My cat, Vesta, occasionally fails to watch where she is going as she dashes about the apartment. When surprised, or when being chased by my other cat (in fun, she’s the boss), she will jump quickly up onto a chair and then back down at an angle. This irritates us, but it is much worse when one of us is actually in the chair. This time, surprised by some noise or motion, Vesta jumped up to the arm of the chair that my wife was sitting in. Surprised to find it occupied, she abruptly changed course, putting claw marks in both wife and chair, then barreling through my wife’s food and drink. This is the second time this has happened, and I need it to be the last.
I don’t think my cat is trying to attack us, she never jumps onto us if she isn’t running around. I think she just doesn’t look where she’s going and sometimes jumps to places she can’t see from the ground. Her hearing is fine, but she has an “out of sight-out of mind” problem, even though we aren’t super quiet. Is there any way to prevent this from happening? The problem is becoming more urgent as we will soon have a baby, and I absolutely can’t have my cat clawing up my child.
I have considered:
a)noisemakers on the chairs, to train her never to jump on the chairs whether or not someone is sitting there. Can they be effective and not wake the baby one room over?
b)claw caps: mitigates but doesn’t solve the problem, also she loves scratching her post and pad, and never scratches furniture intentionally
Greetings fellow cat person! I have two fur babies that will occasionally engage in that type of play. You don’t know terror until you hear a twelve pound cat barreling towards you at full speed
My furry little lunatics can run through the house and zip up to the top of the tower. Cats don’t like to be cornered and will try to go up high to gain an advantage and sense of security. If you give them an alternative to the chair that should alleviate the problem.
I will definitely investigate that - if she’s chasing the feather on a stick (I call it cat fishing), she definitely won’t be jumping up on the chairs.
That leaves the times she just wants to go from one side of the chair to the other without checking if the chair is occupied. Maybe make a more convenient path from one side to the other?
Is it the chair or the location that she’s stuck on? If she’s going full speed, and the chair is the easiest “bridge” for her to take to where she wants to go maybe moving it would stop her, or at least slow her down enough for your wife to see her coming, and be able to defend herself.
If you see the cat running in the baby’s direction, you can yell.
In any case, if a baby were in the way of a running cat, it would be very easy for the cat to just jump over the baby. I too have a cat who runs around like he’s crazy but he’s never put his claws in a pet/person roughly his size to reorient or jump.
So, I moved the chair in question so that there is a much easier path around the side, hopefully making that the preferred route. I also moved the lower, larger chair further out of the way of the area the cats like to chase in. We’ll see how they react.
I will look into the stickies and shock mats- regular piece of paper won’t work on the chairs, but sticky papers might.
I’m not worried about the baby on the floor, but in the rock&play or on the chair with me or mom - places where the cat might jump without being able to see.
The cat in question never intentionally uses her claws on us; she keeps them in even when we subject her to vet or grooming related indignities. When the last incident happened, my wife was sitting in the recliner (not reclined), and the cat was behind the recliner. The cat jumped up to the arm of the recliner as she often does, and landed on my wife’s arm. In her surprise and haste to get out of there, her claws came out. I’m just concerned about the same thing happening while we’re holding the baby.
