aggressive manx behavior

Question
When we got Milo he was just a year old.  A previous owner, teenager boy, taught Milo to be on the aggressive side.  He was an indoor cat.  He is now indoor/outdoor and mellowed a lot with love and affection.  He knows 'no' well.  Lately he has been biting me more and attacking with a look of anger.  Usually it is when I am walking in the house.  Now he will do it when I am sitting on the floor our couch, even after I've pet him for a while.  Sometimes I pick him up and tell him no and set him outside for a while.  I wish I knew if he simply wanted out and is getting my attention or if he's angry about something that we can change.  He seems to be challenging me more the last two weeks.  He doesn't do this to my 6 year old daughter.
Thank you.  I'm tired of him drawing blood.  Milo will be two in May.

Answer
Michele,

These are always difficult cases.  First of all, is Milo neutered?  If not, springtime is a time of raging hormones, females in season, and the like, and this can turn a normally affectionate whole male into what appears to be aggressive behavior.  If this is the case, neutering will be most helpful.  I find it interesting that he does not exhibit this behavior with your 6 year old.  It almost seems as if he is behaving like a whole male.

If not, you might see if there is a physical problem with Milo, just to be on the safe side.  If cats are in pain, they will exhibit aggressive behavior.

Picking him up and teling him no is an absolutely useless exercise.  When he begins this type of behavior, the most important thing to do is to "leave the field", i.e. whatever you were doing with Mio, it stops and you walk away.  No affection, no attention, ignore him!

Obviously, Milo was not correctly socialized to playing with humans.  If you saw how very young kittens interact with each other and mama, you would understand the behavior better.  Kittens play incredibly roughly with teeth and claws.  Since cats (including kittens) have very tough skin, there is no harm done. Cats have to learn to play more gently with us (soft skinned) humans.  We usually do this by holding our very young kittens, talking softly to them and stroking them gently.  If they begin the teeth and claws game, we stop, put them down and walk away.  They quicky learn that teeth and claws are not acceptable behaviors with humans.

Over time this approach will eventually work with Milo, but it will take much patience and perseverance. Another approach might be to look at clicker training.  A number of people have claimed success with this training technique.  You can get more information by visiting Karn Pryor's website:

  http://www.clickertraining.com


Good luck and best regards... Norm.