Kneading the Dough-Type Behavior...

carto_guy · New member Joined: 17 Dec 2007 Posts: 1

Hello out there,

I stumbled upon a really old post about cats performing a kneeding-type behavior on stuffed animals...my cat, Darwin, does it but with a strange, aggressive twist sometimes...

Darwin started doing this "kneeding the dough" thing to one of my wife's stuffed animals. Having never owned a cat before, we were like "what the heck is he doing?" He does it all the time and one day we moved the stuffed animal to get something from underneath it and Darwin belted out a wicked hiss, puffed up his tail and took a menacing step towards it. Crazy! This is the same stuffed animal that he continues to kneed upon, lick, and sleep with.

It's happend a couple of times where one of us had to move the stuffed animal and Darwin happend to be watching and he would do the same thing. He's definitely hissing towards the animal and not me or my wife...any ideas out there?

Thank you!

Mary_NH · Posted: Mon Dec 17, 2007 2:20 pm Post subject:

it's his!!! Don't touch it LOL

Chessmind · Posted: Mon Dec 17, 2007 3:11 pm Post subject:

Hi and welcome to Auspet. Kneading is a very normal behavior in cats. Not all of them do it though. It seems like a lot of cats that were taken away from their Mom too soon have a tendency to do it more often. Some people seem put off by the behavior thinking the cat is 'making out' with the object or the person, but that's not the case at all. Originally kittens do it to their mothers stomach area to help push the milk out as they nurse. When they get older it's just a comfort thing.

Anyway, I totally agree with Mary_NH. That is his stuffed toy. I hope you never throw it out.

sunset05 · Posted: Wed Dec 19, 2007 10:58 pm Post subject:

Welcome carto_guy. My one kitty kneads quite a bit, too. If I'm sitting on the couch with a blanket over my legs, she'll lie next to me and knead my leg with the blanket on it. I think it is cute. My other kitty doesn't knead very much.

When I was a kid and my kitty back then was kneading, my dad would say the kitty was tap dancing. I always thought that was funny. It's something I'll never forget.

That is so cute that your kitty has a special stuffed animal.