Aggressive Kitten??

[candypalmer]

Well I recently got a companion for my 8 week old kitten, Bailey. Bailey, she's kind of a firecracker as most kittens tend to be. Anyways her and Yorick, our new kitten, are now getting along great. He's 8 weeks too but not QUITE as energetic as Bailey. I've noticed that since they've been playing, every now and then Yorick lets out a squeak, which I'm thinking means Bailey is being too rough.

I wouldn't be too worried but I had experience in the past with my best friend's cat. He was REALLY hyper as a kitten, like REALLY hyper, and grew up into a MONSTER. He'd be a sweety/affectionate one moment, and the next he'd latch onto your face or scratch you or bite you friggin HARD. It was completely random and I'd never met such a bipolar cat. Now keep in mind this was him PLAYING. When I moved in with my friend we brought other young cats into the picture. It was always fine for the new cat, AT FIRST. They would chase and play and have fun (Calvin ALWAYS had to play, ALWAYS) but when it got down to good old fashioned wrestling, it ALWAYS ended up with Calvin forgetting he was playing and would get REALLY rough. This ruined his relationship with our other 3 cats. Sometimes it took him a month to ruin it, other times it took a week. It was awful. I don't know why he's like that. He's close to 7 now and I visited recently and he's STILL like that.

So annywho, I bring Calvin up because I want to know if there are any precautions I can take to keep Bailey from becoming Calvin. I might be jumping to conclusions but it's very important to me that I don't raise her to be a Calvin. Calvin is the only cat I literally HATE and I don't want my sweet Bailey to end up like him. I think a big part of it was my friend constantly wrestling with him with her hand his whole childhood too. I don't know. There's probably an easy solution but I've only owned adult cats set in their ways. Super little kittens are new to me. =)

THANKS!

[Marybelle]

It sounds like he most likely left mom too early to learn the manners he's supposed to learn.  Most of the time, if kitten get too rough, mom will give them a smack, and let them know that it's unacceptable.  I've not had to deal with it myself, so I've not researched it completely.  I just know it's fairly common when you're dealing with young kittens.

[nakedrats]

I get a continuous flow of foster cats through my house, so I police my cats' behavior a lot.  I have a squirt bottle that I keep handy and if someone's playing too rough, then the offender is moistened.  They learn pretty quick to play nice with little kittens and not to harass or fight hard because they don't want to get wet.  Pairing the water bottle with a verbal cue works well as a long term training tool.

I also had an adult cat foster that seemed to be bipolar.  She was found outdoors so I don't know her past, but she would be sacked out on the bed purring and suddenly reach out and claw you for apparently no reason.  I don't know what her malfunction was, but even after being here 2 weeks, she was still randomly violent.