Here's the progress so far, I'm looking for tips on how to make sure the situation doesn't degrade.
We got a new cat about 1.5 years old. His owner had passed and he's a little withdrawn. We started him in 1 room door closed.
We have 2 cats. Both elderly. 1 with a history of aggression that hasn't been a problem in a long time now, but seems to be regressing with the new cat. The other seems to progressing normally.
I'm going to focus on the 1 aggressive cat because that's the interactions we need help monitoring.
We have had the new cat for about 6 weeks. After a week or so of getting the new cat acclimated to us and the new house smells within that room we switched out the solid door for a pet screen.
That was the new normal for about 4 weeks. After a week of having the screen, we'd open it during the day while we were home and close it at night and while at work. But there was a problem. The cats refused to socialize. He stayed in the room and the other cats gave it a wide berth both before and after opening it. We know a necessary part of socializing is socializing and they just weren't. Meanwhile the new cat was starting to get restless when we'd close him off. So we tried something new and brought him into our bedroom. Again we started doors closed. He would leave at nighttime and have the rest of the house and our existing cats would sleep with us, which is great for smell swapping but not for socializing. When we tried monitored socializing, it's tense but ok until the new cat tries to play alone. I want to reinforce that he's not attempting to play with the aggressive cat. He's playing alone in the vicinity of the aggressive cat. When the new cat gets playful and plays the old cat yowls at him and swipes and chases him off.
That usually leads to the new cat being withdrawn most of the day.
There's no hissing that preempts it, no warning growls. It's straight to aggressive behavior.
I don't know how to get them to interact with each other in a healthy way, so I feel like continuing isolation is the best course of action but in isolation they refuse to familiarize themselves with each other and no progress is made.
Am I missing something? Attempts to get them to eat near each other haven't worked. The new cat waits until they're out of sight. I tried scent swapping before we made the move to the bedroom and I'm not sure it did anything to help.
I'm worried about making the wrong move and making it worse. So far no real fighting has occurred but I don't know how long the new cat will remain submissive if the aggressive cat doesn't change his behavior.
