My little guys, Tigger and Roo, are now 13 and 17 weeks old respectively,
and pretty much behave quite well.  Sure they have their little quirks, but
that's why we love them.  They have, however, in the past few weeks begun
doing some odd things, and I was wondering if anyone might have some insights
into why they do these things.  None of them are dangerous, or worrisome,
just odd.
  1.  They no longer sleep in their cage.  When we first gave them free
range, they slept in the cage every night, now they sleep either in the
drawers of our desk or in one of the dressers.  It's pretty cute, and it's
always fun, trying to figure out which drawer they have cuddled up in, but we
wonder why they have forsaken their (formerly) beloved hammock.
  2.  Just in the last week they began refusing to drink form their water
bottle.  It was cleaned daily and the water was always fresh, so that wasn't
the problem.  They were drinking out of the tub, and this didn't seem like a
good thing, so we gave them a water bowl.  This makes a bit of a mess, as you
can imagine, but they drink out of it.  They still drink out of the tub,
however, whenever they can, even with fresh, clean water in their bowl.
Could they perhaps think that the leaky tub faucet is some sort of stream?  A
little Call of the Wild sort of thing?
  3. Despite great success early on in litter box training, we've been having
a few problems of late.  They both have started going in a cornen in front of
the front door.  We could accomodate them, and just move a box there, but
obviously having a litter box sitting in front of the front door (with the
door opening inward) is a little silly.  Their litter boxes are cleaned very
regularly, but we try to leave a little wet litter or feces to let them know
what the box is for, and like I said, for the first month we had them, there
were no problems.
  LIke I said, none of these are particularly troubling, but they are
strange.  Any comments would be appreciated.
 
Also, to Grendel,  et al (anon): Thanks for the info regarding cats and
ferrets.  Since there are, I believe, six cats in other apartments in the
house we live in I was a little worried about possible altercations.  I feel
much better now.
 
Gail
 
[Posted in FML issue 0728]