aggressive kitten

Question
I have already ask this in the Cat Behavioral section and i have been directed to you. I have two female 5month old Maine Coon kittens that are sisters and have never been seperated. I purchased them from a reputable breeder and they are being spayed in 3 weeks. My problem is with aggresion in one of them. Zoie is the bigger one and has been being a bully lately to her little sister Allie. I have not seen Zoie but am sure that Zoie is bulling Allie out of her food bowl. I do have two sets of food and water bowls and have separeted them in the room. I have also noticed Zoie chasing Allie out of different rooms. I have corrected Zoie on her behavior but not forsure if I should be doing this or let them go. We have noticed that Zoie is gaining weight continously but Allie is not. I have started feeding Allie several small meals threw out the day in a separate room from Zoie.I am not forsure how to handle Zoie. I have had them completely checked out by my vet and they are fine.I have also had problems with Zoie showing aggression towards me but she has shown no aggression towards our dogs.What can i do or is this normal?Please help me with my new babies.

Answer
Dear Sabrina

It is unusual for litter mates of this age to be doing this.  It may have been caused by a cat outside coming up close to a window and spooking them and then as Zoie couldn't chase the cat off she got confused and turned on her sister.  It may take quite a bit of work and determination to rectify the situation and I have known some cases that never resolve.

However I would suggest that to start with, you make sure you feed Allie in a different room and give her plenty of time of uninterrupted feeding time before you allow Zoie back in.  You can purchase pheremone sprays or plug in devices which sometimes work and do so by emitted the synthetic pheremones into the amosphere which calm aggression.  There is also a product which you can buy easily on the web or via your vet called Zylkene.  This is a natural product derived from milk which when given over a period can help to destress the cat which may help.  The other thing you could look into is Bach Flower remedies (if you can get them in the USA) and you would then have to judge which one would be best depending on the general temperament of your cat.  You would be best to contact someone well practiced in the flower remedies to determine the correct one for your situation and cat.

You could also go back to basics as if you were introducing them to each other for the first time.  You could pen Allie to start with so that Zoie can interact with her but without Allie being chased all the time, and then swap them over so that Allie can feel some freedom without the threat, and boost her confidence.  You may have to consider doing this for quite some time until the status quo returns.  

Spaying them both may also help as hormones may be coming to the fore here and once they are spayed and their hormones have settled down, Zoie may lose her aggression.

I think we have to be realistic here too as not every situation will resolve. In that case you may have to decide to do what is best in the cats' interest and consider rehoming one of them, but that is a long way off at the moment as I hope I have given you some options to try and one of them may work for you.

Marcia.