CRIES FOR ATTENTION
When an easily-bored kitten keeps howling for attention, the owners called Peter Neville for help — would they finally get a good night’s sleep?
When an easily-bored kitten keeps howling for attention, the owners called Peter Neville for help.
Indeed, a screaming kitten can be bad for one’s sleep, so I set up a remote consultation and the tired Di and Hayley told me all about their kitten. Moss had been adopted from a local cat rescue organisation. Hayley recalled that there were “so many lovely kittens to choose from but that Moss had stood out because he was the loudest.” It seems that Moss had already learned that yelling was a very effective way to get attention and so it wasn’t much of a surprise that the behaviour had continued at home.
When he was brought home, Moss settled in well after a day or so. He was first kept in the couple’s bedroom, but he soon grew restless, especially if they were not in the bedroom with him. If someone wasn’t with him, he would sit by the door and scream until either Di or Hayley came to fetch him. Then he would be quiet and would snuggle up to them, purring loudly.
Di mentioned that there had been a brief pause in the screaming when they had first allowed Moss access to the rest of the house. He spent lots of time investigating and soon discovered the windows that had the best views. He spent a lot of time watching the birds but after a week or so, he started to shout again whenever he was bored, lonely, or there were no birds to be seen.
HOWLING IN THE NIGHT
The night-time shouting started more recently. He would settle down fine at first but would get off the bed during the night to wander around the house and then sit in whichever room he was in and shout until someone came to fetch him. As soon as he was discovered, he would then be full of the joys of life, irrespective of the time of night. Di said that they would then play with him for a good hour before he would be sleepy again. Needless to say, this was starting to take
He did love a good
game of chase...
its toll and both women were exhausted. When Moss started waking them up twice a night, they decided it was time to call in the cavalry (me!).
I spent some time observing Moss via Zoom and could see that he really was an active little kitten. He often had moments where he would rush around the house madly and once those were over, he’d flop down wherever he was to meow loudly until someone fetched him. He would then curl up on a lap and sleep for an hour before waking up and repeating the cycle. I initially thought that Moss might be struggling to be alone, but after watching him for a few hours and conferring with Di and Hayley, it soon became clear that his main problem was that he did not like being bored.
His vocalisations were worse whenever he was alone with nothing going on, whereas if he was busy doing something, he didn’t mind being alone at all.
MENTAL STIMULATION
Hayley and Di felt that he was still too young to go outside, even though they said that they were happy to let him out once he reached about six months of age. In light of this, we decided to enrich Moss’s environment as much as possible. We began to introduce a variety of cardboard boxes around the house, all with holes cut at different places, and some even two or three stories high. Treats and food were hidden in random places, and Di and Hayley were taught how to play with Moss to meet his needs for daily, novel stimulation and all the active elements of hunting. He was also given a scratching post, perching spots near windows, several cat tunnels, and a variety of toys that the couple could rotate to keep them interesting.
Moss wasn’t particularly food motivated but he did love a good game of chase and pounce, so we provided toys, such as dangly ones suspended from door handles, that provoked that behaviour, without constantly relying on a human’s presence. I also convinced Di and Hayley to harness train him and go for short walks outside in the garden on a lead until he was big enough to have free access. Several outings a day were good stimulation and enabled Moss to explore some of his future outdoor environment without the risk of him getting lost.
I promised to follow up with Di and Hayley on how they were doing after two weeks before we tried to do anything more specific about the vocalisation, as I first wanted to see how much environmental enrichment might improve the problem. If the meowing didn’t stop, we would have to look at other reasons.
Two weeks later, Di called to say that all was going well. They wanted my help to teach Moss to come when called because they were both realising that he needed to spend more time outside than they had and he really enjoyed it. As soon as they took the lead out, Moss’s
tail would go up and he would purr loudly and he spent the whole time in the garden pouncing on insects or chasing butterflies! They discussed it and felt that since he was now four months of age, he would probably be OK to play outside, under supervision, off-lead, but they still wanted him to come when they called him as a precaution. Well, that was easy enough to do! While
Moss didn’t particularly fancy a food reward, he did love playing catch with a feather on a line and so we used that to encourage him to come when called. Di or Hayley waited until he was distracted, then called him with a whistle before rewarding him with a vigorous game of catch. Within a week, Moss would come running from anywhere on the property if he heard the whistle.