How to introduce your new baby to the dogs. (A kitten, not a real baby)

On June 9th, 2019 we welcomed our new baby to the home. Oh.. wait.. not a real baby... we welcomed our very first kitten baby.

You may wonder how we got 3 dogs who are very much adults to welcome our new kitten to the family. I was wondering the same thing as I was signing the adoption paperwork. :p

Before I go any further.. I think it is important to know your dogs before you add a cat to the family. I knew that adding a kitten who could grow up with these three crazies would be easier than adopting an adult cat. I really wanted our cat to play with the dogs rather than just tolerate them.

Starting from the left, Chevy. Chevy is the most difficult and challenging dog I have ever owned. She's aggressive. Very aggressive. Not with people but with dogs and other animals. I knew she would be the last one to accept the new kitten, and I was right.

Harley (center) she has a VERY high prey drive. But she has lived with a cat before. When we brought Harley home at 6 months.. we had a room mate who had a 6 month old kitten.. so Harley lived with a cat for a few months... I knew I just had to remind her of that.

Pigpen (right) This boy won't even hurt a fly. Literally... he catches them and lets them go. So I knew he would be the easiest... I just had to make sure he didn't play Whack-a-Kitten and pounce on her with excitement.

So week one: Kitten stayed in the bathroom. We had a gate at the bathroom door.. she was 8 weeks old so she couldn't get out. The dogs got to smell her through the gate, but when we were tired of supervising... we made the dogs leave and go about their day.

Week two: Kitten got the upstairs, dogs got the down stairs. We had a gate at the top of the stairs. The kitten could now climb the gate, so i taped cardboard boxes across the top (so she would climb the gate and reach a box... couldn't go any higher)

I allowed the dogs to watch her through the gate as long as they wanted to. Pigpen moved on with his life pretty quickly. Chevy stalked the poor baby through the gate for hours until I felt like she had enough and I peeled her off... and Harley would lunge at the gate when the kitten moved quickly.

Week three: Pigpen gets to meet the kitten. He LOVES her. We pulled out cat toys and he tossed them in the air and let our kitten play with his tail as he wagged it. That went well.. but they still can't be alone together. She's super tiny and at risk of being stomped.

Week four: This seems like a long time to do intros to many people. I had many friends asking why I don't just throw everyone together yet. Here is why. I wanted them to build trust. I didn't want the kitten to be afraid of the dogs, and I didn't want her to scratch the dogs in fear causing the dogs to have a reaction. I wanted to make sure 100% that everyone was safe before they all got to meet.

So then Harley met her. Harley was muzzled. Like i said.. she has a very high prey drive.. it wasn't worth her biting our little 3lb bundle of joy.

Harley poked the kitten with her muddled snout, figured out what this thing was.. and gave up quickly.

So now we bring in the monster. Chevy. We didn't move to this step until Chevy stopped stalking Vamp through the fence. This took four weeks before Chevy decided she had better things to do with her life now.

We would hold the kitten and watch tv with Chevy on one side of the couch, kitten on the other. We slowly started letting Vamp play with the other two in the living room and eventually Chevy learned to leave her alone.

When Vamp was about 6 months old.. we decided they could all start mingling around the house together when we are home. (we brought her home at 8 weeks.. so yes this took a long time, a lot of patience, and a lot of frustration.. but it is 100% worth doing this the right way)

We got a cat tree for every room. Once Vamp figured out that she could hop on any cat tree and escape the dogs if needed, she suddenly felt safe and stopped bolting around the house as much.

Fast forward a few months.. everyone loves each other. They all get along great, and we are SO HAPPY we decided to get our kitty. We call her our fourth dog, and I'm very happy we took the time to do intros the way we did.