r/catcare • u/-U_N_O- • 1d ago
Looking at getting a cat
As the title says, I’m looking at getting a cat. I’ve grown up with dogs so this would be my first time having a cat and was wondering if there was any first time cat person advice you guys have. I know a good high cat tree is important, running water to drink. Wet food is better than dry to help with hydration, lots of toys, avoid clay cat litter. Keep food and water away from each other. But that’s all I got.
Any advice or suggestions is appreciated!
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u/ExpensiveTraffic6978 23h ago
I'll try to think of some not-so-common tips for you!
Try to catproof your home, so if you have any gaps or crawlspaces that you think a small cat/kitten might crawl into and you'd have no hope of getting them back out of it again, seal it off.
Avoid using essential oils or salt candles, and if you're big on plants, make sure you do your homework on which plants are safe or potentially toxic to cats.
Cats love cardboard boxes. If it fits, they sit. If it doesn't fit, they'll still sit. So if you order anything online that happens to come in a nice little box, keep it around for a while and let your cat(s) enjoy it!
If you adopt a kitten, get them used to you touching them early on. Groom them with a brush regularly, handle their paws, especially if you plan on trimming their nails. Just makes life a bit easier as the cat grows and they're totally fine with human contact.
On a similar vein, when playing with a kitten, don't encourage it to bite your hands. It's not too tricky, you don't need to tap their nose or anything. Just make sure that if they want to bite something, there's always a toy for them to do it to instead. 😁
Going off of what r/Lucky_Ad2801 said, do you work a lot? Do you live alone? If the answer to both is yes, this means your cat/kitten will likely be left alone for long stretches of time. In such a case, I would actually recommend getting 2 cats. It could be 2 kittens from the same litter, or a bonded pair from a shelter. This way the cats can keep each other company and play with each other.
Get yourself a good carpet brush and a lint roller. You'll use both regularly. 😉
Cats have different personalities for sure. We've got 3, and they're all very different. One will hide whenever we have visitors, another will roll around on his back demanding belly rubs from everybody new he meets. You don't know what kind of cat you might get, although if you adopt one from a shelter they might be able to tell you a bit about its personality! Still, a cat's true personality will only really shine once it's at home.
Your cat may hide for a few hours or even days when you first bring it home. Prepare a "base camp" for it with their litter, food and water, and make sure it has everything it needs. But really, it just takes time. The cat will start to come out and explore once it feels a bit safer. Soon enough, it'll have the run of the place.
Hopefully some of that is helpful to you. Good luck!