Your Maine Coon Guide

Brushing a Maine Coon cat will elicit different responses and not always signs that they enjoy it. Image: MikeB using Canva. Like anyone else I believed that all Maine Coons would generally enjoy being brushed. It should be a pleasurable experience and a necessary experience as all the experts say that owners need to brush and keep matt-free their Maine Coon's coat. Just one of those added obligations for the Maine Coon owner. But scientists in one study say this about the Maine Coon behavioural response to being brushed: Withdrawal, passive interactions, aggressive behaviors, facial discomfort, and purring characterized brushing . Vocalizations were significantly more frequent during isolation and brushing than during waiting for food, but it is possible that the characteristics of the vocalizations in these two situations are different. Our principal finding is that cats showed different behavioural patterns in the three situations and, in particular, their behaviour during brus...

Nothing better than seeing a Maine Coon on a lead in a public place. Image: in the public domain as assessed. Please read the article careful to get the true meaning. Thanks. The headline to this article is based on a study I have used to prepare an article on cat breed personality ( click this to read that article ). It is a good study which also refers to previous studies. In it the scientists refer to the Maine Coon. I'll quote what they say about the Maine Coon: "In previous studies, Maine Coon [11,19,47] and Burmese [19] have been ranked among the breeds showing the most touch sensitivity/owner-directed aggression, and they also scored high in our study." The numbers are references to earlier studies. Ignore those. But what they say is interesting and I have not seen this kind of language before in describing the character of the Maine Coon. Before I discuss it I should say that anyone reading a scientific study should exercise a bit of caution because not all of wha...

It goes without saying that Maine Coons should not be aggressive. They are not known for their aggression. In fact, all domestic cats should not be aggressive and the Maine Coon is no different from any other domestic cat in this respect. So, if your Maine Coon cat is aggressive something is wrong. One remote reason for purebred cat aggression is that the cat is not socialised but this would be highly irregular for a Maine Coon because breeders create Maine Coons under controlled conditions. Is there solemn duty to ensure that their kittens are socialised before they are sold to clients. The chances of a Maine Coon cat being unsocialised is highly remote.  A person might adopt a Maine Coon mix thinking that their cat is a purebred Maine Coon. Some Maine Coon mix cats might be unsocialised because they might have been born in a home where the owner is engaged in informal breeding and the cats are unregistered.  He or she may do a bad job of socialising their kittens and then se...

Do Maine Coons have a temper? This is a question asked on one of the top Maine Coon websites which Google favours. And I've got to say that it is a slightly stupid or misleading question. That might sound arrogant of me but I will explain myself. No domestic cat has a bad temper unless they are ill. Although they might be suffering from audiogenic reflex seizures or other environmental problems. I'll look at illness first.  Pain When a cat feels pain inside their body, they may be quiet about it. They might go quiet. They might sleep more than normal and find a quiet corner in the home. But you don't really know what's going on at least initially. So, you pick up your Maine Coon to give him a cuddle. They are very cuddly. Your Maine Coon companion cries out and strikes out at you as if in retaliation. You don't understand. You might think that your cat has suddenly developed a bad temper but he hasn't.  He/she has simply responded to feeling pain when you picked...

Image: MikeB Below is a list of seven potential Maine Coon behavioural problems from a well-known website about this cat breed. I would like to discuss them. The picture that I have made hints at the fact that I question whether these really are genuine Maine Coon problems. They are clearly natural behaviours because everything that a Maine Coon cat does is essentially natural; a reaction to the circumstances under which they find themselves and for a Maine Coon cat those circumstances are invariably created by their human caregiver because nearly all Maine Coon cats are full-time indoor cats. They live inside a human world; a human environment both in terms of the inanimate objects and the animate objects. Aggressive Territorial Clingy Inappropriate Climbing Spraying Scratching Furniture Destructive Aggression Of course, Maine Coon cats can be aggressive. Their inherent character trait lends this cat to be pretty calm and unaggressive; perhaps, in general, less aggressive than a typic...

I have just written a short article about domestic cat redirected aggression which Dr Fogle also calls 'pain-induced' aggression. I hadn't connected the two before but there is a connection. It is also called 'transferred aggression'. Cat redirected aggression or pain-induced aggression Pain-induced aggression in cats will typically be seen if a cat suffers from chronic pain to varying extents because of an underlying illness. When this cat is picked up for instance it may trigger a burst of pain. The owner puts their cat down as the cat cries out. Maine Coons more likely to exhibit redirected aggression? Image: MikeB The cat does not attack their owner perhaps because they feel unable to. They attack another cat in the home instead, shortly afterwards, to release their instinctive desire to strike back at the animal that caused the pain. We know with regret that the Maine Coon cat suffers from a range of inherited diseases which can cause discomfort to hard pain. T...

 A woman on social media is asking for help. It's quite a strange question. She has two Maine Coon cats, one male and one female. Their ages are 12 months and 9 months respectively. The male cat is calm and fine. The female is aggressive whenever she tries to brush or pick her up.  She hisses, growls, swats and nips her owner. She can't handle her cat and is at her wits end. She is asking for advice as to what to do next. Annoyed MC. NOT the cat in question!! This is probably a male Maine Coon. Image: YouTube. I must say I find this peculiar because an adopter buys a Maine Coon cat from a breeder or that is the normal route unless somebody has given you one or the cat has been owned previous to you. If you buy a Maine Coon cat from a breeder, they should be fully socialised and ready to be integrated into their new home. That is the duty of the breeder. They should spend a considerable end of time achieving a well socialised kitten. This cat appears to be unsocialised to a cer...

The problem described in the title posted on the mumsnet.com website is one which occurred in the countryside in the UK. The owner of more than one Maine Coon cat allows them outside because she feels that they are safe to wander the countryside. That's fairly rare. Maine Coon outside. Image in the public. I modified it by changing the background. RELATED:  Are citrus fruits a good cat deterrent ? And even though they are several hundred yards away from her neighbour, they do come onto her property and scare her relatively small rescue cats and on one occasion one of them physically attacked one of them. She wants advice on how to deal with it. My response is below, and this is the same as the response on the mumsnet.com website. The problem that you are encountering is really to do with humans trying to manage and control feline society which is very difficult. Legally, domestic cats can trespass on a neighbour's property as trespass doesn't apply to cats. Also, it seems t...

I'm going to comment on this. These are my views only. I respect the views of others. The story comes from the AVMA Journals website under the heading "Animal Behaviour Case of the Month". It is a story about inappropriate feline behaviour and how they dealt with it. They treated this Maine Coon cat as a patient with a mental health problem (my words) it seems to me from the way that they proceeded. I disagreed immediately with that method of proceeding. What happened is that the owners of a Maine Coon found the animal as a stray. The cat was neutered and about 4.5 years old. The cat was doing quite well and was fairly passive to the point where the woman of the house took the cat on the leash into the backyard. This proves that the cat was pliable and well behaved. While outside the cat saw an intruding cat. The woman picked up her Maine Coon to take him into the house. The cat redirected his aggression at the intruding cat onto the woman and bit her hand. The bite br...

Maine Coons are domestic cats like any other domestic cat. Yes, they are more glamorous than some other domestic cats but in terms of their behaviour there is not one iota of difference between a Maine Coon and a moggy which you can adopt from a rescue centre. Nobody asks whether a moggy is dangerous because they are domestic cats. So the same answer applies to Maine Coons. They are not dangerous in any way. Maine Coon. Silver tabby. Photo: Pixabay There is one caveat which applies to all domestic cats. If a domestic cat is badly provoked by a person for whatever reason then they may retaliate aggressively. They may attack that person and they may injure the person. Under those circumstances a Maine Coon could be described as dangerous but the victim would be the author of their own injuries. It will be extremely rare for a person to provoke a domestic cat but I have seen it and I have seen a well-behaved domestic cat turn very aggressive. You don't have to provoke a cat purposeful...