Friday, July 08, 2011

To spray or not to spray - that is the question!


Dear George,
I am currently extremely stressed by my home situation and my human's behaviour. It has really upset me. She has brought home a new human, one who works in a veterinary clinic. Yes, one of those. A complete stranger to me. He smells of dogs, feline fear, vaccination needles and disinfectant (ironically smells a bit like cat pee). True, I have had a few scent hints about his presence in her life. She stayed out one night all night and came back looking very pleased with herself. As if the cat had got the cream, I might almost say. Now he has turned up and spent the night here. Yes, the whole night. He didn't even have the decency to mate and leave.
Shall I spray? I think it might make me feel better. And it would show her how very upset I am by her mating behaviour. What do you think? I rather thought I might do it on the unmade bed after he had got out of it.
Yours
Louis.

Dear Louis,
No wonder you are upset. The sex life of these humans is so outrageous. Any time. Any season. The females are ready for it all year round. Their permanent readiness is really disgusting to felines. We have proper seasons for it, interspersed with kitten bearing and usually we remain abstinent during the winter. Makes sense. Who wants to have kittens that die of cold. As a cat who has had the snip, I really feel sorry for them, at the mercy of their ever present hormones.
Spraying gives the message "Stop it." Or "Piss off". Or both messages at the same time. However, it is the nuclear option for us cats, Louis. It is the ultimate weapon and the final deterrent. It can go wrong. Humans seem unable to read the message - which is "I am upset". They sometimes think we are just being malicious.
So my advice would be to avoid all out final war and try to set up a training programme using more gradual rewards and punishments. Obviously you will refuse to sleep on the bed, as usual. You wouldn't get a wink of sleep anyway. Pace round it making little kitten mewing noises. Jump up on the side of your human, then shudder, crouch and hiss at the new mate beside her.
Run away immediately he comes into the house, making sure that your human sees your fear. Refuse to eat your food (you can probably get a good meal further down the street anyway). In every way treat him as if he was a cat killer. A human who smells of the vet is a killer. They call it euthanasia. I call it murder.
Sympathies,
George

7 comments:

  1. SebastianJuly 09, 2011

    Spray on HER - make it very clear she's yours!
    Mark your territory baby!
    Sebastian

    ReplyDelete
  2. Be very careful! If he smells like a vet (Ugh!) don't spray - he might take you to his clinic!
    May be ask for more attention from your human? Charm her more and more and hopefully she'll forget about him.
    Minnie

    ReplyDelete
  3. Fluffy and CayenneJuly 09, 2011

    Dear Louis, here is a tip we got from George a while back; get a white cloth (you can borrow one from your human)and rub it on you and then rub it on this new human that smells so bad. This will help him get your smell and hopefully his natural smell won't bother you so much. If your human is happy in his presence that's your only chance to live a happy life because he'll never leave. Or you can rub your fur on the bed sheet and they both will get your smell.
    Hugs
    Fluffy & Cayenne

    ReplyDelete
  4. Man, start showing more affection to him then to her. Hopefully this will drive her nuts and make her get rid of him! Be happy!
    Diego

    ReplyDelete
  5. For what she did....you should spray on both of them! How come she found a vet and not an astronaut? Completely lack of imagination!
    Porthos

    ReplyDelete
  6. FredericoJuly 09, 2011

    Humans not even mate when in the same bed. Most of time they watch TV and then ...one takes one bedroom and the other takes the other bedroom. They take so much space! Soooo inconvenient!
    Frederico

    ReplyDelete
  7. Louis, George's advice is very good, but we reckon that bringing home apes who smell of the vet is one step too far. Next time this ape appears, take the stance, tail up and quivering and spray up his leg. Soak him. Save up a whole bladder full and let him have it. It'll make him smell better and let him know who runs the house.

    George and Celia, thank you so much for the kind words and love you left for our darling bro' Whicky. We miss him so much. He left a very big hole behind him

    Gerry & Oliver

    ReplyDelete

Help for cats whose humans show behaviour problems.

This blog is devoted to the study of human behaviour. We cats, who live with this sometimes unpredictable and always feeble minded species, can benefit from seeing their behaviour in its proper scientific context. The study of feline dilemmas, training problems, and difficulties with humans, can only benefit all of us. All of us train our humans - to buy the right food, for instance, but many of us do not have knowledge of how to improve our training methods. The human species is obviously not as intelligent as the cat, but nevertheless can learn quite a lot - if properly managed. Topics of interest include the use of claw and order, purring as a human reward, rubbing your human up the right way, when to bite, spraying as a method of making our wishes known, ignoring the human, human harassment, human inattention and sheer human stupidity. I welcome your questions. Photos can be sent via my secretary's website, www.celiahaddon.com This blog has been chosen as one of the top 50 feline blogs by Online VetTechprogramms.org