SHOULD YOU DO IT ANYWAY?
Your responsibility should be primarily for the cat or cats already in your care. Think hard before asking an very elderly cat to put up with a new companion. Kittens will be accepted better than an adult cat, but kittens often pounce on and pester old cats. Some old cats will mother a kitten; others (like my eight year old Mog) definitely won't! It can take months and months for harmony and sometimes the cats will never be friends. Cats which are used to a multi-cat household will be less upset than a cat which has lived alone. Get a kitten from a cat shelter, which will promise to take it back if the introduction really doesn't work out. A male female mix is probably better than all female.
Be careful about accepting the local stray into your home. Ask yourself if an existing cat should have to put up with a former stray, who may bully her/him. Also you need to have the stray tested for Feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV), so that it does not pass this on to your existing cat or cats. Think in terms of quarantine until the new stray is vaccinated and make sure all your cats are vaccinated before the introduction. In the case of a stray cat, you can feed it outside, then when it is tame enough find it a new home via the Cats Protection or the Blue Cross.
THE INTRODUCTION
The best way to introduce a new cat is to give it an indoor pen with food, litter
etc. If you can't borrow or buy one, give the new cat its own room, so that it
feels it has safe territory. Shut doors windows, and block chimneys before letting
it out. If possible a retreat hole like a covered cardboard box with entrance
hole, or a cage-den . Put familiar toys (if available), feeding bowls etc. in
the room. Put litter tray in the room. You can't expect a cat to go outside in
the first few days, and if you let it, you may not see it again.
Mix the smells. From the point of view of a cat, anything which smells strange
is an intruder. Give the new cat something to sleep on which smells of the old
cat, then visa versa. Using same grooming tools on both cats. Pet one, then go
to next room and pet the other. Transfer used litter from the new cat tray to
the old cat's tray and visa versa to mix smells. If you have a large indoor pen, all this can be done while the kitten spends time
in the pen.
Vets can sell something called Feliway. This is a pheromone, a cat scent, that reduces feline anxiety and will therefore help. Spray it at chin
height on things a cat would rub with its chin, all round the new pen and the
room where the pen is. That is to say, you want both the new cat and the existing cat to have access to it. So if they are being kept in different rooms, use Feliway in both. Feliway comes as a spray or a plug-in.
If you don't have a pen, first swap all the smells while the new cat is in
the separate room. Then use a cat box with the new kitten in it for the first
introduction. That way, they have the chance to see each other in safety. Watch
the body language closely. Introduce the animals together when the new cat is
used to his room and territory. Make sure there are escape routes for a
cat wants to run away. Do not leave strange animals together alone. You must be
there to make sure accidents don't happen.
Staring, puffing up fur, hissing, growing etc may happen. This is OK as long as
it isn't translated into aggressive action. Do not intervene unless you think
one cat is being seriously hurt. Do not pet the newcomer in front of the old cat
to begin with. Give the old cat extra affection.
For two cats make sure that there are at least two feeding stations and two litter tray locations. There should be several cat beds or cat resting places. Each cat should be able to eat and eliminate without having to worry about the other cat ambushing it. Allow them to live separate lives, so to speak, in the same house for as long as they want to.
Be careful of letting the new animals out -- give them
about 3 weeks inside first. Make sure that the first time, there is an easy way
back inside the house -- ie. don't expect a new cat necessarily to know about
catflaps, leave an open door.
Accept that that the new cat and the old cat may never be friends. If they tolerate each other, that should
be good enough. Try to make sure they both have safe places to retreat to. But
if one cat is seriously bullied -- not able to eat without being hassled, ambushed
on its way in and out of the litter tray, harassed in its cat bed, spending all
its time under the bed, then think of rehoming.
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OTHER INFO
Cats Protection hss information on from www.cats.org.uk .
Consult Introducing our cat to other cats and dogs on www.fabcats.org .