help for my friend ~please~

[boxerlover955]

Well here's the story. My friends mom died a few years back of Cancer and now about 5 years later her dad is getting married again. Well they have a huge boxer mix named Bleu and his fiance has a small cat. Bleu doesn't really get along with cats. He tends to chase them and stuff. Well they are moving into the same house and when Bleu is there they put the cat in the basement. Last night I spent the night and Bleu was sitting by the basement door whinnying, barking and literally drooling by the door. So there are going to try and introduce Bleu to the cat, but before they do my friend asked me if I knew how to do it. I couldn't really tell her because we never had this problem with our dogs and cats because they grew up with each other and we have never had a problem with our dogs attacking the cats.

Well here are a few of my Ideas.

1)Have the dog on a leash and put him in a sit. Have some treats like peanut butter in hand then bring the cat in. While the cat is in the room give him some peanut butter then remove the cat and then remove the peanut butter. So eventually he'll associate the cat with treats.

Now I can't really be sure if this is a good Idea so I was looking for some advice on what to tell her. If you have some that would be great.

~Thanks in advanced

[daisy'smom]

My boxer that I have had for about 6 weeks has serious "cat issues". I made so many mistakes so I would like to pass on what I have learned. I tried to rush things. I introduced her to the cats as soon as I brought her home which was a huge mistake. Tell your friend to keep them separate for awhile. Let her dog get used to the cat in the basement. Do not rush things. Do it gradually. One thing that I have been doing is when I walk Daisy and we come across a cat I keep a high value treat (like hot dogs) that she only gets when she sees a cat. When she is calm I reward her with the treat. Today on our walk it finally worked!! The goal is for her to see cats as something positive. I also let her see me hold one of the cats when Daisy is outside and she can see in through my patio door. I want her to see that the cat belongs to me. She looks at me very confused but she does not lunge at the door. I have only done that a few seconds at a time. The next thing I am going to do is have someone out side with Daisy and give her her high value treat while she sees me with one of the cats.

As for barking at the door, Daisy was lunging and jumping at the door to my upstairs room where my cats are. I put up a baby gate to keep her from doing it. When she looks up I tell her to "leave it" and when she does she gets a treat. I don't let her get to the point of fixating on the cat room. At night I keep her in the crate (I cover the crate so she can't see out") and the cats have the run of the house. I have to tie the door shut because when I first got her she broke through the door to try to get the cats.