New and have questions

[okeemom]

Good morning and hope everyone had a super Christmas!!! I adopted a rescue Border Collie (Stella) last Friday and she is beautiful! She's 5 years old and the previous owners had to move out of the country and had to surrender her. From the paperwork I received she had been around cats before. I'm 62 yrs old and have five older inside cats who have never been around dogs. I keep Stella in my family room which has a sliding glass door. I figured that way she can see them and they can see her. I also walk her through the house on a leash several times a day so they can see each other. There has been no hissing, barking etc and the cats just sit and watch. None have moved so I'm not sure if Stella will chase them or not. I know this can be a long process especially with OLD cats. Any advice will be appreciated!!! I'm sure I'll have a lot more questions in the future. This site is wonderful!

 

okeemom

[GentleLake]

Sounds like what you're doing is just fine. When you do finally allow them to meet with Stella off leash, I'd start with just one cat at a time, allowing them to get to know each other individually before just letting Stella loose with all of them.

 

Good luck, and thanks for giving Stella a great new home!

[NJSwede]

Welcome to the wonderful word of rescued Border Collies! We got one three months ago and the whole family is loving every minute of it!

[Jumpin Boots]

A few months ago we were adopted by a feral kitten, if he was going to stay with us dogs were going to have to be ok. I would take one if the dogs beds into the room he was living in so he could smell the dog smell without being worried about the dog itself. This really seemed to help. You could try this with your cats. Also whenever we have a new dog in with our cats they are put on a drag line so that if something naughty does occur we can easy stop the dog.

[gcv-border]

Thank you for adopting!

 

I would also add that if she is calm around cats, take that opportunity to reward her in a calm manner. i.e. a treat or a pet or anything else that she enjoys.

[D'Elle]

Sounds promising to me. The fact that the cats stay calm is a good sign, as is the fact that your new dog doesn't try to pull toward the cats. I second the introducing of them one cat at a time, and make sure the cat has an escape route to a place the dog cannot reach. If there's a cat tree that works, if not then a door open only far enough to admit a cat and not the dog, held in place by a string around the doorknob and attached to the other side.

 

Actually, I find that for the cats to have egress to a safe "cat room" is necessary even though none of my dogs would harm a cat. Sometimes the cats just need "cat time" without having dogs around, so I have the room with the cat boxes in it blocked off to dogs. I recommend you arrange something like this, even if it is just part of a room, or a closet.

 

I have fostered border collies for years and most of that time had a cat. Mostly I had no problems with the dogs bothering the cats, although there were a couple of glaring exceptions. Even then, the fosters were not interested in hurting the cats, just harassing them to death trying to round them up and move them from place to place.

[simba]

Okeemom- have the cats ever been around dogs before?

 

The 'cat room' is a great idea. Now how do I make a 'dog room' the cat can't get in to?