Can you train cats? Tips, Tricks and Common Questions Answered

So, can you train cats?

The short answer: Of course you can!

Using positive reinforcement (rewarding desired behaviour), you can train just about any animal. That said, training cats is a little different to training, say, dogs, so here are my tips to get you started and some answers to common questions. 

Tip one:  Make it fun! 

Cats, unlike dogs, haven't been bred to work with us - they don't tend to have the desire to please that drives dogs to do well in training, so we have to be extra awesome to hold their attention. 

I do this by using treats that my cats only ever get during training.  So, if you are thinking of throwing your cat some special treats, or a delicious morsel from the dinner table: Stop. Save it. Use it to motivate him/her later, when you need them to focus in training.

Tip two: Keep it short!

Training a cat (even an adult one) is more like training a puppy, than teaching an older dog. They have relatively short attention spans, they want to go off and do their own thing, and sometime they just want to take a nap. So when you are training your cat to do anything, keep sessions as short as possible - a maximum of 5 minutes, and pick times to train when your cat is naturally active and playful (dusk is usually good but if you know your cat likes playtime in the morning then train early, conversely, if your cat likes to sleep in the afternoon then that would be a bad time to train). 

You'll get much more progress from your cat if you train for 5 minutes a couple of times per day, than if you try to train once a day for 30 minutes. 

Tip three: Stay positive!

Punishment doesn't really 'work' with cats. They are nowhere near as forgiving as dogs and will often see being punished for something as you getting aggressive with them for no reason. This can lead them to either fear you and begin avoiding you or to become aggressive towards you.

  

If you want to train a cat NOT to do something, don't wait for it to do it and then punish it. Instead, teach it something it CAN do. Example: don't want your cat to jump on kitchen counters? Give it a cosy perch (something at the same height, or higher than the counter tops) in the kitchen, that it IS allowed to sit on, and simply encourage it to go there instead. 

(TV cat behaviourist, Jackson Galaxy (of 'My Cat From Hell'), describes this as always giving the cat a clear 'No' and a clear 'Yes'. Going on the counter is a 'No', but the perch supplies a 'Yes' that the cat can do instead. I like to think of it as focusing on the positive by teaching something desirable, instead of punishing something undesirable, but it's the same concept.)

Tip four: Don't push it!

Don't expect your cat to learn complex tricks after a couple of days of training - start with the small stuff like 'Sit' and 'Shake' before getting into more difficult stuff like this: Cat Parkour . Remember that training well, means challenging your animal enough that they have to think, but not so much that they start to get it wrong! Getting it wrong, means they don't get a reward, and getting it wrong a few times in a row will start to make them frustrated and bored! Set them up to succeed, so that they get plenty of praise and rewards and learn to love training.  

Common questions answered: 

So, can you train a cat to do anything a dog can do? 

Pretty much! Apart from barking, cats are physically and mentally capable of learning just about any trick you can teach a dog - and there are some cases where a cats athletic prowess and graceful movement might make it much BETTER at something than a dog!  

You just have to keep in mind that, while your Lab might do anything just to please you, your Persian is much more independent creature - sometimes she just doesn't feel like training, and you have to respect that and leave her be (or come back with tastier treats!) trying to force her to train will get you nowhere. 

My cat is old, is it too late to start training it? 

No. It's never too late to give training a go. With an older cat, however, there are extra things to bear in mind:

It might take more to motivate an animal that has never had to work for its food before. Make sure the treats you are using are extra special, or your old cat might take one sniff and wander off to eat the free food from its bowl instead!  

An older cat might have physical issues that need to be worked around, like arthritis or less range of movement. Think about whether the things you are training are safe for an elderly cat's weaker body. 

Be very patient. Older cats might take a few more repetitions to learn something new. They'll get there if you keep at it!

My cat is just a kitten, is it too early to start training? 

No. Kittens can be trained from a very young age. In fact, in my experience, kittens/juvenile cats are much easier to train than adults. Their brains are like sponges at that age; they just soak up anything you care to teach them. Though, of course, they will have a very short attention span and be more easily distracted than an older, wiser cat!   

Also, similar to elderly cats, kittens have weaker bodies. They are still growing, their joints and muscles can easily get overworked and they could get injured fairly easily. Always ask yourself if the trick you are training is safe for a delicate kitten. If it might be a little too much work for them physically, save it till they are older and more up to the challenge. 

I don't know where to start! What can I teach my cat?

When I first started training my cats, it was because I noticed they used their paws a lot to try and get treats out of my hands. So I harnessed the fact they naturally pawed at my hands to teach them to 'high five' and we went from there. (Full tutorial on that soon!)

If you can't think of anything your cat already does that you want to encourage, then start with the same basic things you would teach a dog: Sit, Down, Come, Touch, Shake etc. then you can move on to more advanced things, like complex tricks or even agility!  Don't believe you can teach a cat agility? Think again: Best of: Cat Agility They can even compete in organised shows: http://catagility.com http://agility.cfa.org/index.shtml

Personally, I would start with 'touch'. Its so simple, and it can be a base for teaching more complex things later. Just hold out a finger, or target stick

A commercial Target or Touch Stick, you can also make your own with a stick and small polystyrene ball/circle of paper.

and reward the cat for touching it with their nose. Cats are so curious, they'll naturally give it a sniff eventually, so its a really easy one to start them off with. Its especially good for a cat that hasn't ever met the concept of doing something to get a treat before. 

What rewards motivate cats most? 

Treats. Delicious, preferable smelly, moist, treats. Its best to use something small and soft (tiny cubes of cheese, little bits of cooked chicken) so that they can eat it quickly and then keep the training going.  Some cats might work for toys, but most don't, so treats are definitely the best way to reward. 

Praise? Not so much. Even most dogs don't respond that much to praise unless it's paired with treats or playtime, and with cats it's even less so. You can eventually phase out food rewards for some tricks and with some cats, but mostly they are in it for the rewards and the fun of the activity itself, not the love! By all means, praise and pet your cat AND give them the treat - a little affection is always appreciated - just don't expect them to work for cuddles alone!

Should I use a clicker to train my cat?

If you'd like. All the clicker is, is a tool to 'mark' good behaviours with a distinctive clicking sound. You first get the animal to associate the click sound with getting treats, then you proceed to train by clicking and rewarding when the animal does the right thing. 

A simple clicker.

Its mainly useful because it allows us to have perfect timing - so, for example, we can click as soon as the animals bottom touches the floor when teaching 'sit' and the animal knows the exact moment it did the correct thing (rather than it having to wait for you to fumble around in your pocket  to find a treat and you accidentally rewarding it for something else it did after it sat). 

I personally prefer to use a marker word, instead (I used clickers for a time but they're small, and I kept misplacing the damn things!). So, where a clicker trainer would click, I say 'Yes'. It works on exactly the same basis as the click - a short noise that marks the exact moment the animal did the right thing, and means 'That's right! A treat is coming'. Some people use a phrase like 'good boy' to try and mark behaviour, but that is much less effective - the reward marker word MUST mean 'a treat is coming', and you might say 'good boy' a lot to your dog during the day without giving a reward. It's also too long - a reward marker should be one syllable, short and crisp, so as to mark the split second in which the animal does the right thing - 'Yes' or 'Good' are the ones most people use, though some people choose to click with their tongue instead.