I want to start off saying that I do not hit my pets, but a friend does and I want to know if you hit your pes as a way of disipline? I think it’s wrong to hit my pets, but I have hit them when potty training with a newspaper or I smacked them on the butt when they are bad, but I don’t do this anymore. So Dopers, do you hit your pets as a way of discipline?
I have cats. Cats respond the same way whether you hit them or not. They ignore you. So I don’t bother hitting them. You know, besides the fact that it’s really kind of borderline…
I DO corral them with my foot when they make a break for the door, though. Not hitting, not kicking, just kind of hooking them and pulling them back in before the theme to Born Free starts playing too loudly in their crazy little brains.
Of course not! What kind of moron would hit an animal? I’d like for my cats to love me, not be afraid of me. (My father could have used this bit of wisdom…)
I’ve been known to swat the dogs on the bottom to get them to go outside when they didn’t want to. (They needed to go out to do their business, but didn’t want to because it was raining and they hate to get their paws wet.) But it’s far from what I’d call hitting, more of a “go on - git” sort of swat.
But to actually “hit” my dogs for something…nope.
Absolutely not! I do use behavior modifications, such as the noise of a rolled up newspaper being smacked across my palm, clapping my hands while giving the proper command, a spritz with the squirt bottle, etc. which works very well with the dogs. I also scruff if the behavior warrants it, growl and maintain eye contact until they submit, but that is a very rare occurrence The cats can be discouraged from some behaviors with the squirt bottle, but they generally exact revenge at a later date, so I try to accomodate their evey whim.
Too funny! I will not be able to get the image of my cats hearing that song every time they escape!!!
Yes.
Cat on table, looking anxiously around while dragging the meat on my plate in the split second I had been getting an extra fork in the kitchen:
First warning: look him directly in the eye and say his name sternly or just “no”
If he goes on meatdragging, the second warning, two seconds later, will be a hiss.
If he still looks at me in that “how interesting, carry on” way, I will hit his front shoulder with my hand just once, and lightly. Cats do it this way to each other, as a sign of : “mine, keep paws off” as well. That has always done the trick, and I hardly have to let it go beyond second warning now.
I never would hit a cat for anything that happenend longer then three seconds ago, because the cat wouldn’t understand. I also don’t hit when the cat has instincts going wrong, like suddenly biting me during play or stroking. In both cases, I just quit what I’m doing and let the cat calm down.
I have given up trying to train the cat in other ways, and just try to let the situation steer the cat. For instance, my fiancé allows them free access to dry catfood al l day. Treat catfood I give at totally random intervals, to prevent nagging. It works great: they never nag for meals, and they stay the same weight.
My fiancé also has a rule that even the boldest cat can never eat left-overs and treats on the table, but only if we place a plate on the ground. He has been very consistent in doing this, and the cats get it now.
Any other disciplining, we don’t even bother, and the cats and us are doing fine.
We have three dogs. The biggest dog is a huge, lovable Lab. In his early puppy days, part of his training was the occasional swat, or a full-out spanking if his behavior was that egregious. My Hubby was the one who raised him, and he would never administer something the puppy wouldnt’ comprehend. Doc is such a well behaved “furry person” now that extreme discipline is not needed. A stern word and/or hand signals work very well with him. Many times all it takes is a raised eyebrow and a change in the tone of your voice.
The next “biggest” dog is our sweet Feist mix. Hannah is so always wanting to be a good dog that, even in her house-training days, I can’t remember if I’ve ever spanked her. Sometimes, maybe, if she was getting a bath and needed to be still, I prolly swatted the butt. Mostly she is extremely well behaved.
The smallest is our Chihuahua-Corgi mix. I don’t know what it is about Marli, but “challenge” must be her middle name. I have had to spank her often, sometimes more harshly than I’d like, because she’s so headstrong. However, like the others, she has learned good behaviors because of discipline.
I think it’s a lot like kids … if you think you have to beat someone sensless to get a point across, why are you fooling with them anyway? :dubious:
There are some parts about keeping a pet safe, for example, when on leash, they must obey or harm will come to them… in the short term, sometimes that means a jerk on the collar or a swat on the butt.
Outside of their early training, I can’t say that I’ve had to strike my dogs … in the last few years. And nobody should have to, unless it’s a crisis situation.
I don’t BEAT them, but a swat on the butt on occasion , yeah, I have to say I have done this. It is rare, tho , normally just a growled “NO!” will stop unwanted behavior.
The 5 month old puppy is still in a mouthy-bitey stage, and if I tell him no and he continues, I tap his nose with 2 fingers, and this stops him with an apolgetic expression.
Long distance corrections are usually made with a squirt bottle, oth dogs and cats. And the funny thing is, it is mainly just a reminder to the dogs that they are doing something unacceptable, they are not afraid of the bottle (Unlike the cats, who run like the devil is on their tail when I pick it up 
), when I am at dog shows or the like , I use a squirt bottle to spray water in their mouths and on their bellies to cool them, and they know the difference in the situations.
Never. I also don’t hit my boyfriend or any other living thing, for that matter.
No, I don’t hit my cats… They hit back!
They got the “spray bottle from God”, training. That is until they figured out it was NOT God, just me, with the sprayer. They ignored it , didin’t run away from it any more. They would simply turn their heads an give me “The Look.”
Now they only do bad things when I’m not in the room. As long as they straighten up after themselves, I’m ok with kitty “don’t ask, don’t tell” mentality.
No, not with the cats I have now. But I had a cat who loved to bite and sometimes I would slap his fat butt when he wouldn’t let go of my flesh. In cases like this, I would say call it self-defense.
We have an aggressive biter. She gets tapped on the nose when she’s biting. And she knoooows she’s not allowed because she tries to be sneaky about it.
Our old guy Tuffy was a love biter. He was funny in that he’d open his mouth and very very slowly attempt to put it around your wrist or finger. A stern “Tuffy,” usually stopped him, but he got the occasional nose tap, too.
Yes. Not hard, I certainly don’t beat them, but when they have ignored all other forms of behaviour correction I give them a smack. Not enough to hurt them, but enough to insult them. I did try squirting them with a water bottle for a while but it just made one cat terrified of all spray bottles, which is distressing for both of us when I’m merely putting on deodorant and she’s in the room. The other cat has no reaction to anything (truthfully, I don’t actually smack her - she simply doesn’t get it. It’s only the one cat who gets a swat on the rump once in a while, and it’s generally only when she’s exhibiting destructive behaviour in front of me to get a reaction.).
I was raised by parents who smacked and believe it did me no harm and much good so I see no evil in smacking.
I once swatted my dog with a broom. I can’t recall the final straw that prompted it, but she had just not been listening all day, and we were outside (I obviously must have been sweeping the walk, hence the broom), and i gave her a whack across the butt with the broom.
Now, granted, I’m often “rough” with her–she’s underfoot a lot, so I’ll nudge/shove her out of the way if I need to get by. And if she does something extraordinarily bad (snaps at someone, say–though I don’t think that’s happened since she was past her first year) I’ll grab her by the scruff and pin her down until she settles down. Lots of growling on my part. Mostly, I just try to be a bigger dog.
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- I do until the pet learns. When they are doing something wrong, I yell at them first, and then they get hit if they don’t stop. Learning doesn’t take long, pretty soon when I yell they drop what they’re doing and run for cover, and that’s the way I like it. I do not buy into the theory that a cat or dog has the mental capacity to recall every moment in their whole lives when you were mean to them, and if they were in any group of their own kind, they’d occasionally be mean to each other anyway.
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There are few things more pathetic than a person who lets their pet do whatever it pleases.
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Everything I’ve read about cat training says that hitting is a bad idea, and I find hitting distasteful anyway, so I don’t do it. Nevertheless, my cats are both well-trained.
We tap and shove around here. If the cat is doing something dangerous (as the kitten did a week or so ago when he tried to jump into the hot oven, he gets a shove and a yell to try and scare him away from ever thinking of jumping into the oven again. When he bites, he gets a tap on the nose, then a hiss, then he’s shoved off the bed or scruffed off the bed. Nothing more than a mom cat would do.
The dog loves to be “kicked” and “punched”. She lies on her back and playgrowls. Then you place your foot under her hind end and kick upwards. She will do this for hours. She also will take a pillow and bury her face in it. This means “pick up the pillow and punch my face through it”. She wears us out with this game, and she’s 11.
She got nose taps as a puppy, but she doesn’t need them any more. Once in a while, A. will assert dominance by biting (lightly) her muzzle.
Nope. I’m not into abuse.
Neither of us hits the cats when they do something wrong. We usually just make really loud noises, and immediately after the cat does whatever earned him or her the punishment. Sometimes the little cat doesn’t seem to understand or be affected by the punishment, particularly if she gets carried away biting me, so I just give her a firm nudge away from me and won’t let her back up for a few minutes.
I haven’t yet seen a situation where actual hitting (beyond a light swat, newspaper smack on the butt or a push) has been effective on a cat. A friend of mine hit her cats, and it just made the cats afraid of her and never prevented them from doing those things that would have earned them punishment. And every time she’d hit them, they’d pee on the carpet, so her place smelled constantly of cat piss.
I think I have posted this before, but I really prefer using canned air vs. a water bottle for disciplining my cats. For one thing it does not get the cat and surroundings all wet and it sounds like a mad momma cat. I think cats will respect that more than a squirt. Plus, I have a cat who does not mind the water bottle.
My cats are overall very well behaved. I prefer to remove them from a situation rather than hit. I have, however, put my youngest cat into the bedroom or basement for a time-out from time to time. I don’t think she connects quite with “I was being bad, that’s why this is happening”, but it removes her from the situation and gives her time to mellow out. This is when she gets a little wild and is picking on one of the older cats. I don’t use the canned air here because i don’t want to ‘hiss’ at the other, innocent cat.