Pets are like friends of humans and are dear to them. Just like dogs, cats are also trainable and intelligent animals. A well-trained pet is most desirable. Cats love to be praised and pampered, and ask for extra love and affection. Usually most cats are well-trained; though, a few of their actions might not be considered as trained actions. For example, when you open a can or a packet of food, your cat comes running to it. This action might not be acceptable to you, but a cat, associating the noise created by opening a food packet with the availability of food, cannot resist the temptation.
Sometimes, people fail to understand the behaviour of their cats. The basic training involves providing some positive and negative feedback associated with the actions or behaviour of their pets. Just like small kids love to get rewards for some good work done by them, pets also like to be appreciated in terms of rewards. So, the owners should try to reward their pets for showing a good behaviour.
Training a cat is easy and should be practised at home. Consider these 5 tips to train a cat.
- Finding out the problem: sometimes you find that your cat starts scratching the furniture or chewing your shoes or socks. Instead of frowning at them, the best way is to understand their problem. This behavior of your cat could be associated with some health issue. Sometimes, your cat might even urinate outside the litter box, which might turn your mood bad. But, the idea is to figure out the real cause behind the action.
- Changing the environment: training a cat involves understanding their mood fluctuations. It could sometimes be observed that your cat is avoiding its permanent litter box, or has started eating in the same food box. So, instead of trying to punish your lovely pet, change its environment and place. This might change their mood.
- Reward for their action: if you want to stay in a good mood by making your cat behave properly, giving them rewards is the best way to teach them. For example, if your cat uses the litter box properly out and eats in the food box, reward it with its favorite food or, may be, a new food box.
- Overcome dangerous behavior: some chewing is justified, while some is dangerous and destructive. For example, chewing the cable wires is totally harmful. This can be avoided by covering the wires with some rubber or plastic tubing, or by taking any other precautionary measures.
- Teach a lesson for their wrongdoing: it is useful for you to know that cats dislike high-pitched sounds. While training a cat, such sounds turn out to be a useful tool. In situations where your cat is creating a fuss, hide yourself and make certain noises, like shaking a can of pennies. Cats also dislike playing with water. In this way punishing every undesirable action plays an important role in training a cat.
In case you are still facing problems in training your cats and understanding them, the other way to approach the issue is, to take the help of a professional trainer, or refer to some books on animal behaviour. So, what is most important is to understand your pet and love it.
Be Sociable, Share!