Is your cat crazy--John Wright Chapter 2 , 3

Jennifer say:


Chapter 2_Secret of litter-box success-as mentioned, i do not use litter box for my cats and so i skipped this chapter.

Chapter 3- The crime of punishment

1) Physical punishment usually backfires, making the cat more angry or more fearful and aggressive.

2) Case Study: Tigger a male cat had a litter box problem as a kitten, when he missed the box, his owner would shoved the cat nose into the wet spot and bit the owner. When tigger bit, the owner will rap the nose, resulting in the cat lunging at the owner ankles at all times--feeding, petting. Tigger's initial encounter with his owner knuckles reulted in fear induced aggression and it was clearly a case where physical abuse had severly aggravated what had started as a rather minor and occasional problem. Wright concluded that Tigger was failry reactive--was responding emontionally to a signal or stimulus was that his eyes would dilate just before an attack. Dilated pupils may signal the cats are overly aroused and probably about to do something regrettable, such as losing it a rug or attacking somebody. Tigger usually attack his owner when she put down his food bowl. The stimulus was so cued in as in a ritualized pattern that he attacked his owner more or less automatically.
Solution: Wright taught the owner to break their daily pattern. The owner wil back off the food bowl instead of walking past the bowl to prevent tigger from attacking her legs. Also the owner must stop all physical punishment and play with tigger. Tigger must know that his owner presence will signal play time, not punishment.

3) If your cat start to misbehave, just a voice--"ah, ah" will interrupt the activity. When the cat looks at you, you can say "good kitty" in a sweet smooth voice. Then your cats will learn the difference between doing something that gets a 'Ah Ah" and doing something that gets a paise.. The idea is to reduce the misbehaviour by interrupting it or redirecting ti to an accepable outlet, not to PUNISH the pet. we changed behaviour by redirecting it, or inducing in the cat a happy or calm mood. Once you change the mood, then changing behaviour is easier for pet n owner.