Effect of Environment on Feline Behaviour

Introduction

Cats are highly dependent on their environment, which different to other animals. The inside of the home should be considered the ‘core’ of the cat’s territory. This is somewhere that cats expect to feel safe and where they can eat, drink and rest in privacy away from any enemies. Cats also need to be able to climb up high to vantage points where they feel safe.

It is important to provide cats with a home that meets their needs, especially if several cats are sharing the same home. Otherwise there is risk of the cats suffering from stress and behavioural problems like aggression, house soiling or indoor urine marking.

Any changes to their environment may have profound effect on their well being and behavioural problems may develop if this is not addressed appropriately, particularly at times of rehoming or owners moving house. Proper introduction to a new ‘core territory’ reduces stress and the likelihood of fear problems. Creating attachment to a new core territory also reduces the risk of the cat straying or trying to return to its original territory after a house move.

Adequate Environment for Cats

Cats are usually kept either outdoor, indoor only or indoor with access to the outdoors. In all cases, cats need stimulating environment to avoid boredom and unnecessary stress but if the cat cannot go outside, it is even more important to make sure that the indoor home environment is really suitable. For indoor cats (and those with access to the outdoors) it is advisable to provide each resources as one per cat plus one more. Resources include litter trays, food and water bowls, sleeping places, hiding places. It is important to allow cats free access to all the resources without the need for human intervention. Cats prefer to be in control and this should be allowed as much as possible. Indoor cats with access to the outdoors generally use a cat flap. It is often a vulnerable spot from the cat's perspective and it is important not to locate any resources near there.

The cat’s basic needs are for:

Space (including access to height)

Cats should be provided with lots of opportunity to climb and explore. For example shelves at different heights, cat furniture and access to the tops of cupboards and wardrobes.

Resources

Each cat needs several places to eat, drink, and rest. This gives them choice and means that cats that don’t get along do not have to compete for the same toilet or food bowl. Enabling the cats to live separate lives actually increases the chances that they will live happily with each other.

Food provision: Cats in the wild spend a large amount of time hunting and foraging. To keep them happy, it is useful to provide not only multiple food bowls in different locations but also more challenging ways of obtaining food, for example using play or food dispensing balls.

Water provision: Cats often don’t drink enough water to keep their kidneys and urinary system healthy. They can be encouraged to drink more healthy amounts by providing them with a recirculating-type water fountain. These are available commercially and include a filter to remove impurities that cats don’t like to taste. This makes the water more like rainwater. The water movement and provision of a running water slope make it much easier for the cat to drink.

Resting places: Choice over resting places is particularly important because cats move from one place to another every few days so that they can avoid parasites like fleas.

Latrines: Typically cats should be provided with one toilet per cat plus one extra. This is because in the wild cats do not share toilets and they prefer to have separate ones for urination and defecation. Fortunately, it is possible to provide outdoor toilets for cats so that fewer indoor litter trays are needed.

Opportunities to perform normal behaviour (hunting, clawing etc.)

Clawing is often a problem because it is destructive and annoying for owners. It is important to give cats opportunities to claw so that it does not become a problem in the first place. Cats will tend to claw when they need to stretch back muscles after waking, mark boundaries of territory, sharpen claws or gain attention from their owners. Sensible places to position clawing posts are therefore close to where cats rest, near to cat doors and at the edges of the garden and in living rooms close to furniture or the television (where the cat may claw to get attention or a reaction from its owner). Cats have preferences for particular kinds of material to claw. Upholstered furniture is often used for claw sharpening and stretching. Soft wood is often scratched to leave a scent mark at a boundary. Owners need to experiment with providing the right surfaces to satisfy the cat’s clawing needs and encourage clawing by taking notice and praising the cat when it claws on an appropriate object.

Hunting and play are important for cats, especially in the early morning and evening. These are times when it is important to encourage interactive games using fishing toys, laser pointers and lightweight toys that can be rolled on the floor. Cats should never be encouraged to play with people’s feet or hands because this can create problems of aggression especially for cats that are kept indoors. At other times, the cat should be provided with a continually-changing selection of small lightweight toys to play with. It is useful to keep a selection of feathers, decorated ping pong balls, furry mouse toys and similar small items in a box and scatter a selection of these toys around the house daily. Real fur toys are particularly good because they act as a focus for cat’s predatory behaviour.

Certain features of toys are very important:

• Noise: toys that twitter or squeak when touched
• Movement: toys that move rapidly and unpredictably when they roll
• Texture, size and colour: bright colours, feathers, parts that sparkle or dangle, or toys that mimic real prey

Typically cats get bored with play after about 10 minutes unless the toys or games are changed every few minutes.

In the wild, cats spend more than six hours every day hunting for, catching and eating their prey. In the domestic environment, all of this activity may be absent, especially for indoor cats. It is also known that well-fed cats continue to hunt wildlife but when they catch a bird or mouse they will take more time to kill it. This means that the wild animal’s suffering is prolonged. One way to replace this lost activity and reduce boredom is to provide cats' food through activity feeding. Activity feeders force the cat to play in order to get food, and help reduce obesity and frustration, especially for indoor cats but they also reduce the outdoor cat’s interest in predatory behaviour, and can therefore save local wildlife from being killed.

Activity feeders include:

Delidome: An electronic cat feeder that throws out small balls full of food every 1-2 hours for the cat to play with.

Empty plastic drinks bottles perforated with food-pellet sized holes and part filled with dried cat food. The food falls out as the toy rolls along.

Food bowls placed high on shelves for the cat to find.

Activity box filled with crumpled newspaper, small toys and hidden small dried food treats for the cat to rummage and find (freeze-dried prawns and smelly fish treats work well).

Privacy

Privacy is partly provided by giving cats plenty of choice. If cats can choose to feed or rest away from each other they are more likely to get along well. Some cats, especially those which are elderly or infirm, also like to have ground-level hiding places where they can run in and hide. Empty cat baskets or cardboard boxes are perfectly suitable.

Choice: The need to have alternative places to eat, rest, play and go to the toilet.

Indoor Environment

The indoor part of the cat’s territory is somewhere that the cat should feel secure. In the wild this ‘core’ part of the cat’s territory is never invaded or overlooked by other cats because it is surrounded by an area that the cat patrols and scent marks in order to repel other cats. Indoor-only cats are unable to do this and they may feel very vulnerable if outside cats can look in at them through the windows. Even cats that do have outdoor access may not be able to maintain a suitable buffer distance that keeps other cats away from their home. It is therefore important to block views from windows that are overlooked, perhaps close to places where your cat has urine marked or shown signs of aggression or fear in the past. This is easily achieved using ‘glass etch spray’ which is used to make bathroom windows opaque. Light still comes through but the cat cannot see clearly what is on the other side of the glass. Other cats tend to hang around less when there is no chance to threaten the indoor cat. Changes may also be made outdoors to deter other cats from lurking and menacing the indoor cat.

The indoor territory should only be available to the resident cat. To avoid problems of other cats entering the home, which can cause urine spraying or aggression between the resident cats, it is best to fit an electronic cat flap with personalised coded collar keys that allow only the selected cats to enter.

Giving indoor housed cats some fresh air

Harness and lead
Some cats can learn to walk on a leash and harness if this is introduced while they are young. However, cats should not be taken on walks in the same way as dogs because this can be terrifying and distressing for them. Walks should be confined to a garden within easy access of the house so that the cat can build up familiarity with the landscape and odour marks that are there. If the cat shows signs of fear or anxiety, walks should be stopped.

Outdoor pen
Indoor cats should ideally be given access to an enclosed outdoor area. Free access is via a cat flap so that the cat can choose when it goes in and out. A well-designed pen should mimic the outside world as closely as possible, providing a multitude of tree trunks, toys, scratching posts and high-up resting places. Introduction to the pen should be gradual, perhaps involving play or searches for food treats. The cat must always be able to return to the house voluntarily.

Introducing a Cat to a New Home/Environment

The importance of properly introducing new cats to a home where there are existing cats is well known. If introduction is not managed correctly, there is a greater probability of fear and anxiety problems in the future. It is also important to introduce cats correctly to households where there are no other cats, but where animals, children and the general routine in the household may be unfamiliar and stressful. The same is true when moving cats form one home to another.

• Before moving the cat to its new home, try to harvest some of the cat’s flank and facial odours onto a clean cloth.
• Place this cloth into a sealed bag ready to use in the new home.
• When transferring the cat, bring items that will carry some of the cat’s facial and flank odour marks (bedding, resting places).
• Prepare a quiet room in the new home with food, water, a latrine, and familiar items from the cat’s previous home. This will be the room into which the cat will be initially introduced, so it is best if this place has not recently been occupied by other cats.
• Use the cloth to transfer facial and flank odours to furniture in this room of the new home.
• Install a F3 diffuser (Feliway) in this room 1-2 hours before the cat arrives.
• Install additional diffusers throughout the home at a rate of 1 per 50-70m2.
• Allow the cat to explore the new room by opening the cat basket. The cat should be able to return to the basket if it desires. The cat should not be pulled out of the basket or coaxed.
• Do not allow access to the rest of the house until the cat is completely relaxed in this first room. This may take several hours or even a few days. The cat should be relaxed, playful and approachable.
• The cat should then be allowed free access to one or two additional rooms in the house every couple of hours until it has explored the whole house. The cat should be allowed to do this in peace, not with people rushing around or trying to distract it.

Environment in Potentially Fearful Situation

The normal feline coping strategy in fearful situations is highly dependent upon familiarity with the environment and the opportunities it provides for escape and avoidance behaviour. In this way, the cat is highly attached and dependent upon its territory for security, which also means that success in treating fear-based problems is substantially dependent upon the cat’s environment.

The core zone of the cat’s territory is where it expects to be safest. This is where it may meet familiar conspecifics. Recognition of the core territory is partially dependent upon pheromone odour signals. The cat expends a lot of time and energy placing face and flank marks within the core territory area, not only to identify elements of the environment as familiar but also to create an appeasing environment for itself. In a new home, these personalised signals will be absent and may even be replaced by the odours of other cats that were previously resident. The anxiety caused creates the conditions for establishing problem behaviour.

It is possible, by using synthetic pheromone analogues such as F3 (Feliway), to recreate or enhance core territory odours. This can increase perceived safety and familiarity in an existing environment, or make a new environment appear familiar and safe.

Normal exploration of a new environment follows a star-shaped pattern. The cat makes forays into the environment away from an initial safe place. Any fearful event will cause the cat to return briefly to its place of safety. Indeed, successfully learning about a new environment depends upon already having somewhere safe to return to. Without this the cat will experience considerable anxiety and fear, which may create long-term aversions to the stimuli the cat encounters during the first few hours in a new location. For example, a well-socialised cat might enjoy the company of children when they are in an environment that it understands, but the same cat may react fearfully to boisterous children when in a new environment. This kind of encounter can condition fear reactions that continue to plague the cat’s relationship with the children even once it has settled into the new home.

It is therefore essential that the cat accepts and feels safe in the new environment before encountering any potential stressors.