Why does my cat go into the other room, then meow pathetically from there? If she wants my attention, why doesn't she simply fuss in the room that I am currently in, rather than going to a distant room.

Hopefully you can answer a behavioural question for me. We have two labs, nearly 2 year girl and an 8 year old male. We crate trained the younger girl and haven't had any problems with accidents in the night. However our older male has sporadically been peeing at night time. He will go for ages with no accidents and then seem to have a run of bad nights. He always goes to the same spot and we've tried putting something in the way which usually deters him. We make sure both of them go before bedtime and limit their water intake from about 8pm. They both sleep in the lounge on mats. Any suggestions?

Seeing that picture of the samoyd reminds me of what our Samoyd used to do to our black and white cat. In summer she used to dig holes in the sandy ground of the back yard and then stuff the cat in the hole and sit on him. When we asked a breeder about it we were told that its the artic winter. To keep their babies warm they dig holes in the snow and sit on them to keep them warm. And our Bengal cat, paws his water bowl so the water is moving, because asian leopard cats that they come from did this to remove pond scum, and he dies it to fresh drinking water - no pond scum in sight! Since then nothing surprises me with the wierd thing animals do.

Our old LabX was useless at burying things - she'd dig a shallow hole, about 1 inch, then cover up her biscuit or bone with the dirt & grass from the hole, next to the hole, on top of the lawn. I guess the burying urge came from making sure she had food for later, but due to a lack of predators/competition for food, she never really refined the whole "put it in the hole & cover it up" part.

I rescued my cat when he was only a few weeks old (still had closed eyes) so he has quite a few weird habits... including refusing to eat unless someone stands over him and watches. He has recently started ripping out his fur in big chunks. We've done everything we can think of to stop him... but given he only does it when we're not home or asleep, and not when we're paying attention or stroking him, we're fairly sure he's playing us for attention!

Whenever my japanese spitz gets excited he likes to nip and bite hands and fingers. He's done this since he was a puppy and most of the time its not very hard but there have been occasions when he has gotten over excited and bitten down too hard. Is this a very bad habit?

One of the funniest thing I saw my moggy do was come hurtling towards our deck from the garden, leap up on to it, miss and bash herself on it as she jumped..then she quick as a flash turned round to me and hissed madly like it was totally my fault!

@ Leon - I'm not sure if it's true, but I tend to subscribe to the theory that cats like to know they can control you - making you get off the sofa and go to the other room = serious control! Maybe try calling the cat to you instead?

@ KH - LOVE the idea of the cat being stuffed in the hole and sat on! Did the cat mind?

@ Hayley - our cat, also rescued, also much prefers to be watched and even told it's ok to eat. She will eat without us there but is much happier being watched initially. I don't know why though - or whether the rescued aspect has anything to do with it... The ripping the fur out might be anxiety and / or boredom - assume you've checked out it isn't a skin condition etc with the vet? Doesn't sound so much like attention seeking if he does it when you're not there?

we wake up every morning to find 10 or so dead cabbage tree leaves in our house that our 2 cats bring inside. i've seen them sort through the pile under the tree to pick a good one, then they drag it to the house & through the cat door, looking quite pleased with themselves.

we used to joke that they were worried i wasn't building a nest as i was pregnant when they first started doing it. they are very good hunters & catch heaps of cicadas & mice, so why leaves?

anyone have any ideas as to why they do this?

Hi #2. If it is about 2 weeks or so between peeing you have territorial marking. If this has been going on since the other dog was about 12 - 18 months defintely territorial marking