or there, but as each day passes, we see more and more improvement. The other day we saw one of the older cats playing with the kitten a bit, so I think they will soon all be best friends.