feline fanatic

The general consensus question is are they neutered? I am gonna take a stab in the dark and say yes. Second question do they go outside at all? Years ago I had littermates, male and female. Always a peaceable kingdom. They only went outside under my strict supervision. Male got some strange smell on him. Female attacked and I mean attacked him big time. Poor guy was all sorts of confused about the attacks. I bathed male, attacks persisted. I wrapped male in towel, then wrapped female in same towel to comingle scents, still attacks and I mean vicous ones. After about 4 days I cart the female off to the vet and he said a smell can set them off like that and even though I eliminated the smell the behavior was still persisting. The only thing we could do to break the cycle was medicate the female. I called them kitty qualudes. Worked like a charm. She only had to be on them for about a week or so.

My current crew consists of 4 neutered males and 1 spayed female. All get along. But the occasional play does end up turning into a bit of a fight but usually the agressee runs away from the agressor. Rarely does fur fly. All of mine co-habitate so well I can not tell who is alpha in the bunch.
Like many others said they could be trying to establish who is alpha but if the problem persists and escalates a call to the vet may be in order for a scrip of kitty qualudes :lol:

nativetexan

i have a mamma and her two girls. they play and fight. she can be very mean at times but we jsut stomp our foot or yell at her and she calms down. the girls usually fair well enough. mostly they do get along and play together.

Bobbinwinder

Oh, Mad, I didn't mean to imply that it was a bad thing...and neither did the vet. I actually condensed the story from the vet and the "humor" may have been lost. The vet gave students an opportunity to work in the clinic while attending veterinary school...one of his student assistants overheard the vet tell one of his longtime employees that a client would be bringing her cat in and to set up the surgical suite. The student went to the employee to inquire as to what procedure was planned in hopes of observing/assisting...the clinic orderly said "brain surgery"...when the student noticed that everything seemed to be headed toward the wrong end of the cat, he asked when they would start the "brain surgery"....the orderly then told him that the vet had just changed the cat's thinking...SAME THING, isn't it? That great old vet and his longtime orderly delighted in telling the story!
For my part, I am FOR NEUTERING...I believe it saves lives, prevents injuries and reduces spread of diseases, and greatly improves the quality of life for the cat and the human the cat owns.

Jingle

All my animals are spayed/neutered as soon as they are old enough. I now have 4 cats and they have been declawed, all four feet, since they are alone all day and all night. They get into scuffles but, having no claws it never gets serious. I do find tufts of hair sometimes in their room. I've never known of these cats or past cats fighting for territory. I guess I have been lucky, ages range from 14 down to 3 years old. I haven't seen any of them getting mad at each other. They are in a small room, not much room to get away from each other. Good luck.

Nancy in Louisiana

It is in a cat's nature to reproduce -- by depriving him (or her) from that action, it can cause physical problems down the line with tumors, cancers, etc. (Cats would be susceptible to prostate cancer, breast cancer, ovarian cancer -- surprised me when I looked it up on the web.) Behavior problems are only the tip of the iceburg. Yeah, you NEED to get pets neutered or spayed. The older they get, the worse they get because of being deprived of their natural functions. I KNOW you had those males neutered -- who would want them "spraying" inside a house? Just take care of it early before they establish bad habits. And if it's a dominance issue, watch out to make sure the "loser" isn't banned from the litter box by the alpha. After several carpets and carpet cleaners, I learned the hard way that there is a definite need for more than one litter box and having NO large inside houseplants. Sometimes, too, they will attack each other if one is ill -- I had two male tabbies that kept trying to stalk and bring down an elderly shih tzu during the end stages of his life (cancer and urinary problems). It's all about survival of the fittest. They smell the weak, and nature kicks in. And when one of the tabbies started into old age renal failure, it's lifelong buddy turned on him. So you might need to get the victimized cat a good checkup if the behavior continues after neutering.

Aurora

With cats they can be only half siblings. Every kitten can have a different father.

I once had a male cat that took his turn sitting with the kittens. While she was giving birth, he never left her side and would lick her on the head when she cried out in pain during delivery. That night she took the babies one at a time and put them with the father in his favorite sleeping chair and he was still with them in the morning. From that point on he took turns watching the kittens.

Bobbinwinder

Good point about littermates not necessarily being full siblings.
That male of yours was truly special. Most of what I've heard regarding Toms and newborns wasn't pleasant...but they might not have been the father!

Aurora

I had heard that males will kill the young, so I watched in amazement as he took his turn when they were not nursing.

amandasgramma

My two boys do the same. They're 3 yr old brothers, too!!! It's not really fighting ---it's actually a game - they're doing a normal cat thing. If you watch them, they'll start grooming each other or loving each other up when they're done --- IF they're not interrupted.

Bobbinwinder

With all due respect, mine are not playing a game of any kind...they've not been close enough to touch one another without aggression in years. Both have survived serious wounds that required professional medical attention...wounds they gave each other when we weren't around to interrupt them or prevent the altercations.