Weirdest experience ever. Dog vs Cat

[ThreeWishes]

I just had the strangest experience.
Husband fed both dogs a chewy bone. I was in the living room watching tv. Younger female finished first. Old male was halfway done and went to take a drink of water. In the interim female dog snuck over and commenced to eating old dog’s bone. Old dog returns. And snarling dog ruckus commences. They’ve done it intermittently over the years. It’s all spit snarling and bluster. Never any real tooth action or wounds. Maybe 4 times in the last 7 years I’ve had to drag one off the other. Completely a resource guarding issue. Like I said all noise and spit.
Human fault.
Cue today. Mid snarl fight the previously only outside cat I inherited from a neighbor who moved away after a terrible accident. Who I have after a year acclimated to being an inside cat. Launched across the room and joined the fray. He attached himself onto the old dog’s back like a cowboy hugging a bucking bronco. He was clinging to that old dogs back and fighting and scratching him.

Got the cat off. Removed the precious bone. And separated everyone. Now they’re all simpatico again. Old dog is scratched. Female dog is limping and cat is also limping. And they’re all sleeping together in the living room. Someone explain this to me.

[Foxglove]

Cats can become protective. My tiny Maude (6 pounds) went full-blown psycho kitty when DD brought her English Bulldog over. Doggy bumbled over to me for a pat; Maude went airborne and landed on his head screaming and spitting. She spent the rest of the visit glued to me and glaring at the confused puppy.

[ThreeWishes]

This was the same. Just seemed so weird for a 10 pound cat to involve itself like that with 2 sixty pound dogs having a fracas that didn’t involve him at all. It was like he was in a frenzy.

[Fiesta01]

I think cats, when confronted with something unsettling like the dog disagreement, sometimes just react aggressively to whatever is nearest at hand (or claw), which maybe was the old dog.

My DH and I had male and female tuxedo cats, Dexter and Leia. They loved each other, especially Leia doted on Dexter. On a handful of occasions over the years, we would hear a god-awful caterwauling, would run to see what the problem was and find Leia attacking a bewildered and frightened Dexter.

Each time this happened, we saw a cat outside the sliding glass door or window. It wasn’t the same cat each time, just a random neighborhood cat would stop and look in. One time, I actually caught the beginning of the incident. I heard Leia growling, looked out and saw a strange cat in the yard, and before I could rescue Dexter, Leia had jumped him.

I think she would get her hackles and adrenaline up about the strange cat, go into attack mode but couldn’t get to the cat outdoors and poor Dexter happened to be sitting next to her. Each time it happened, a few minutes later, after we shooed the trespassing cat out of sight, she would begin grooming Dexter as if nothing had happened, and they were best buds again.

Maybe your cat was just having an instinctive attack response to the upset of the doggie brouhaha?

Dexter and Leia acting as normal. (No strange cat outside).
(Sorry, didn’t want to take the very old pictures out of their frame).

[endlessclimb]

Redirected aggression is pretty common in cats.

It’s more common that it’s triggered by another cat but I can absolutely see how the brouhaha could trigger it.

I’m sorry you had to deal with that! What a mess.

https://www.vet.cornell.edu/departments-centers-and-institutes/cornell-feline-health-center/health-information/feline-health-topics/feline-behavior-problems-aggression#:~:text=When%20a%20cat%20is%20excited,another%20cat%20in%20the%20house.

[ThreeWishes]

Thank you all for your responses!!! I’ve seen misplaced/ redirection in dogs. Never in a cat. I had no idea. He was previously someone else’s outside cat for a decade. Took him in about a year ago. To leave him an outside cat meant constant abscesses from fighting. Took me weeks to heal his face the last time he got out. He accepted his domesticity after a while. It was like a triggered war soldier heard an incoming helicopter . He went nuts.

[ThreeWishes]

Said cat
Edward. He’s sleeping with the dogs as I type.

[Fiesta01]

Interesting. Thanks for the link! That must have been exactly what would occur with Leia.

[Fiesta01]

And a handsome guy he is. Thanks for taking him in when your neighbors left!

[2DogsFarm]

My explanation:
Cats

They think different.
Even different from other “predators”.
Canines hunt in packs.
Felines go solo.

Glad Edward (very handsome guy!) isn’t holding a grudge against the dogs.

[endlessclimb]

I’m glad it didn’t continue on though - my coworker had a similar thing happen, but between his two cats. One cat saw a stray outside, and redirected the aggression towards the other cat in the house. They had to go through all kinds of rigmarole to get the cats to coexist again, because the aggressive cat kept attacking the other cat. He was very distraught about the whole thing.

[ThreeWishes]

That’s sucks. I separated everybody and put them all in different rooms to chill out. Then I put the dogs back together and they immediately started playing. After about an hour I went and got Eddie and I could feel his heart start beating faster so I petted him and took him into the kitchen for some scratches and treats. He relaxed and watched the dogs for a while. Eventually he went into the living room and went to sleep.

Today I left the female dog at home. She’s stiff from the fracas. I took the old dog to the barn with me for the day and left Eddie in the back bedroom. I will keep an eye on their dynamic. And make sure they’re all together only when I’m home until I’m satisfied there’s no lingering hard feelings.

[suz]

My daughter’s cat and my two males seemingly adore battling each other, when they’re not all hanging out together in the garden. When it starts up the cat left out almost always launches himself into the fray. My female either yawns herself back to sleep or removes herself from the battleground.

[chestnutmarebeware]

As others have mentioned, cats are the kings and queens of the world at mis-/redirected aggression.

But as I was reading your original post, I honestly thought you were about to describe an issue I used to have with one of my late cats: the cat loved rawhide chewies and would take them away from the dogs any chance she got. But she didn’t want her own chewy—she only liked the pre-chewed versions covered with dog spit.

Thankfully, neither of the corgis I had back then had any resource-guarding issues, or that cat would have been toast…

[SuzieQNutter]

In my youth, so pretty young there was a stray dog hanging around for about a week.

The stray went for my brother. The cat went for the stray. The cat took off. The stray after it and our dog after the stray.

[skydy]

That calls this to mind;

'Super Cat' saves boy from dog attack in California - BBC News

[ThreeWishes]

Holy cow! That’s exactly how it looked (the launch) except Edward attached himself to Oliver’s back like a monkey on a bucking horse.

[BatCoach]

exactly. I was reading this book “The Cat Who Cried for Help” and they have a chapter dedicated to redirected aggression and ways you can try to minimize it.

The Cat Who Cried for Help: Attitudes, Emotions, and th…

[ClaireBear_NZ]

I adopted an older cat from the local shelter who suffered tremendously from fear aggression while there. They also warned me he “doesn’t like dogs”. Fine, I don’t have dogs. By “doesn’t like dogs” apparently means tries to kill them and means it. He once attacked me because the neighbour’s dog had got through the fence while I’d been out. I had spectacular bruising and puncture wounds all up my leg. I had to fight him off with a broom. Massive redirected aggression. He was back to his usual weirdo self in a couple of days and never reacted poorly to his very irritating young cat friend.