Keeping Your Indoor Cat Happy

Keeping your cat indoors is the safest option.  It helps to:

• Protect from trauma
• Attacks from other animals
• Infectious diseases

Even though indoors in the best place for your cat, indoor life can also contribute to boredom and stress that might result in medical and behavior problems.  There are steps cat owners can take to provide an interesting indoor life for feline companions.

Try to think of your cat as a guest in your home.  Realize just a few preparations will make the cat feel welcome and happier.  First of all, try to understand your cat's physical, mental and emotional needs.  For further information, please follow the link in the resource box to my Persian cat site.  On this site you will find helpful articles about every aspect of caring for and living with cats.  Bookmark the site as I will be adding information continuously.  On this site, I will also be exploring other members of the cat family such as tigers and lions that will help you to understand the natural instincts of the cat.

Cats are not herd or pack animals.  They evolved as solitary hunters of small prey and spent much of their day in pursuit of food.  Other portion of their time was spent establishing, marking and defending a territory.  Free-living cats lead very busy lives.  Our domesticated cats lead fully indoor lives, which removes the need to find food and patrol territory, but does not eliminate their daily need for stimulation and activity that involved finding food and patrolling territories.  So you can imagine how much "extra" time our domesticated cats have on their hands each day living indoors with us.

Most of us realize the cat's basic indoor needs of food, water and a litter box.  What we might not realize is certain mental and emotional needs.  These include:

• A place to scratch
• A place to rest
• A place to perch above the ground
• Some interaction with toys to mimic the hunting of prey

The mental and emotional needs of a cat call for an informed and understanding owner.  For example, scratching is a natural feline activity that helps cats exercise their muscles, shed the old outer layers of their claws and mark their territory using both scent-based and visual sings.  Scratching is a cat's instinctive behavior.  This urge to scratch will vary from cat to cat as does preferences of location and other materials.  You will need to experiment with different scratching devices to see which your cat or cats prefer.  Some prefer horizontal surfaces, others prefer vertical.  Observe your cat to see what his or her preferences are and then accommodate them with the appropriate scratching devices.  I notice my Diamond and Fairy like vertical scratching areas, and my male, Taz, seems to do very little scratching.  As you observe your particular cat, you will learn how to communicate with them and what they are saying to you.

A funny story about my Taz is with the addition of a new girl, Diamond, she has been teaching the others it seems more games to play.  Taz would sit in my lap and roll around and try to grasp hold of my hand or arm with his paws, then very lightly and almost in question start to bite.  At first, I was a little alarmed and of course I told him this was absolutely out of the question.   He could not bite "mommy."  After a few rounds of this, Taz suddenly jumped down from my lap, ran across the room, jumped upon one of the climbing trees, slapped at the little bird hanging there, then grasp hold of it with his paws and starting biting it.  Then he ran back over to me, jumped up in my lap and looked straight into my eyes.  I felt like he was saying:  "I only want to wrestle and play with you."  "I am not trying to hurt you."  And I do believe this is what he was communicating with his actions and body language.  I notice Diamond has been wrestling with Taz and Fairy, so I concluded Diamond taught Taz this new game.

Disclaimer:  The information in this article is not meant to diagnose or treat any kind of health problem in your cat.  You should always consult with a trusted veterinarian for all health problems.

Source:  The Winn Feline Foundation Online