Cat training- help!

In My Humble Opinion
1

Mr Neville and I recently got two cats. One is eight months old, the other is about 4-5 months old. Mr Neville sometimes works at home, sitting in the recliner in our living room and working on his laptop.

Recently, the 8-month-old cat has been jumping up onto the laptop. He takes her off it, and after a few tries she will stay off. But, after he takes her off the laptop, she bites his feet and the recliner.

I would like to nip this behavior in the bud if I can, but we are both new cat owners and don’t know what to do to get the cat to stop doing this. Any advice?

2

A squirt bottle with water works wonders and is very humane. :slight_smile:

3

squirt bottles are the best, but if you’re worried about water getting into the laptop, use some sort of noisemaker, like a tambourine or something. be consistent and do it the second kitty is on the laptop.

Don’t shout at the kitty, because that will just engage her in a struggle for the laptop “territory.”

4

You can also try taking an empty soda can, putting a couple of pennies in it, and crushing the can a tad so the pennies can’t come out.

Shake that at kitty, or throw it near kitty (not at kitty). Works well if water ain’t an option.

5

I’ve found that positive reinforcement combined with aversion/diversion works best with cats.

Noisemakers and spray bottle are effective negative reinforcement, but that will only go so far.

You want to reward the cat for proper behavior, and give her an incentive to behave properly.

I recommend buying a kitty bed, and placing it on an acceptable location on your desk or on a chair next to your desk. Scent it with catnip or some other scent she likes, probably your own, like a used pillowcase or tee shirt. When she comes into the office, put her in the bed. Do not scold her, just place her in the bed when she is on the keyboard. Reward her when she climbs into the bed herself.

Eventually she will prefer the bed to your keyboard.

6

Instead of using water (when my cats get into the plants or somewhere else they’re not supposed to be) I use canned air. It makes a scary-hissy sound and doesn’t get everything all wet.

When the cats jump into my lap when I’m working on something, I just take a break. It is really hard to train a cat to do something that is OK some of the time, but not all of the time. Can he work in a closed room? Or let the cat sleep on his lap behind the laptop, so she’s not blocking his view?

7

When our kitten was 8 months old, he jumped on the keyboard all the time. We push him off with a NO! and then throw a toy for him to chase.

In a month or two he figured out that bringing the toy to us without jumping resulted in more playtime and less shouting.