Litter training is a simple solution to the alternative which is running over and letting them out of the house whenever they need to relieve themselves. Then, you have to hope you are home during these times. Yes, a litter trained cat is much easier to live with.

However, litter trays can be messy to clean and they can also start to smell too. For that reason, many owners often look into different ways of housetraining their cat. One method which seems to be popular with some owners is toilet training. Here you will find the top five ways to toilet train your cat. It may sound silly, but toilet training might actually be the best thing that you ever teach your cat!

1. Litter train with Newspaper

Before you can toilet train your cat, they first need to be litter trained. Ideally you should provide them with a solid box and newspaper to cover up their business. You should not use actual kitty litter as this will not flush down the toilet when it comes time to toilet train the cat. So using newspaper is the best idea.

2. Gradually Move the Litter Tray

Since cats are creatures of habit it is not a good idea to move their box quickly. They may lose where it is or refuse to use it at all. So, you will have to move the box in stages. Think of the box as if it were walking to the toilet. Everyday scoot the box a little closer to the toilet. (Or whenever you notice your cat is comfortable to where you moved it previously.)

3. Lowering The Sides Of The Litterbox

There is quite a difference between the toilet and the litter tray and your cat will definitely be able to tell the difference! So you need to start trimming down the sides of the litter tray. If you are using a strong cardboard box then this shouldn’t be too difficult. However you should obviously be careful if you are using a plastic tray!

Remember as you move the box lower the edges. Do this gradually so that kitty doesn’t notice you disrupting their everyday routine.

4. Place the Tray in the Toilet

Now that you have done all the past three steps and the box has gradually made it’s way to the toilet. You are now ready to put the box into the toilet. You will do this by tying the box inside of the toilet. Make sure when you tie the box inside the toilet that it is tied tight. If it were to fall in while your cat was using it, it will scare them and they may never come to use it again. Now it’s time for a little patience. Leave the box in the toilet until you notice your cat has become completely comfortable with the new situation. When your cat has adjusted then, move on to step five.

5. Cut a Hole in the Tray

The last step is simple. Just cut a hole in the bottom of the box. This is so kitty gets use to the water at the bottom of the toilet, and whatever kitty does will fall into the toilet. After kitty adjusts to this you can remove the box all together, and your cat will be toilet trained, and you a happy cat owner.

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Has your cat recently started to act a little strange? Perhaps it has started to act a little aggressively towards you or other family members? Or maybe it has become fearful of something or someone for no apparent reason? Whatever the strange behavior, it is important to get to the bottom of it before it develops any further.

What most cat owners don’t know is that the sudden changes in their cats behavior could be a result of stress. If you are like most cat owners and are not sure how to help your feline friend then here is a little helpful advice.

Understanding Stress in Cats

Cats just like many other beings are vulnerable to stressful situations. Any event that comes on suddenly changing your cats environment or someone new joining the household can cause serious stress to your cat. Some cats take on the change with little or no behaviorial issues at all, however most cats do not react this way. Most cats feel threatened and display these insecurities by being aggressive, or withdrawn. No matter how minor the change could be, most likely your cat is going to feel stressed out and react to it. Some of the changes that stress out your cat include: Moving, and not only moving to a different house, but also just moving furniture around in your home. (Especially if its their cat stuff you’re moving.) Another stressful event is when a new member joins the family whether it be a new person moving in or a new pet.

However, after you’ve considered all the stressors above and have concluded that neither of these could be the reasoning behind your cats stress, then it’s crucial that you take your feline friend to a vet. Because change is not the only reason for a cats behaviorial problems it’s important to rule out illness. Yes, illness could be one of the reasons your cat is acting strangely.When a cat is ill they cannot tell you the what is wrong with them so their behaviors will change in hopes you will notice or just because of the pain they’re in.

Once you have found the cause of your cat’s stress, you can then focus on dealing with the problem.

How to Deal with Feline Stress

How you deal with your cat’s stress will depend entirely upon what it is that your cat is stressed about. Sometimes patience is the best remedy and this is especially the case when you move homes. Start by placing the cat in one room and allow it to become familiar with the house gradually. By giving the cat its own room, it will start to feel safer in there and when it does feel threatened once it is exposed to the rest of the house, it will automatically go into ‘its’ room to relax.

For other stressors or when your patience is wearing thin you could always go to commercial products to assist you. One product which is call ‘Rescue Remedies’ which includes the ingredient Bach Flower Essence is used to assist in letting your cat relax a bit. This product is not only used for cats, but many other animals and even for humans. This is how it works when it comes to cats. You will put 2-3 drops in their drinking water. This is a quick and simple way to relieve a little cat stress. At times cats will not drink the water with this product in it because it can taste the acohol content. If this is the case you can put the rememdy behind their ears.

When dealing with your cats behavioral problems, first know that stress is a contibuting factor. So, if your cat is displaying any strange behaviors notice the recent changes or people that could be stressing out your cat.

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Cat fights always seem to start through arguments over territory or a struggle for dominance. The areas they fight over tend to be high places or new furniture that has not been marked yet. We have two play stations - one about three foot six and one about four foot tall. There is often a spat over who will have the highest platform and it is usually Louie our red Somali, who appears to be more dominant. In a cats hierarchy the higher the cat is physically, the more dominant the cat is.

These battles are really no more than spats. A quick paw and a hefty growl may well let the invader know “this is no time for revolution”. Fights seem to be more apparent if there is a change in the weather. We have always felt that Louies’ territory is the garden. He loves to hunt and he spends a lot of time out there. Ellie, our blue Burmese on the other hand, spends time in the house where she is close to people. When it rains Lou gets pretty melancholy. Hr cant go out so now he’s also got to share the house with Ellie. This means those territory boundaries have got to be fought over all over again.

Another time fights started was when our patterns of behaviour changed. It can have an effect on the cats. For example, the main bedroom had always been Ellie’s territory. This is probably because as a Burmese Ellie always needs to be where the people of the house are. This didn’t bother Lou so much. Also Ellie enjoyed the warmth of the bed. Lou on the other hand had a thick fur coat to keep him warm so was not enticed. However for some reason we started giving them treats last thing at night. Treats which Lou was absolutely bonkers about. Suddenly the bedroom was the place to be. We then began to notice fights breaking out (instigated by Lou) just as we were going to bed. Again, a case of “this town aint big enough for the both of us.” Don’t get me wrong these fights are infrequent but what I want to emphasize is, if you look close enough you will see patterns that you can remedy. We started to give them their treats in a separate room. This did the trick nicely.

It is difficult to know when they are fighting or playing. Most of the time play is obvious. They will chase each other around the house; thunder up and down the stairs; and even play hide and seek behind the furniture. This is great to see and a reflection of how they get on most of the time. But there are times when tempers seem strained and there is more than just play in the air.

These times we have found are usually accompanied by low, long fearsome growls, tails erect and bushy, bodies confrontative in the prone position, ears flat and back on their heads. Where tussles which started out as roly poly turn fighting which creates a frightened squeal from one or the other. Simple chasing turns to stalking with an ulterior and aggressive motive.

We were advised by our breeder that this fighting was usually over territory and dominance and therefore they had to work it out for themselves. The philosophy being the loser will submit, the victor will gain dominance, and the fighting will cease quite quickly. Which it does tend to do. If you intervene you prevent the natural progression taking place and it will only start again (as Mother Nature says it must).

But it is difficult sometimes to listen to one of the cat when she sounds frightened or either in pain. We were advised that the time to intervene was when one of the cats is cornered. So this is what we do.

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Is your cat’s bad behavior driving you up the wall? Many people are under the impression that cats are too independent to be trained. This is not true. Any animal can be trained. You just need to condition its reactions in a consistent and predictable manner. Animal behaviorists call this Pavlovian Conditioning. Although the most famous of the experiments revolved around dogs, subsequent scientists have successfully shown this effect even in human children. In other words, this effect is the basis of all successful animal training methods, from dogs to rats to lions.

Now, conditioning and punishment do not mean the same thing. You do not need to hurt your cat when it misbehaves, you just need to clearly demonstrate that its behavior is unacceptable. So, how do you do that? All you need are a number of spray water bottles filled with cold water, placed in convenient locations around your house. Anytime you see your cat doing something wrong, you immediately spray its body with cold water. This method gets your cats attention and annoys it but does not hurt it. You are not punishing your cat. You are interrupting it in the middle of its misbehavior. Do this consistently and immediately and you will eventually break your cat of its bad habits. An obvious limitation of this method is that if you are not around when kitty misbehaves, it will not work.

Here is a method of deterrence which works even when you are not at home. If your cat eats or scratches your houseplants, you can try putting mothballs in them. Cats are sensitive to the strong smell, and this will keep your cat away from your plants. You can also use the same trick to keep your cat from urinating and defecating in inappropriate locations.

Another problem which you may face as a cat owner is having your cat scratch your furniture or carpet. First, you need to know that your cat is only doing what comes naturally and you should not stop it from scratching. The scratching is meant to maintain its claws in good condition and also to stretch and tone its muscles. If you punish it for scratching, you will confuse it and this will lead to further bad behavior. What you want to do is minimize the damage it can do. Just trim its claws. If you do not know how, get a veterinarian to trim them for you. Ask your vet to teach you. You also want to redirect your cat’s attention from your carpet or furniture to another target. If your cat likes to scratch vertical surfaces, then get it a vertical scratching post. Ditto for horizontal surfaces.

Try these tips for stopping your cat’s bad behavior. You do not have to be cruel and punish kitty. Just take some suitable preventative measures to interrupt or prevent its bad behavior. Be consistent, be firm and patient in keeping the bad behavior from turning into bad habits.

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Playing with kitty - that’s why we become cat owners, isn’t it? But what happens when play turns to pain, when kitty starts biting and scratching and drawing blood? Animal behaviorists call this play aggression, but who cares about the big words? What really matters is how you can get rid of it? First, you need to know what causes cats to become aggressive when playing with you. Once you know what causes the problem, you can learn how to fix it.

Play aggression normally occurs in kittens which are taken away from their mothers too early in life. A normal kitten, raised with littermates, quickly learns to bite and scratch with less intensity. They learn that playing rough will either cause their playmates to retaliate or to stop playing. You can recognize this behavior from the kitten’s posture. It lashes its tail, flattens its ears and its pupils dilate. This is soon followed by biting and scratching.

To correct this behavior, you need to redirect your kitten’s attention to another acceptable object. Drag kitty’s toy along the floor, or throw the toy around and let kitty chase after it. A good choice for this would be a ping pong ball or something similar which bounces nicely. A soft, stuffed toy the same size as your kitten is also good. This lets kitty wrestle with it, closely simulating the way young kittens play with each other. Encourage play with this wrestling toy when your kitten starts to play rough.

You need to keep things under control. Set up 3 or 4 consistent times everyday to play with your kitten. This conditions your kitten so that it knows not to bother you at other times.

When playing with your cat, do not encourage it to chase after your hands and feet. This can also cause play aggression. In addition, if your cat tries to play with you outside your scheduled playtimes, you should ignore it. Otherwise it will start ambushing you when you climb down the stairs, or go around a corner, or when you go to bed. That would be an accident waiting to happen.

Sometimes, just ignoring kitty does not help. In this case, try using some kind of noise maker. You just want to startle it, grab its attention and break its momentum just before it pounces on you. Never physically strike your cat. A painful strike will make your cat afraid of you and avoid you. On the other hand, a harmless strike will just encourage it to continue its behavior. Either way, this is not what you want.

To enjoy playtime with your cat, you need to contain its aggression. Follow these tips consistently and with patience, and you will be able to have fun playing with your cat.

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Does your cat or kitten defecate and urinate all over your house? Is this driving you nuts? Then you need to train them to use the litter box. First, you do know what a litter box is, right? I am not being sarcastic here, but I know of some cat owners who have no idea that these things exist. And second, you have to accept as a fact, that cats can be trained. Some cat owners allow their cats to run wild, adamantly refusing to believe that cats can be trained.

Assuming that you accept that you can train your cat not to mess up all over your home, how do you do so? To start, you need to gather some intelligence. You need to know when and where your cats like to defecate and urinate. And you need to learn how to recognize the signs when they are going to shit and pee. Luckily, cats are creatures of habit. They like to do their business in the same places, around the same times. Most cats eliminate when they wake up, after they eat or after they exercise. They usually go to some corner or behind a piece of furniture and sniff the floor there just before elimination.

Next, you need to prepare a litter box in a quiet, out of the way location. Just like you, your cat prefers to have privacy during the process of elimination. The litter box should have high sides to keep the litter in when your cat scratches in it. The litter itself should be clumpable and scoopable. You have to remember to clean the litter box everyday, and replace the litter every week. Cats are clean and fastidious creatures, so if you fail to keep their litter box clean, they will soon start doing their business elsewhere. There is one additional point regarding the litter - do not change brands. Once your cat gets used to a particular brand of kitty litter, it will refuse to use another brand. If you are forced to change to another litter, you will need to retrain your cat.

As the final step, of course, you need to train your cat to use the litter box. Every time you see your cat giving its signal, you need to carry it to the litter box. This action does two things. It breaks your cat’s habit of eliminating in its old spot, and it conditions your cat to eliminate in the litter box. Immediately after it uses the litter box, you should also give it a treat or reward. This further reinforces the new habit of eliminating in the litter box. Obviously, your cat will refuse to use the litter box in the beginning. Do not scold or beat him. You do not want kitty to associate the litter box with punishment. Otherwise it will learn to deliberately avoid the litter box, which is not what you want. Just be patient and consistent and your cat will eventually learn to do its business in the right place - the litter box.

Follow these steps and your cat will stop making a mess all over your house. You will only need to clean the litter box, instead of having to track down every spot kitty makes a mess.

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You love your cat, you also happen to love your furniture. The trouble is, you cat loves to scratch your furniture. This can cause a few problems, especially if you furniture is nice and new and expensive.

The real trick to stopping your cat from continuing its scratching and general mayhem when your not around and more than likely even when you are. Is redirecting its excess energy. It is a matter of forming new habits and behaviour patterns that your cat will adhere to for a long time to come.

One of the most positive ways of stopping bad cat behaviour is to find the hazard area, the area of your home that seems to get the most attack from your cat’s claws and place an item or items that offer your cat incentive to take its aggressions out in another way. Placing a scratching post right next to the area most vulnerable to attack is a good way to associate a new habit for your cat. After a while it will most likely use the post instead of the corner of your couch or bed corner. There will usually be certain routine times of the day that your cat will decide to play havoc with areas of your home so by either catching him in the act or placing items, namely scratching posts or soft toys, at the site most likely to be brutalized. Then hopefully you will implement change in your cat’s behaviour. You must try to stay one step ahead of him at all times.

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A lot of people think that cats work on their own agenda, not paying much attention to their owner - provided they have clean litter, food, and water. Cats can behave in odd manners at times, which can easily confuse their owners and make it really hard to determine what the cat wants. As much as cat behavior can be confusing, there are some ways that you can solve common cat behavior mysteries.

A common behavior that almost all cats do is push their heads into any type of object that will allow them to do it. You’ve probably seen your cat do this before, probably against table legs, TV stands, or another object. This can be noticed more when you have other people who own animals or those with allergies over at your house. When a cat notices this, he will rub his head against the person. In doing so, he will put a touch of saliva on the individual. In a cat’s mind, he owns what he puts his saliva on.

By putting his saliva on something, that object or person will have a familiar scent. Although this can be very annoying, you have to understand that other people in your home are seen as odd or weird to your cat. When a cat does this, he is simply trying to make the visitor belong. When he brushes up against them and puts his saliva on them, he is trying to put his scent on them - which in his mind will mean that they belong in

his territory.

Even though marking someone or something with saliva is beneficial to the cat, saliva is one of the most common forms of pet allergies. When someone wipes the saliva off of them, the scent will be gone and the cat will go back and attempt to do it again. Even though it may appear that cats target those with allergies, cats are actually just trying to make the visitor belong at the house. If the guest simply cannot take the saliva, allow the cat to rub himself on their pants leg a few times. Normally, this is all takes for a cat to leave the person alone.

Those of you who an indoor cat should expect the cat to spend quite a bit of time lying near windows. During this time, you may hear your cat make very strange noises or weird movements. You shouldn’t fear though, as he is simply acting out his hunting instincts. Whether it’s another cat or object outside moving about, the cat will see it and simply go into his native hunting instinct.

As most already know, cats love to play. They love to played with, especially with toys. They will pounce on things on occasion, which should always be expected. If you try to prevent this type of behavior, your cat will take a very negative approach and you’ll end up with a lot of broken things in your home. You can always play with your cat using a string, as he will love to chase the string around the room.

The longer you own your cat, the more odd behavior you’ll see him exhibit. Cats behave in strange ways, although they always have a reason for behaving the way they do. If you can understand why your cat behaves like he does, you’ll have no problems keeping him healthy and happy. If you simply pay attention to your cat and the way he behaves at times - you’ll be able to understand him better than ever before.

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