Your Kitten: 8 Months Old

Mental and Physical Development

Aggressive Behavior If you have noticed aggressive behavior in your eight-month-old kitten, you will need to take quick action to prevent your kitten from becoming an aggressive cat. In nature, aggressive and dominant behaviors serve kittens at this age well; they help independent kittens to survive in the wild and win the mate they want. However in a home, a tendency towards aggressive behaviors needs to be stopped.

One of the first things you can do to calm your kitten's aggression is to spay or neuter them. Once your kitten no longer has the desire to win over a mate, their behavior will improve. Next, you can assert your position as the "alpha cat," or boss, of the household by ignoring a kitten's aggressive behavior and waiting a few minutes before you attend to your kitten's demands for attention and food.

How to Safely Introduce Adult Cat Food At eight months of age, your kitten is ready for adult cat food. However, kittens at this age still have delicate digestive systems that can react badly to new foods.

Gradually changing your kitten's food over a long period of time will help to prevent any digestive upset from a change in diet. You can also help your kitten make the switch to adult cat food by feeding your kitten adult cat food that contains ingredients similar to its kitten food diet.

The new adult cat food fed to your kitten should be a premium high-quality cat food that contains meat as the primary ingredient. Begin the change to adult cat food by blending in a very small portion, no more than one teaspoon, of the new food into your kitten's diet. Every four days, increase the amount of new food by another teaspoon and decrease the kitten food by the same amount.

Health and Veterinary Care: Healthy Skin and Fur

As you play with your kitten each day, you should pay special attention to the appearance of her skin and fur. A kitten that grooms herself and eats a high-quality diet should have a smooth and shiny coat that is nice to touch.

Skin and fur that does not appear well-groomed, or that seems unhealthy in some way, is cause for concern. Fleas, fungus, allergies, poor diet, underlying disease or anxiety disorders are all capable of producing varying degrees of skin infection or a hair coat with an abnormal appearance.

Be aware of clinical signs like itching or scratching, patches of hair loss, coarse hair, scabs, lumps and bumps, crusts, scales, discharge, bleeding or redness. If any of these symptoms occur, it is extremely important to consult with a veterinarian immediately to resolve the problem for the kitten as well as to prevent potentially transmissible diseases (such as ringworm or fleas) from infecting you or your family.

Training: Training Equipment

While training equipment for kittens may seem like an unusual idea, it can greatly help pet owners to teach their kittens how to behave in a home. Don't forget that kittens are animals, and many of their natural behaviors and tendencies can be destructive in a household environment.

Training equipment for kittens relies on the use of scents and sprays to teach kittens where to find appropriate outlets for their natural behavior. For instance, the use of catnip essence sprays will attract kittens to their toys and scratching posts, and deterrent sprays will stop kittens from scratching furniture.

Deterrent sprays are noticeable to only cats or kittens, and they will not stain your furniture. Always remember to switch your kitten's toys periodically to keep your kitten mentally stimulated and to prevent destructive behavior caused by boredom.