Neighbours cat - wants to make friends

GingerLily

Hi,

We have a youngish (18 months only) cat, she's easily scared and has been attacked by a local black cat a few times. She recently lost her brother who used to protect her which means there are more cats entering in our garden / her territory.

There's a friendly ginger cat we've spotted a few times near our house, she's scared of him (although she can stand up to him, she can't to the other neighbourhood bully) , he seems very persistent to make 'friends' (both nuetred i might add).

She's hissed and swipped at him, he doesn't ever respond in aggression, we obviously seperate them and give her safety and cuddles.

So, he spent most of yesterday yowling outside the house for her (his owners eventually brought him home) and this morning he got in our house in an open window, she'd cornered him so he ended up going all the way upstairs. I don't think he's going to leave her alone, and part of me thinks he's better walking/guarding around the area than the other aggressive males.

So my real question:

Can two cats be 'friends' like this? Is it something we should encourage?

I might add that she seems very lonely since she lost her brother

YellowBucket

To be perfectly honest, I don’t think you can really interpret, encourage or discourage interactions or friendships.

Cat social behaviour is very complex, full of nuances and the reasons for cats being friends are complex, subtle and seem to come down to personality and upbringing.

They’re not like dogs and they don’t necessarily need or seek out other cats to be friendly with, but at the same time they can end up in quite strong relationships, but usually not with very many other cats.

There are all sorts of other signals from body language to scents and eye contact going on that you’ll be unlikely to be able to interpret.

They also often live “together but separately” carefully spacing out and being friendly and tolerant until certain invisible lines are stepped across.

If your cat and the neighbours’ cat chose to be friendly it’ll happen, if they don’t they don’t. The hissing and argument is about defining territory.

Also cat social behaviour is entirely different to dogs and also extremely different to humans. So neither is a good model for cat behaviour.

They’re social, but very much on their own terms as individuals.

Heroditas

We have three cats - a brother and sister and a stray who adopted us a couple of years after we got the other two as kittens.
The stray will barely tolerate us touching her but she is infatuated with the male. She follows him everywhere, howls if he goes out of sight, runs up to him at every opportunity and the two always sleep cuddled up together.
He's a bit too cool for school about the whole relationship but she is completely nuts about him.

scilover

I'm afraid that is out of our control. We can't force, encourage or discourage a relationship between cats. It will just take time for them to get used to each other.