Cat Introduction Stories: Biggie & Mac

Aug 20, 2021

Cat Introduction Stories: Biggie & Mac

Introducing a male kitten to a resident male cat.

After lots of time spent at home during lockdown with British Blue, Biggie (AKA The Notorious BSH) owner Naomi was worried that this sociable boy would get lonely when she returned to work. In this journal series of real-life cat introductions, I meet other owners who have navigated this complicated journey, as I did with Percy and Penelope (Read my story here). Hopefully, this will help you gain a better understanding of what to expect if you decide to grow your cat family.

Naomi very kindly shares her story which proves not all cat intros end in disaster!

"I got Biggie in March 2020, just before going into lockdown for the first time, so we've been together almost 24/7 since then. He's happy enough playing by himself at times but can also be very needy - so I was worried about life going back to normal and going back into the office with him being by himself for large parts of the day at home alone.

I started to consider getting a kitten to keep him company and play with him when the time came to go back to the office. I spent a long time thinking about whether it was the right thing to do for Biggie. I was nervous that they might not get along or that Biggie would end up getting stressed or hating me! In the end, I decided that whilst he's still young and such a friendly cat, getting him a little companion was worth the risk.

The day I brought Mac home, I let Biggie have a sniff through the carrier but then set Mac up in his own room so he could get settled into his new environment. I was expecting the process to take around 3 weeks before I was happy to leave them unsupervised together with free roam of the flat. The first couple of days, I'd let Biggie come into Mac's room to sniff around and start getting used to each other; he was unsure at first but luckily never got aggressive. He would occasionally hiss but felt like he was testing the waters to see Mac's reaction, but that would usually be the point I'd decide to shut him out again.

The morning of the third day, I opened the door to check on Mac, and he marched straight past me and up to Biggie and cuddled him! From that moment on, they were inseparable, cuddled up, licking each other by the end of the day.

I couldn't quite believe how well it all went. I think Mac just assumed they were best friends immediately and didn't give Biggie a chance to disagree. They're now never more than a couple of feet away from each other; I'm pretty jealous and feel a bit like a third wheel!