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Old 11/25/2007, 03:22 PM
catdoc catdoc is offline
Fish nerd
 
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: Bloomington, IN
Posts: 1,382
First, you need to watch this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qit3ALTelOo

I don't know anything about your kitten, but I know that my first kitten was a crazy thing--would attack anything that moved for about the first year of his life. He wasn't trying to hurt anything, just wanted to play and hone his hunting skills on my fingers and toes! That said, he turned into the greatest cat ever once he was a year old. I had him wearing Soft Paws (the vinyl glue-on nail caps) for the first few months while I trained him what was and wasn't acceptable. I did have good luck using a water bottle on him (set it to "stream", no "mist") but it hasn't worked as well on some of my other cats.

Give him something that IS acceptable scratching material (I gather that is part of the problem?). The crummy store-bought scratching poles never work for my cats, they just can't get their claws into them for a good rip. Either use the corrugated cardboard scratching pads (they have them at Wal-Mart, Petstmart, and probably every other pet suppy store) or make one yourself. I've made killer scratching poles for my cats--floor to ceiling, use shelving brackets to attach shelves to it, then cover it all in berber (NOT shag-type) carpeting. My cats wear these things out, I'm on version 4.0 or so by now. When you catch him scratching where he shouldn't be, take him to what IS acceptable and let him have at it. He'll catch on.

Here's a pic of what I mean:
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Christy

Animals are such agreeable friends - they ask no questions, they pass no criticisms.
-George Eliot