Fighting among animals is a common thing happen. Even some pets, such as cats and dogs might fight each other because of several reasons. As a pet owner, you need to know how to prevent this condition, otherwise, one or both of your pets might die because of fighting. You can see the example of how to train puppies to stop fighting each other in the house so you get the idea how to stop animals from fighting.
Cat is also likely to fight to its friends or enemies. Why do cats fight? Cats are territory animals, which means they will fight to defend what is on their territory or area.
You might have ever seen your cat fight with other cats outside the house. Your cat thinks that your house is its territory and it wants to defend what is in its territory.
Other cats shouldn’t be there! It doesn’t only happen to pet cat and other cats, but even some pet cats fight with each other. So, if you have more than one cat at home, be ready with this issue.
Besides its nature as territorial animal, cat also likes to play with others and sometimes it can get too rough. When a cat plays roughly, the condition may look like aggression and fighting.
You can check the signs of cats that want to play. However, you need to be aware whether their play is turning into a fight or cause harm to both or one of the cats.
It might be a question for you “What should I do if I see my cats are fighting?” Here are the 6 ways to stop them from fighting.
- Distraction Works!
Distracting your cats while they are fighting is one of the effective ways to stop them. You can use their toy or something that it loves very much, or even making a noise with the toy to get their attention. When their attention is distracted, it might be possible to separate them from fighting.
- Enrich Their Resources
Lack of each cat’s resources, such as food, water bowls, scratching posts and litter trays might be the cause of your cats fighting. Try to provide sufficient resources for each cat in your house, so they won’t get jealous of each other. If possible, provide resources so that each cat can access its resources easily.
- Territory Matters
Just like the resources, each cat’s territory might be thought carefully. As being told before, cat doesn’t really feel fond of being in a group, so they won’t be likely to share their territory with other cats.
They need private space for climbing, hiding and sleeping. By providing separated and private territory to do so, they will hardly see any conflict between them. If you want to know more about cat being territorial animal, you can read how to stop your cat from marking territory at your house.
- Spraying Water
This is one of the ways you can do when your cats are fighting with each other. To separate them, gently spray a fine mist of water, and they will pause for a while. When they pause for a while, then it is your time to pick one of the cats to separate it from the other.
- Never Use Violence
Shouting loudly, such as “Stop!” “Hey” and etc. or even hit your cats to separate them from fighting won’t never work. Those actions will just make the conditions worse: your cats get hurt or stressed, and the fight may get worse.
Never use violence to stop them from fighting, but use gentle techniques so that they won’t get stressed and afraid. Using violence might lead your cat to have trauma, and here are the signs your cat has trauma. Be aware of them!
- Who Doesn’t Love Rewards and Attention?
Rewards and attention play important role in training your pets, including cats. One thing to remember is only give rewards and attention when your cats are behaving well.
Once they are showing poor behavior, such as fighting, then never give them any reward as it might lead to more and more fight in the future. Give reward and attention while your cats are calm and showing good behavior when they are close together.
Using reward is one of the ways of how to gain trust from your newly adopted cat. Of course, reward is not only the way to gain trust, but also for making your cat happy.
Handling the problems of fighting cats might seem hard and tiring, but time will prove that all the efforts will be paid off. Don’t you feel happy to see your cats are living peacefully and happily together?
If you want to see other tips about keeping cats as pets at home, you can see symptoms of cats anxiety you need to pay attention to and what should be done and fun games to play with your beloved cats at home. Happy cats, happy owners!