When thinking of adding a new adult cat to your home, there are some things you should consider, as well as some preparation that you’ll want to do before you bring your new cat home.

Understanding your resident cat’s history is really important when considering adopting a new cat. Has your cat lived with or interacted with cats before? Is she generally a confident cat, or does she become shy or uneasy when things change in your home? How does she react when new people come over? Knowing who your cat is and what her previous experiences have been (as much as possible) can help inform the decision to bring another cat home.

If she’s quite shy and change is hard for her, you might want to be cautious about adopting a second cat as this addition could be hard for her to acclimate to. It’s also important to remember that just because your cat tolerated living with or interacting with another cat at one point, the introduction process should still be done slowly… just like people, cats pick and choose their friends and your resident cat might not take to the new cat the way they did their previous feline friends.

Making sure that you have a great space to set your new cat up in so that the introduction process can be done slowly is also quite important. A separate bedroom or bathroom can be an excellent choice for this. You’ll want to keep your cats separate as you work through the introduction process, so having this space will be crucial for your success. Some introductions take only a couple of weeks, while others can take much longer. It just depends on the personalities and previous history of both cats, so some will need to be separated longer than others. Being patient and having a little extra space at home will both be important tools when beginning intros with new cats.

For more information, check out this fantastic blog post by Jackson Galaxy, cat guru extraordinaire!!