The Peak of Kitten Powers

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Our kitten, Olwyn, is a little over five months old. She is communicating well with both sets of lifeforms she lives with; the humans, and the cats.

Olwyn is about the same age as now two-year-old RJ was when we got him. But their core competencies at this stage of development are markedly different, and it actually has little to do with their individual personalities or talents. Both are sensitive to human signals, social with us and the other cats, and equally bright and curious.

The 5-7 month age range in a kitten roughly corresponds to 9-12 years in a human.

Not yet dealing with the expansion of powers that come with adolescence, they are at the peak of their child, or kitten, powers. They are no longer a baby, and are now capable of doing many things for themselves.

Olwyn has many charming ways to tell us what she is thinking. She play bites when she is hungry, but carefully, and afterwards sits back to study us, hoping we get the hint. She will sleep on Dear Husband’s foot while he washes the dishes, knowing the next step in the routine is her midday snack. She will nudge us with her paw to help her find a favorite toy.

When she asks for attention, we play “who is it, where is it” to get her to show us what she might want. We are quick to get up and follow her around to reinforce her attempts at communication.

This active encouragement was the same thing we did for RJ at this age. But while Olwyn loves the attention, and comes up with new things to do to test our reaction, RJ was concentrating on solitary play, and showing only a fraction of her ways to get our attention. When he showed signs of frantic movement, we would have to step in and figure out what he needed, because he didn’t know how to tell us.

This is not an essential difference in these two cats. This is an essential difference in their early experiences.

While Olwyn was very sick as a baby, and thus did not get much in the way of littermate play, she got plenty of attention. Her natural liking for people was not ruined by the experience. Since she is naturally interested in us, we have built on her enjoyment of our antics to get more interaction from us.

RJ had very little time, with anything, before we got him. Being in a cage at the shelter was a step up for him at the time. I had to teach him how to play with toys. So RJ missed some crucial concepts about cause and effect. He had trouble connecting what he did with what anything did in response.

Olwyn had opportunities to do things and to see things happen. RJ did not.

This is how RJ ran into early difficulties when he and Olwyn first started playing together. He immediately responded kitten-to-kitten. But she isn’t even three pounds yet, and he’s over ten pounds. He did not realize he was getting overbearing, and Olwyn would complain.

He’s picking up on her signals, encouraged by us and kept in line by Mr. Bond, and improving all the time. This is where having a senior cat to help with the policing is a great boon; provided they care to, know how, and are encouraged to do so.

Mr. Bond showed his smart and soft side recently when he snagged a fly with the casual grace of a martial arts master. (He’s still got it!) Olwyn became interested, and Mr. Bond gave her the fly by backing off and staring intently at it so she would focus on it too. Then he contentedly watched her playing with it, warning RJ off with a paw. You’ll just eat it. Let the kid have some fun.

RJ is sweet, too. But he doesn’t understand how to convey that to his new kitten. But since she has become even more fascinating than the open summer windows, I feel confident that he’ll find attending Olwyn University an enjoyable way to keep learning.

It’s a process which should never end.

This post was about how our new kitten is fitting into a family of two humans, and two Beta boys of widely varying age. See all my Olwyn posts.

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