Explore cautiously, Mickey!
– was he rescued from being lost outside? Some cats who were out and unable for some time to find a house that anybody would let them into will, if they do manage to get inside, be very reluctant to ever go out again.
from Craigs List. I think he was too young to be taken from his mother looking back on it.
Ah. Yes, that can mess them up; a lot of people think they’re ready to leave as soon as they can eat solid food, but they really need to stay with mama at least six weeks and eight’s a lot better; longer yet if they’re going to be the only cat where they’re going, because there are things about being a cat that they need to learn from other cats.
He might also be terrified of the outside just if he’s never been outside. Outside is a big and strange and scary place if you’re not used to it. But maybe being moved from one indoor place to another and then to a third and the world still not ending has led him to think maybe strange places are survivable.
Be careful with him being out, though – he also won’t know what’s genuinely dangerous to him, or how to find his way back if he wanders a bit too far.
I’m on the second floor. I will not let him go down the stairs and I’m positive he will not want to. Not without me going with him and that is not happening
Ah. That should be all right then.
I’ve known cats to jump from second floors; but this one seems less likely to. (Young healthy cats; they weren’t hurt. An older or otherwise frail one could be a different matter; and I’ve seen a feral cat land wrong from a one-story jump and run off limping badly.)
speaking of feral cats that reminds me - when I was in NYC one was sitting on the stoop of an apartment building. Someone came down the street with a German Shepard and when he saw the cat he started barking ferociously and went up to the cat. The cat did not run away but leaped off the stoop like a leopard onto the dog’s head. Poor dog didn’t know what hit him
Yeah, a cat who knows what they’re doing can generally stand off any single dog, presuming they see it coming; though multiple dogs would be a different matter. And of course a lot of cats don’t know that trick, and many try to run – which only works if they can get up a tree or into a space too small for the dog before the dog catches them.
I expect the feral cats who get it wrong don’t live long, however.
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who is Discobot and why does he care?
@Discobot, who are you?
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