So, I got this new cat, Salem.

[Emit]

Striking animal with the softest jet black fur and yellow eyes ... he's got just a touch of white marking on his chest, tummy and one paw, but his face, including his nose, is black as coal.

I rescued him and his little sister, Domino, from a litter of unwanted kittens. Don't really know if the mother was feral or belonged to a human family, or what his life was like prior to coming into our human family. They're about 3 months old now.

He's taken to climbing up my leg to find a warm lap. This happens multiple times a day. I am always rewarded with lots of love and affection after his climb. But, dammit! My upper thigh looks like a friggin' pin cushion!

I've tried to thwart his ascents, but he catches me off guard most of the time. He fails to give me much warning. It usually happens when I'm working on the computer, where my chair sits higher off the ground; where he likely has more leverage to exact his jump.

I've never really had to discipline a cat, and I've seen attempts by others to discipline cats backfire, horribly. I am much more inclined to offer some sort of behavioral reward program, but can't wrap my head around how that could be implemented effectively in this situation.

I can't imagine what the future holds for me when this little guy is full grown.

Any advice out there on how to curtail this kitten's bad habit?

It will be warmly appreciated.

Salem just made his ascent. Ergh, ow, ow, ow ... yeeow! He's curled in my lap, purring loudly now, with his slitted yellow eyes gazing lovingly up at me. A little trickle of blood seeps through my pajama pants.

We sit together and await wisdom.

[yellowdogintexas]

1. pictures. it's the law nt

[Emit]

2. I edited my OP to include a most recent picture.

Edited to add, the unseemly blood stains are further down my thigh, toward my knee, this time.

[yellowdogintexas]

11. he is very handsome indeed! I LOVE shiny black cats

here is my black kitty, Clark

[ironflange]

22. I love them too

This is Cleo, another rescued cat.



You can see how shiny she is, the staff at the vet always comment on how nice her coat is. It had better be nice, she's always bathing, and loves being brushed and vacuumed. Too bad she's so dumb.

[Emit]

23. Your Clark is very handsome

and looks a lot like my Salem! Thanks for sharing.

[yellowdogintexas]

25. Thank you! Clark is a sweet cat too. Loves him some cuddle time

at bedtime.

[Name removed]

12. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

13. Not funny, not clever.

[Wcross]

3. When he gets older he will be able to jump up.

My two guys jump on the desk, stand in front of the monitor until I invite them to sit on my lap. Of course they have to soften up the lap with their claws before they settle down......

Cute little fella!

[Emit]

4. My daughter calls that "pawsing"...

a term she coined when she was just a little thing. I thought it very fitting. :)

[Orsino]

5. As kittens gain coordination...

...they rely less on the pitons. For now, you can just gently remove the claws from your anatomy, and preempt the mountaineering by picking them up before they assault K2.

[Lex]

6. My vet told us to make a cry of pain for the kitten to hear when he

uses his claws and hurts us and that he will eventually understand that it hurts us and will stop.

It seemed to help.

[Lil Missy]

7. One of mine did that when he was a kitten. Here's what I did.

To be fair, he was part of a litter that the mother cat died and was only 3 or 4 weeks old. He literally demanded to be held constantly, and also crawled up my legs and caused several scratches. And at night, he would lay on my neck or head to sleep. During the day I would try to carefully lay him in the bed when he fell asleep, but he's wake up and demand to be held again.

I just felt it was because he was still in the kitten stage and because he lacked the bonding with a mother kitten. I ended up buying a sports bra and tucked him in there with his head sticking out of the top of my shirt so i could at least get around and use my hands for simple things like making coffee, eating, housework, etc.

He finally grew out of it. And now, years later, he refuses to let anyone hold him! LOL!!

[Emit]

24. I was wondering if part of this kitten's behavior was due to the fact that he was so young

when we adopted him. He and his sister were supposedly 7 weeks old, but they were tiny and didn't have much meat on their bones. The girl kitten was so small she could fit in the palm of my hand -- and she seemed very under-nourished. I wouldn't even let my boisterous 6yo son hold her much at first, for fear he'd be too heavy-handed. They slept with us in bed, right up on our heads for the first month or so, like you describe...and followed me around as if in need of protection or comfort. They're both still a little skittish, compared to other cats we've owned. I just get the sense that they were (are) really needy, and that could be one of the reasons Salem seeks me out like he does.

[Lil Missy]

28. I think so too

Mine was rather malnourished when I got him, and I think he simply needed the warmth of a warm body. When I stuck him down my shirt in a sports bra he was perfectly content without attention and slept most of the time.

He was only 3 or 4 weeks old when I rescued him and had other problems too, I had to feed him with a dropper at first because he wasn't used to eating dry food. And of course the usual vet visit for ear mites and shots, and I think he had to take a liquid vitamin for a while due to his undernourished status.

And it seems to me that a litter of kittens are usually all huddled together against mama cat's belly for several weeks anyway, or until they are weaned. Thus, they get a lot of body warmth and a feeling of bonding that way.

I did have a little help as he progressed from my older female cat I had at the time. She was a bit disgusted with his grooming habits and started grooming him herself, and he finally figured out how to do that on his own.

Good luck with your little guy. I really think this especially needy stage he is displaying will pass. Heck, mine has not allowed anyone to pick him up or pet him for years now because he is so persnickety and fussy. But at night he still comes and sleep on top of or behind mama's butt. (Me)

And I still just love him to pieces!

[Lil Missy]

29. PS - Be sure to trim his nails too! n/t

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

8. They normally stop leg-climbing when they get older.

In the meantime, carefully trim off the tips of his claws with a nail-clipper. And shriek like a banshee whenever he impales you; they hate the noise. He looks like a real cutie (I just got a cute 4-month-old last week, but she hasn't climbed legs, just curtains).

[havocmom]

10. Good advice all around.

Keep the curved tip of nails trimmed and howl when they are too rough. They will learn. Takes to about age 3 years for them to really become great pets. Patience pays ;)

Oh, wearing jeans is a help until the howling breaks them of the Impaler routine.

[spooky3]

15. if that doesn't work, try this

One of my cats was 10 months old and no one had ever taught him not to bite (hard) and claw when he was playing, sitting with you, or anything else. It wasn't necessary to scream in pain. I was teaching him his name when I called him before feeding, and he loved petting so he learned pretty quickly to pay attention when I said his name. So when he started the wild kitten behavior of biting, I would say "(Name), ow! No! (not too loudly) No biting!" and gently pull his mouth from whatever he was biting and cuddle him. He would look directly at me and honestly looked puzzled but he learned how to stop this without any screaming, hitting or other unpleasantness. Every few months now he forgets and all I have to do is repeat this and he stops without further action.

Emit, You just have to be patient and consistent-- cats can learn. In your case try to anticipate before he starts climbing, if you can, and ask "(Name), do you want some cuddling?" Pick him up and cuddle him. I fostered some orphans who did this--they would climb all the way to the back of my neck, from behind, purring all the way, so I couldn't pull them off. It was painful but endearing. I cried and cried when they were adopted but I know they all got happy homes.

Good luck!

[TrogL]

9. They stop doing it as soon as they're old enough to jump

...up into your lap instead of mountaineering.

[distantearlywarning]

14. Kittens are actually pretty sensitive to the feelings of others, at least physical feelings

If they were with their siblings, the other little kittens and their mother would let them know when they were doing something painful by yelping and ignoring for a few seconds or a minute. So if you do the same thing (i.e., say "OW!" in a really loud voice when he climbs your leg and briefly put him on the floor), he will learn that he is hurting you and stop. Make sure to praise and reassure him after you ignore for a minute and he doesn't repeat the bad behavior.

We used this method with our two kittens starting when we got them at 10 weeks. They are now 6 months old and are extremely careful with their claws around us and our houseguests. They have learned that humans can't tolerate kitty claws or teeth. They don't try to jump up in our laps unless they are sure they can land without climbing, and they always play with us with their claws retracted. It also helped that they played with one another and reinforced the "don't bite or claw too hard or your friend will leave" lesson.

[FloridaJudy]

16. It could be worse

You could have adopted the infamous "Pinky"!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eht-kEzq88w

My cat seems to have naturally abandoned her clawing her way up my leg when she was old enough to make a leap of faith. My legs look a whole lot better, but household objects now get broken on an annoyingly regular basis.

edited to add: I just played that video, and the dog ran and hid in the closet!

[judaspriestess]

17. awww, funny we adopted two black kittens from the shelter

about 2 years ago. They are not super affectionate but they are good kitties. I will post pics of my new baby Joaquin hopefully by Monday.

Your baby is gorgeous. He is going to look like my babybaloney when he's all growed up. as far as advice, I'm a huge sap and let my kitten have his way with me but I have learned from this thread.

[ThomCat]

18. Others already gave you good advice

so I'm just going to say Awww.... :)

I am so glad she's adopted both of them. I hope they are both very happy and affectionate parts of your family for a very, very long time time to come.

[stuntcat]

19. If he'll let you hold his hands..

Use a clipper to clip the sharp ends. Be careful of course not to clip far down, just the pointy tips.
My old cat Tonka trusts me to do it and his claws are always blunt, he can tromp all over me without clawing me, I just have to redo it every few weeks.
But our youngest, Percy, is a spaz and he doesn't even like being lifted so there's no way I can hold his paws.

It's totally sweet how he has to sit on you :loveya:

[CreekDog]

20. With that name, he will be on the no-fly list for sure!

DHS goofuses.

[SoCalDem]

21. Spray bottle with water and a loud NO.. after a while just showing them the bottle

will settle them down.. unless you have malicious little evil cats like I do.. Marvin CHEWED the nozzle of the water bottle once, and just stared me down when I picked it up to "give him a little shower"..

[Kajsa]

27. ROFL!

Oh no!

I've got a spray bottle of water, too.

It works like a charm, just putting it in plain sight
does the trick, No water needed. ;-)

I can only imagine if the little buggers
would chew the nozzle off and give me their
famous, " Wha?- I'm a cat, damnit" look.

You have your hands fulls, SoCalDem!

:rofl: :hi:

[applegrove]

26. Water pistol. Wet the cat with a water pistol a few times and pretty soon all you will

have to do is aim the gun and say "freeze" and your cat will stop what they are doing and freeze - then run away.

I used one with one of my cats. I was too lazy to do it with my latest kitten so now that cute little thing has some bad habits. Train them well when they are young. My little guy destroys furniture.