Expert: Norman Auspitz - 1/18/2010

Question
Hello,

I have a couple of questions about my cats rather odd behaviour, though it is not a hinderance im just curious as to why they do this.
I own three out of the families five cats, the other two are two males, both nurtured.
The youngest of the two is Murthy, my brothers cat, who has never liked me. I do not understand why he doesnt as i normally find cats will follow me around and most of my friends cats like me too. He has fathered two litters to one of my females, Milli, but he was recently nutured and since then hes been a little friendlier to me in that he will let me feed him treats and yesterday he forcefully rubbed in my legs. At night i shut Milli and the two kittens we kept from the first litter in my room to protect them from our eldest cat who can play aggressivly sometimes. This is the only reason i can think of as to his dislike of me, that i shut his mate and kits away. Could this be a reason, or can you think of any others?

The other, main question is that my own three cats can be very affectionate. The two kittens i have, Gloria is the affectionate one. At night she cuddles in and sleeps under the covers with me, and she often jumps up on my chest and licks and rubs my face with hers, however, she will only do this when no one else is in the room. If someone else walks in the room, she jump off me and wander away. Is there any reason for her to do this at all?

Thank you for any help you can give me :]

Answer
Nichola,

I am afraid I will not be of much help in this.  However, there are a couple of comments I would like to make. First of all cats do not think like we do, so we should not be ascribing human emotions and motives to them.  Secondly, like people, all cats are individuals and, even kittens in the same litter will have different personalities.

So, I would not try to figure out why they exhibit the quirky behaviors some of them exhibit, but enjoy their individuality and their antics.

I am sorry I could not be of more help.

Best regards... Norm.