Cats are independent creatures and act based on their own interests. It is difficult to achieve something from a pet if the action does not bring him personal benefit. But it is the independent nature of the cat that will play into the hands of the trainer and help him achieve success in training. In this article we will reveal the basic principles of teaching cats commands. You will learn how to teach your cat various tricks at home.
During training, you and your pet should become a single team.
Pet age
In order for the training of your purring friend to be successful, it is important to start training no earlier than six months. Although it is generally accepted that kittens begin to understand a person from three months, the optimal age for starting training is the interval from six months to eight months.
This is the period when the kitten is really ready to accept human commands, and is already physically developed and very active.
If you start training your pet later, results can be achieved. However, this will take more time and effort. Therefore, the first year of a cat’s life is the best period for teaching it commands and tricks.
Optimal age to start classes
training your beloved pet at 6–7 months . It is during this period that the animal transitions from “childhood”, all actions and deeds occur consciously, the owner’s requirements for the pet become clear. In order to understand how to train a cat at this age, you need to carefully familiarize yourself with all its habits, observe the peculiarities of the game, and note for yourself what exactly the animal likes best. Such attentiveness will make the relationship between the owner and the kitten even closer, the animal will completely trust and obey. It is worth understanding that the cat breed also plays an important role when executing commands.
Preparation and training principles
The kitten looks like a child. The psychology of communication comes first in the relationship between the owner and his furry baby. It is important not to shout at the kitten or use physical force.
You need to play with the kitten more, talk to it, give affection and care. Only in a trusting atmosphere is the future of training possible.
Before training begins, the animal must already have a comfortable home:
- A separate place for sleeping and rest is allocated
- Having your own toys
- Separate eating area (food bowl and water bowl)
- The pet is trained to the tray
When the kitten no longer experiences stress from separation from its mother and has become accustomed to its new place, you can think about starting training. The room should be spacious, without unnecessary distracting objects. It is advisable to conduct classes alone with the cat.
The morning or evening hours are suitable for the lesson, when the pet has slept well and several hours have passed since feeding. The duration of the workout is 10-15 minutes. The animal does not need to be overtired. It's better to do several approaches per day.
When answering the question of how to teach a cat to train, you need to remember two points:
- Fluffy, when slightly hungry, performs his owner’s tasks better
- Encouragement is a tool without which learning will not be effective.
At the start of the training process, the cat is encouraged with its favorite treats. The pieces are prepared in advance, small in size, without the need to chew. Otherwise, the animal will quickly get full and lose interest in the activity.
The treat should be given immediately after performing a command or trick. If you delay this, the cat will not understand what exactly the reward is associated with.
- You can praise the mustache not only with food, but also with affection or voice.
- Most Muroks love being petted by their owners. As for the voice, the cat eventually becomes well versed in human intonations.
- It’s not for nothing that there is even a proverb that a kind word is pleasant to a cat.
- Therefore, during regular training, it is advisable to encourage your pet with treats 3-5 times the task is completed, and the remaining times either by voice or by stroking.
How to teach your cat commands and amaze your friends
Lately, I have become more and more convinced that my wife has not been doing what she loves all her adult life! She has been treating people at the clinic for more than 20 years. Although, in my deepest conviction, she should have become a veterinarian. Is it a joke to say - for 50 sq. meters, five representatives of the cat family and a gang of four dogs, led by the English bulldog Nyusha, coexist! And if we add here an adult daughter and mother-in-law, then our company turned out to be quite cheerful.
An absolutely black kitten of an exotic breed named Kuzya was the fourth. Before his appearance, I, like all ordinary people, was sure that trained cats could only be seen in the Kuklachev Theater and nowhere else. Our cats only understood the command “kitty-kitty!” and showed no predisposition to training. Over time, Kuzya turned into a gorgeous black cat with shiny fur and Asian squinting yellow eyes. In addition, at the time of his majority, he learned to perform the command “die” or “lie down”.
Now this is his favorite thing. He is ready to do this from morning to evening. As long as the bag of goodies remains full! But there is a downside to this entertainment: the cat has become a terrible beggar. In the morning he is already “on duty”. You come home from work in the evening and Kuzya takes a place on the podium, as if saying: “Master, I’ve been waiting for you for so long! Ready to work for the benefit of the Tsar and the Fatherland!” This is understandable, because for every completed task the cat receives a tasty pillow, for which he is ready to sell even his own mother.
And it all started quite simply. The cat figured me out. He realized that I liked to pamper him with treats, and immediately took advantage of my weakness. As soon as the bag of food began to rustle in my hands, Kuzya lay down on the surface of the mezzanine and began to roll on his back, making noises throughout the room.
I suddenly became interested in teaching him the “down” command. I took the path of least resistance - before the cat fell, I gave him the necessary command, and received the exotic treat after he stood up on all fours again.
I tried it a couple of times at first. Not everything immediately turned out the way we wanted. My family members laughed at me. After each not entirely successful performance of my ward, the daughter smiled indulgently, the mother-in-law gloated kindly. However, these circumstances only egged me on. Only my wife fully supported my initiative and wholeheartedly believed in success. And finally, a month later, Kuzya and I had our first successful performance. It was the cat’s benefit performance and, naturally, mine too. Even dogs came running to see the accomplished artist.
Kuzya was in all his glory. He died on stage. He rolled on his back, got up, and lay down again. I didn't even have to tell him anything, he obeyed the gestures. The success was stunning. After the speech, I was awarded a gala dinner, and my mother-in-law even gave me a special extra ration for this occasion.
I didn’t stop there, but moved on. The fifth cat is our Semyon Semyonovich. He is a completely hairless Sphynx. Now he and I are working on the “fetch” command, and we are having some success. So far he only brings a candy wrapper. And my wife recently, as she says, had a prophetic dream. Doorbell. She opens it and sees a white fluffy kitten on the threshold, who in a human voice asked to take him to the veterinarian. Now I’m waiting for the next surprise, and now I know for sure what it will be.
The cat Kuzya showed a deadly number on the command “die”
Watch the video on the topic
Advice from Yuri Kuklachev
1. Tip one: study your cat, understand what she likes. “Training” is the wrong word; to train means to suppress. This trick won't work with a cat. She can only do what suits her. If a cat doesn't like standing on its hind legs, it will never do it. So you’re looking for a cat that wants to stand on its paws, another will sleep in a pan, a third will do somersaults... It’s their “wants” that we must base our education on. You can’t put pressure - she’ll arrange it for you!
2. Under no circumstances should you offend a cat; in principle, it does not tolerate any violence or shouting. If you hit him, he will remember it for the rest of his life.
3. The commands during training can be the simplest, the same as in the circus: “up!”, “off!”, “nizz!”, but it’s not about the teams as such. The most important thing is the timbre of your voice: you need to talk to a cat like you would a child. So you come home in a bad mood, but the child is not at all interested in this. It’s the same with a cat: you need to speak calmly, like a human being, and most importantly - with attention, with interest, she really feels it. Does not tolerate any falsehood.
4. Commands must be accompanied by play gestures that are understandable to the cat, and play should begin. You can make a “fishing rod” with a ball made of wool or paper. By the way, a cat, it seems to me, remembers even more words than a dog, and most importantly, it feels those words that you have not yet said. Just think: “Shouldn’t I feed her?” - and she’s already running to the refrigerator. Cats are psychics, and this is a big plus when raising them.
5. When training a cat, we must remember that by nature it can do much more than we are trying to instill in it - the cat is an excellent healer, relieves psychophysical stress, equalizes blood pressure. The cat saved all of humanity from hunger: if not for her, mice and rats would have eaten everything. Its significance must be remembered. After all, in the end, we are not the cats, but they are raising us.
The cat hypnotist gave the dog a cruel test
Watch the video on the topic
Training equipment
The cat training kit must be prepared before training. First of all, it depends on what command or trick the owner is going to teach the pet.
An important lesson: All objects are familiar to the cat, otherwise, instead of studying, he will sniff them.
Typically training equipment is:
- Small hoop
- Small balls
- Sticks with a toy at the end
- Threads
- Pointer with laser
- Chairs
- Container with goodies
You can buy toys and training items or make your own. It is better to store them in one place. The cat must have them. Otherwise, she will play with inappropriate things, sometimes even causing damage to them.
Cats' ability to learn
Cats have a developed emotional sphere and a finely organized psyche. Thanks to this, they quickly become attached to all members of the owner’s family, but unlike dogs, they do not recognize the unconditional authority of humans. Therefore, cat training should be based on the animals receiving positive emotions and positive experiences, and not on the owner’s desire to take a leadership position and suppressing the pet.
The cat brain is structured similarly to the human brain. It has numerous neural connections, contains white and gray matter, and includes the parietal, temporal, and occipital lobes. When neurons in which information is stored are activated, animals remember certain events and objects.
Every trainer who wants to teach a cat to follow commands must know an important feature of the pet’s memory. For the animal, only the necessary information matters (the location of the tray, the rustling of a bag of food or the sound of the refrigerator door opening).
The cat will not remember the smell and appearance of a person who once visited the house and did not affect her in any way. But the pet will remember the visitor who caused pain for a very long time.
On a note. Multiple experiments involving cats have shown that their short-term memory is 12-16 hours. And the long-term one is even more developed.
Despite the dissimilarity of the speech apparatus, cats understand people very well. True, they perceive not the words themselves, but the emotional message embedded in them, intonation and sound wavelength. It has been proven that cats understand foreign speech perfectly if you communicate with them in a foreign language for two weeks.
Animals remember commands in the same way. And they do it faster than dogs. If the latter need an average of up to seven repetitions, then cats need only three. Therefore, they are easier to train than the average dog.
Simple commands
Training cats at home starts with simple exercises.
These include commands such as:
- Sit
- Lie
- Stand
- To me
- Give me your paw
Their implementation can be practiced in an animal until it becomes automatic. Moreover, these commands are natural for cats. After all, the pet can accept any of the positions itself in everyday life. The command “give me a paw” is also quite familiar to furry animals. It is with their paw that they often try to steal food or touch an object that interests them.
- For example, when teaching the command to stand, you should first say this word in those moments when the cat independently took such a position.
- Don't forget to reward the cat after the command.
- If your pet doesn't get up, you can gently help him and give him a treat again.
- Gradually, the animal will develop an unconditioned reflex, and the command will be mastered.
- Other simple tasks are worked out in the same way.
With such commands, other than treats, special items are not needed. The main thing is the good mood of the owner and the ward.
Difficult tricks
Teams for training cats are built according to the principle from simple to complex. If your pet performs easy tasks, you can move on to more complex tricks. As a rule, pets get a taste for it and learn new commands with interest.
- As examples, consider jumping through a hoop and the command “fetch.”
- To perform the first trick, you will need a small hoop or large embroidery hoop.
- The cat must walk or jump over them. The main thing is not to let her get around the obstacle. When the fluffy gets it right, you can raise the hoop higher and higher.
The “fetch” command is more difficult to teach. In this process, much depends on the animal’s temperament. If a cat likes to play with a ball or a toy, then most likely she will bring them to her owner. If not, it is better not to torture the animal, but to move on to practicing another trick. Try to teach him to jump from chair to chair on command or to climb on top of his owner.
The most trainable breeds
All cats can be trained to one degree or another. What is important here is the right approach, knowledge of the character of your mustachioed friend, patience and regular training.
Despite this, experienced trainers identify a number of breeds that are most prone to training.
- Siamese cat
- Scottish Fold
- Abyssinian breed
- Cornish Rex
True, these breeds are quite expensive and require careful care. And even experts do not exclude the possibility that a person may come across a lazy specimen.
When purchasing an animal for your family, you still need to choose it according to several criteria at once, and not rely only on the theoretical ability to learn.
With the right approach, training a furry at home turns into an exciting form of leisure time. The owner and his pet learn to understand each other. The result of the training, as a rule, pleases both. There are many cat training videos on the Internet that confirm this.
Is it possible to train a cat
Mustachioed sneaks with a cunning look and hunting habits are not dogs devoted to their master and ready to obey. No offense will be said to the barking brothers. The small predator has a natural desire to dominate. A representative of the cat tribe cannot be forced, but she can be persuaded. Then she will fulfill the person’s request. Attachment to the owner is a vulnerable character trait of a proud animal, which allows him to instill unusual skills.
Video: pet turns off the light
The debate about whether cats can be trained has been going on for a long time. There is no consensus on this matter among owners, breeders and felinologists. It cannot be any other way: everyone makes their own arguments based on personal experience. For example, one argues that animals are not teachable. And he motivates with the story that he was unable to develop a conditioned reflex in his pet to the “Voice” command. The owner said this word for half an hour, showing the tasty “prize” to the adult Briton, and he looked at the man’s efforts with bewilderment. Even repeating the order along with “meow” turned out to be useless. Defenders of cat abilities say: pets feel a person so much that they guess the command even before it sounds. They are just pretending, playing at submission. Or they try to please in the hope of getting something tasty. And the owner is happy that the necessary action has been completed, and considers himself a tamer. The third judgment is also based on the example of the behavior of an already trained cat. Knowing exactly the meaning of the order, she refuses to carry it out. Not out of forgetfulness, but on purpose. We have to conclude that standard training with unquestioning execution of a person’s command is impossible. When the opportunity arises, your pet will always show a headstrong character.
