Late night life of pet dog and street cats

1 Day 1 World Project: Donna at 11:00pm – 12:00am

Donna’s community mealtime with street cats

On those days that I boil meat for Donna for her treats, we sometimes take some down to treat our pet dog and the street cats together.

It’s our diabolical plan to brainwash the local kitties into consorting with the pet dog. :P

Please pardon the blurry photos since it’s all taken in low light with my not very amazing camera ;P (Yes! Blame the camera not the human, lol :P)

Anyways, this kitty is rather affectionate and so prime candidate for the easily-swayed-to-like-the-pet-dog club.

And the bottom right box in the photo above shows the distance pet dog and street cat can stand to be with each other before one or the other moves away.

The cat didn’t want to take the food from my hand at first, so I had to drop it on the floor and slowly lure the cat closer and closer to the dog.

When I felt that I have glutted them enough with the food, I had Donna practise her stand-stay and “come”. Kitty is not as good as Donna in staying so she is relegated to the role of the cheerleader, which I’m afraid she has zero disinterest in. :P So there she goes, walking away…

Donna meanwhile, stays… very well… it’s a low distraction environment for her after all.

Moving further away from Donna, so that she is now a small black speck standing and staying.

And then the “Come” command.

Excellent way of making her run without a treadmill. Of course the human has to walk back and forth too to make her run laps, so all around a good way to get both of us moving in a safe environment (close to midnight after all) and also enjoy the relatively large space right below our flat.

How we trained the dog to not get distracted by the cats

1. Donna was on the lead when we started our clandestine night time activities :P
2. Start from a far enough distance where you know the dog will not react. This means there is no need to physically restrain the dog. Treat the dog for not reacting in any way to the cat.
3. If dog is able to stay focused on you and ignore the cat, slowly close the distance between dog and cat.
4. If dog is too close and starts paying attention to the cat, you may want to take a step back and slow down on cutting the distance and continue with treating the dog for putting his focus back on you.
5. I sometimes also tell Donna to “stay” when she appears to want to approach the cat, instead of widening the distance again. Treat the dog if she stays and refocuses on you.
6. This can take days, but the cat that habitually strays in the area that is its territory will also slowly get used to seeing pet dog and you as well.
7. By the time you are able to get within about a metre from the cat, start giving both pet dog and stray cat treats. It is normal for the cat not to want to take food from you hands. You can throw it on the floor closest to her feet instead and slowly lure her towards the dog (if dog is comfortable enough with the cat approaching without reacting to her).
8. I hope that slowly the cat will start associating the appearance of Donna with treats and develop more friendly feelings :D hehehe…
9. Doesn’t work on all cats of course. The black cat in the photos sitting in the background is curious but wary and refused to approach. It consistently kept about 2metres distance away from us.

Note: Cats are carnivores so I’m feeding plain boiled meat in this case. Please clear the floor of any uneaten bits of food so that it doesn’t encourage the congregation and breeding of cockroaches and rats in the neighbourhood.

For 24 weeks, weliveinaflat will post photos taken for a specific hour in that week.
We will cover 24 hours in 24 weeks. (I’ve no idea how we will do the sleeping hours, lol!)
More about the 1 Day 1 World Project here.