Expert: Karen Craft - 9/11/2008

Question
Hi Karen,
We recently did a long distance move with 3 cats. Two of the cats are Burmese, Sadie is 10 very easing going,  sedentary, and diabetic. Sasha,also Burmese, the trouble maker is 4 years old. About 4 months before our move our one male cat Simon died. Sadie and Simon were best of friends and Sasha was usually the odd one out of the pack. So she would hang out with us more or our pug, Lola.
Before moving my son thought it would be a good idea to get a male kitten.He knew how sad everyone was with the loss of Simon and with having to move. The two female cats traveled with my husband and stayed in the new home together one night. My son and I arrived the next day with the kitten and thought all would be fine.
At first everything did seem fine, normal hissing, nothing out of the ordinary.
I put the kitten in the master bedroom because of the bathroom being attached, no idea this would set Sasha off.
Sasha's aggression started to escalate slowly. Eventually
she got a hold of the kitten (Spencer) and attacked him leaving many bleeding scratches and little punctures. I called the local vet and he said once Spencer was neutered all would be fine. The day Spencer was to be neutered Sasha attacked again and his surgery had to be put off until his wounds were healed.
At this point Sasha and Spencer were separated all the time. I would switch them out of the master bedroom a few times every day. Spencer finally got neutered and after healing we reintroduced him to Sasha. She lashed out immediately  and they have been separated since then. 2 weeks ago while opening the door to my bedroom, Sasha snuck in before I could grab her. Spencer saw her and  flew under the bed but she got a hold of him very quickly. It took only a few seconds for me to pull  her off of him but she did not want to let go and scratched me also.
I immediately went back in to see the damage to Spencer and was shocked. He had a 4" gaping gash to his lower inner thigh area. He immediately went to the vet and had to be sedated and got 6 stitches.
Spencer is now as big or bigger than Sasha but he will not fight back. He just lays there when she is attacking.
Spencer gets along with everyone when he is with our older cat Sadie and our Pug Lola even loves him. One vet suggested putting Sasha on kitty prozac. At this point I am running out of funding for this, and my husband is not happy with a litter box still in our bathtub. Any advice would be so appreciated. thanks in advance , Shelley

Answer
Hi Shelley,

Boy you have your hands full. This will take a bit to straighten out. This is pretty heavy duty territorial aggression. When Spencer was brought into the household he went into a highly prized territory, your bedroom. Sasha, as the head cat, feels that Spencer is an interloper in the house. I don't know how you introduced Spencer to all the cats. Did you use a cat intro protocol? It might be too late for that now. But you can try it. Here's are links to a few;
http://www.petpublishing.com/catkit/articles/newcat.shtml
http://www.aspca.org/site/PageServer?pagename=pets_introducingcat
http://www.operationnoblefoster.org/multicat.htm

Get a product called Feliway. It acts like kitty prozac. Use this.
If all of these don't work then ask your vet about using cyproheptadine (Periactin). It's an antihistamine that acts to calm down aggressive cats. I hope this helps you. Good luck.

Ciao, Karen