Thread: Advice for Maine Coon newbies

Originally Posted by LoveMyMaineCoon

We have two 5 year old Maine Coons and they are sweet as can be. That said, they do get excited and will occasionally play bite like you describe. I find that they need a lot of toys and stimulation, more than other cats I've had in the past. When they get to exercise their prey instincts on their toys (or each other lol), I find the play biting is a lot less common.

I also find it helps if you actually show that it hurts when they do it (say "OW!", etc) and immediately stop playing with them when they do it. Sounds funny but they genuinely don't want to hurt you, they're just playing. I noticed that when they play with each other and get rough, as soon as one squeals, it's over. So we started trying that when they'd play bite us and it seems to work!

Thank you so much for your reply. It's somewhat reassuring to hear that other Maine Coons are up to similar stuff! We'd been told by various folks (some breeders and long time owners of Maine Coons) that our cat would be placid, to the point of vulnerability but that's not quite what our girl is like!

It does make sense that our cat isn't trying to hurt us, she is very sweet indeed and can't bear being away from us; she follows us around and has even tried to join me in the shower at one point! Perhaps we just need to play more and I like the idea of showing her the immediate effect of stopping all play as she's so very keen to play! (She fetches her favourite wands and drops them on our lap).

The swiping and biting usually occurs during bouts of play and I'd wondered if it was an overly excited response. She seems very bright so hopefully it won't take too long for her to make the connection.

Thank you again :-) We'll practice patience.