Introducing kitten to old ass man cat

My parents had an older cat (10-15 yrs at the time) and within weeks of getting some younger cats the old cat was treating them like her kittens.

Cats can be finicky, sometimes they warm up to each other and sometimes they don’t.

A decade ago I introduced a ~1yo (Siegfrieda) to a 7yo (Kika). It took us around two weeks to do it.

Nowadays it’s clear Kika doesn’t want to interact with Frieda at all; the later tried it a lot of times, but the former hissed and swatted at the air, as if saying “leave me alone!”. (Eventually Frieda gave up). But Kika never went out of her way to interact with Frieda, for good or bad*; so they tolerate each other really well. And as long as Frieda is quiet/busy Kika sees no problem eating, sleeping, or getting petted near her.

*with one major exception: if Frieda knows my mum is nearby but outside the house, she starts meowing really loud, as if calling my mum back. Like, REALLY loud. Once she was doing this little scandal and Kika was sleeping; Kika stood up, went to Frieda, swatted at her twice, and went back to sleep. As if saying “GODDAMMIT SHUT THE FUCK UP!”. In Kika’s defence I was getting annoyed, too.

On the other hand, when my sister adopted a new kitten (some months ago), two days later and one of the older cats was already licking him. As if the kitten was always part of the family. Nowadays they’re really close, with the new kitten playing with the old’s cat tail and ears, and both sleeping together.

So I think it depends a lot, specially on the personality of the old cat. Odds are they’ll live with each other peacefully, but don’t expect them to become besties.

Old boy might feel extra protective of his treats. You may want to take them out of the equation during interactions. Otherwise, just take it slow and steady, keep up the supervision for a while, and let them do their thing if no one is getting hurt.

I introduced two kittens to a 9yo cat several years ago. Our old lady is also a very sweet cat. To the kittens, she kind of acted (and still acts to some extent) like an auntie who isn’t afraid to tell them what’s what with a hiss or a bap, but it’s never very mean. Nowadays one of them will give it back to her, too. They don’t cuddle, but they all get along fine now and both “kittens” (they are almost 6 now) clearly like the old lady and will often sit near her. I think you have to give your old man a chance to make sure kitten knows that he’s in charge, and the way they do that is by asserting their dominance with a his or a bap. No claws is a great sign.

For what it’s worth, we also had to let our cats make sure the dog also knows who is in charge, lol. And she definitely knows!

What kind of cat is an ass man?