Thread: Herbie is here!

If you suffer from kitten broodiness, look away now!

I brought little Herbie home with me last week...and he's Perfect!



We decided not to isolate him from the others, and took the somewhat risky approach of throwing them all together, trusting in the fact that he is Larry and Monty's little brother and they are all nice-natured (not that that really means anything in feline terms!) Introductions went fairly well: Barney boxed Herbie's ears and slunk off. Larry growled and ran away, and Monty had a good sniff and hung around observing. Herb was very confident and just wanted to make friends.

Then some unfamiliar noise startled him and he shot behind the washing machine. This didn't worry me too much - Larry did the same thing when he was little and he just came out again. But Herbie did not appear for a while, so I pulled the machine out, and to my horror noticed a gap between the wall and the kick-board - Herb was hiding under the kitchen units! OH fitted the kitchen but couldn't remember how he put the kick-board on. He pulled on it but it wasn't going to come off easily. So we decided to wait it out. I spent the next hour or so crouched behind the washing machine under the worktop, offering food and toys to the Gap, trying to talk in kitten language. Not really what I had in mind for Herbie's first day with us. On the plus side, I found a pound coin down there and solved the mystery of the missing ping-pong balls.

Eventually Herbie emerged, all dusty. I made a big fuss of him and put a housebrick in the gap. Phew!

Day 2, and Herb was in his room upstairs chilling out. Monty came in to have a good sniff around. Herbie came with his favourite cuddly toy dog from the breeder's bedroom where he used to sleep, and Monty started sniffing, licking and rolling over on this toy dog, I guess he recognised the scent of the breeder's house. I sat down on the floor to watch, and Monty came over and sat on my lap for a massive cuddle and face-lick. Then to my surprise, little Herb came over and got on my lap as well - and snuggled down into Montys tail! I held my breath and waited for a growl or a side-swipe, but nothing happened, as amazingly Monty didn't seem to mind. We all 3 stayed there for a bit, until I got pins and needles and had to get up! Oh if only OH was on hand with camera!

From then on Monty took Herbie under his wing and started to play with him and to do lots of showing off. Out in the garden Monty made a great show of tree-climbing, tackling 4 trees one after the other, whilst Herbie sat very calmly and watched. Then Herbie decided to have a go - and he performed a text-book climb and descent. This is a bright lad! Nothing like Larry who clambered up a tree at 4 months old, and simply fell out! (what a fright that was - but he was OK).

Meanwhile Larry has been going around with a real face on, saying 'Well, nobody asked me if we should have a stoopid kitten!', and batting Herbie away with his massive paw whenever he got too close (which was most of the time). Barney mostly ignored Herb but made a point of boxing his ears at least once a day. Got to make his point after all, to the young whippersnapper.

But by Day 5 we have harmony. All 4 cats were playing nicely in the kitchen with the tunnel and the cardboard box and the mice and the bunch of feathers on a string. All in all I can't believe how smoothly it's gone. I think it helps that Herbie is a MC from the same breeder as the terrible twosome. It also helps that he's such a placid, friendly little thing. I was expecting mental kitten naughtiness like we had last year when we nicknamed L and M 'The Criminals'. But to our surprise, we've had no leg-climbing, no jumping onto dinner plates, no leaping onto our shoulders from the floor, no kitchen rag-chasing resulting in hand lacerations, no curtain climbing...he's just so well-behaved! Apart from one slight accident on the first night when he weed on the bed (oh dear!) he's used the trays every time, including the big boys' trays down in the cellar. He has only trod in his poo once and didn't mind me dunking his paws in a sink of water to wash them. He eats anything - kibble, raw, tinned.

I'm glad we didn't isolate him because I think he'd be very unhappy on his own. He's come from a house of 12 cats and he really likes the rough and tumble. He'd rather be in with the crowd and getting swatted by big paws, than all on his own.

The other thing is, that Herbie makes his brothers look MASSIVE! We keep saying, 'oh blimey, we've got a couple of monster cats there'. You just get used to their size and when confronted with a comparison it's quite a shock!!