active Abyssinian

Question
I have an elderly Abyssinian girl who wakes me up at about 5:00 am by purring extremely loudly and biting my hand (just enough pressure to get my attention of course!)as well as sticking her nose in my eye, mouth or nose in order to wake me up to feed her (really just to wake me up!) The behavior is funny but it annoys me because it is about an hour too early for me to wake up on a work day! Please advise if you have any suggestions.  

Answer
Martha,

I hate to have to answer these questions because the framer of the question always takes my answer in the wrong way.  The fact is that Abyssinians are very, very independent cats and are going to do what they want to do.  So, unless you can get them to think doing something you want is really their idea, I do not see a lot of chance to change her behavior.

She sounds like an affectionate fun loving cat who has figured out she can manipulate humans in the morning to get fed that much sooner.

There is a training technique called clicker training that does work pretty well on cats, although I am not sure how you could apply it in this situation.  You can look at Karen Pryor's web page at:

http://www.clickertraining.com

and see what you think.

BTW, in years past, I changed my schedule to fit the cats (it was easier than trying to tough out the persistence), and found how much I could get done in that "extra" hour the cats had given me.  I have been an Abyssinian breeder for 36 years.

Best regards... Norm.