I just put the cat in time out

Mr I has been chasing the cat around the house & Tabby has got jack of it and turned around and swiped him(didn't connect). I'm too tired to have to deal with a cat that believes he doesn't have to move for anyone, even though it would be prudent to get up on something so his tail doesn't get grabbed, so I've locked him in the laundry (where his kitty litter,food & water is).

Its got me thinking, I do smack the cats occasionally and I tell them to shut up as other cat is very vocal (a big whinger), and I'm realising this is not the best example for the boys. So has anyone got any gentle pet owning tips?

With ours we used to put both child and cat in time out. One of old cats was very vocal and we used to "parent" him the same way as the kids, they're very intelligent creatures and will learn acceptable behaviour. Maybe give the cats somewhere safe to be, somewhere up high that they can get to. We did this, once the cats had enough of the kids, they would wait until the kids loosened their grip and then the cat would be gone. Yes we had instances that our big old bruiser of a tom (not the vocal one, very quiet so never got warning that he was "at the edge) would swipe a kid (claws retracted) but when you asked the other kids what lead to this, you discovered it was after a lot of tormenting of the cat. This tom would claw an adult for the heck of it but never once did he ever claw one of the kids.

In the situation you described above (personal opinion) Mr I should have gone into time-out for teasing the cat, they were playing together and the cat "warned" Mr I for going a bit too far (which you punished the cat for - which will confuse the cat), you probably would find that Tabby didn't have claws out. We used to find all the time that claws were retracted when this would happen, it is just a warning for the child to be wary of the cat, that the child was pushing the boundaries. Maybe Mr I needs to be swiped to learn the limits of what he can and cannot do with Tabby.

I agree, with above said. we have the most annoying cat ever! She eats, spews up, comes back for more food with the most devilish meow ever, i dont like her very much at all haha But i would never tease her, but i have smacked her a few times when shes swiped at me for no reason. I think u need to talk to Mr I about teasing the cat, its quite dangerous my bestfriend has a scar on her chest from her cat when she was a kid, she usto pull his tail and i guess he'd had enough which is fair enough IMO I dont think your ever going to stop a cat from swiping in retalliation, but you can watch to see whats making him swipe and stop that behaviour.

Mr I is 8 mths so he's not teasing the cat, he's just chasing the thing he can see. I try to re-direct him, but sometimes he stalks the cat without me noticing. Tabby will not move and will not stay put if you gently move him, he'll just go back to where he was in the middle of the floor - the cat creed of I'm the most important thing & I deserve to be where I want to be. He will move with less than gentle persuasion, but I don't think its a good example to be hitting him.

When my cat is being naughty (eg clawing the rug) I use a water spray bottle - perhaps you could incorporate this with Tabby? Better than hitting your fluffy one. Though in your example of this post it wasn't like Tabby was being the naughty one! I'm due in a few weeks and not looking forward to dealing with bub and my 2 cats!!

Once our babies have become interested in the animals we have taken their hands and 'patted' the animals with them so show them how to be gentle when they pat. We keep doing this to give the animal and baby time to get used to each other frequently repeating the word gentle. After that we've always let the kids and cats sort them selves out. If the baby is being too rough the cat will walk away, or give a warning swipe.

The only time one of our cats swiped at DD1 is when she snuck up on the cat when it was fast asleep. DD1 got a fright and a little scratch and the cat knew it was in trouble. But we didn't punish the cat as she only did it cause she was surprised.

HTH

I think there are two issues here, one is how to gently reinforce positive behaviour in your cat without resorting to not nice words or smacking. The other issue is how to teach your cat and your chlid the "rules".

The first one is to parent your pet like you would your child. If your child were physically attacking someone else, you would remove them from the situation and let them calm down before letting them back in. or I should say, "I would...." So do the same with your child. If your cat is meowing non stop and being generally irritating, you can talk back and carry on a conversation... or you could ask them to be quiet... those are gentle options. I know I say to my girls often "Geez that dog is being annoying by barking, lets go see what is going on" so they see that we need to resolve it and not leave the animals to carry on.

I'm not against the use of water pistols for more dangerous behaviour, or for scratching furniture etc etc... cats hate them, but I don't think using them for meowing is something you want to show the kids. I mean its basically saying they get in trouble for talking? My girls have "quiet time" when things are too loud, and if they keep going they go to their room. So I would consider if the cat is too annoying to give the cat somewhere to go. Away from the situation.

The children vs animal thing... well that is a hard one. I often have had to tell the animal that no matter what it is not okay to scratch/bite/claw a child. It doesn't matter how it happened. I think its important to teach our children how to behave around animals and animals to behave around children so that the situation isn't repeated.