Cats and Dutch Shepherds

[pdlucky]

My cat is not afraid of dogs and when she meets a new dog she has never run from it and that usually weirds the dog out enought for them to leave her alone. Since we brought Remington home however things have changed some. Our cat if I'm around will go up to Remington and try to make friends and touch noses but when this happens Remington seems scared of her but if she turns her back and starts to go anywhere then the chase is on. Does anyone have any ideas how to help Remington get more used to the cat so she doesn't have to hide all the time?

[felixone123]

whaha!!! I had this exact problem, but with 4 cats. They get along with my non DS dog, but with Odin it was a different story. We've had Odin since Dec 27 and for about 2 months it was chaos with the cats!! All he wanted to do was chase them and my kitties were very afraid of him.

They hid all the time and when they came out we walked Odin on leash near them.
In order for Odin not to stare and want to "get" the cats, we would walk him on leash in the house near the cats and told him "leave it" and when he looked at us or away from them, we would mark it and treat him. (high vaue treats) We never made a big deal of it when he lunged for them on leash (because he did), we just calmly said leave it, etc, with the treat.

So, fast forward to now, and cats are not so afraid of him anymore and Odin pretty much leaves them alone. If one runs, he will chase, but his recall is good and I just call him back to me and when he comes I marked it and gave him a treat. Now he flies to me, because he's never sure if there will be a treat or not.
This took alot of patience and repetition, believe me.



Once both of them realize neither are going away, it will work itself out. I was so scared that Odin was going to eat them, but it was more about the chase and making beautiful art work on mommy's nice wood floors

That's my story and I'm sticking to it!! Seriously, I had no experience with this and everyone's suggestions and experience on here helped me immensely.

[roxanne]

My cat isn't afraid of dogs either. My daughter found him soon after I adopted my pug/min pin mix so they grew up together and are best friends. Roxie learned to get along with him real quick.....he's a powerful 14 pound cat and she was a 16 pound puppy!