Can't make up my mind - new cat

[smilingcat]

I've fostered lots of newborn kittens. And have way too many failed to be adopted cats. If you were to bring in a full grown male, its possible that Taffy may start marking the house to show the other cat that its his turf. Bringing in a adult male is going to be harder than a young one. If the new male is strong willed, Taffy could get stalked and emotionally stressed. Young neutered male or spayed female (kitten) will be easier to integrate and less chance for Taffy to start misbehaving.

Integrating two adult male can be done but its lot more work. Sometimes, you only get to uneasy truce between the two.

You will also need to get a second litter box. Taffy has his own. He think it belongs to him and not to any new cat. Second litter box should be made available when you bring home a new cat. Also have several water bowls elsewhere in the house so that Taffy isn't protecting his "watering hole". And you will need a second food bowl just for the new cat. All for the same reason. What belongs to Taffy is HIS! Eventually, they will share the litter box and the water bowl. food bowl should be kept separate.

[nuliajuk]

I've fostered lots of newborn kittens. And have way too many failed to be adopted cats. If you were to bring in a full grown male, its possible that Taffy may start marking the house to show the other cat that its his turf. Bringing in a adult male is going to be harder than a young one. If the new male is strong willed, Taffy could get stalked and emotionally stressed. Young neutered male or spayed female (kitten) will be easier to integrate and less chance for Taffy to start misbehaving.

Integrating two adult male can be done but its lot more work. Sometimes, you only get to uneasy truce between the two.

You will also need to get a second litter box. Taffy has his own. He think it belongs to him and not to any new cat. Second litter box should be made available when you bring home a new cat. Also have several water bowls elsewhere in the house so that Taffy isn't protecting his "watering hole". And you will need a second food bowl just for the new cat. All for the same reason. What belongs to Taffy is HIS! Eventually, they will share the litter box and the water bowl. food bowl should be kept separate.

Taffy is a female, and she adapted well to our old cat, as well as to other cats at the clinic where she was boarded after her first owner went into a nursing home. (By coincidence she lived nearby and used the same clinic as us, so StreetCats boarded her there as a temporary thing.)
We do have a second litter box, we bought it when we were trying to introduce the first tabby, and we plan to keep the new cat in the downstairs spare bedroom for a few days and introduce them gradually by alternately brushing them with the same brush. It worked the first time around, just not with the tabby we took in over Christmas, as she was too nervous and hid from us.

I have 5 cats right now. Have had as many as 7. The easiest to introduce to my older and aloof cats were the kittens. Another older cat with a well established personality is harder. No matter what Taffy may never really be friends with another cat. But what you are looking for is another cat that can hold it's own but also doesn't really NEED the other cat to like her. So I recommend younger is better.

She was depressed after Merlin passed away, and only brightened up when summer came and we could take her outside for walks... sometimes several times a day. In November we were able to compensate for the seasonal change with play, but eventually she got bored and mopey again. She is used to other animals, including other cats, and we do think she'd appreciate the right sort of companion. She had other animals in her life in the past, in her old home.

[nuliajuk]

We've taken the plunge and are trying out the blue point Siamese. So far, so good, just a little swearing in the middle of the night when he got too close to Taffy, but otherwise they're cautiously checking each other out and have touched noses. Nothing timid about this boy, he's been checking out the whole house.
He's been a bit of a surprise so far. First surprise - he actually appears to be a Siamese, not a colourpoint mixed breed cat with Siamese ancestry like Taffy. Mind you, he doesn't have the baby-cry voice, so perhaps he isn't completely purebred.
Second surprise - he's HUGE. Only 12 pounds, but long and stretched out, like a panther. When I've seen purebred Siamese at cat shows, they always looked like really small cats. We had to swap a plastic storage tote for the litter box we'd bought for the previous cat as he couldn't fit in with the cover on and hurled litter all over the furness room with it off.