Food Aggression!!!!

[Kevalin]

You may have to "mom cat" her when she engages in the behavior. That is, give her a light "pop" on the head (as a mother cat does with her claws sheathed when one of her kittens does something outre).

Alternatively, or possibly in conjunction with giving her a "pauch" on the head, you may have to take her food from her when she gets aggressive with the other cats. Then, after a few minutes, love her a bit, put the food (or her) back down, and let her eat.

NOTE: This second alternative may require protective gloves when you do it the first few times.

She won't like it, but with such a reaction coming from the "boss cat," she will hopefully make the connection and realize that threatening her brothers and sisters over food that is readily available isn't necessary or desirable.

This worked for me with a cat I owned some years ago. Spot would get pretty aggressive at times--she was definitely an Alpha girl!--but a smart, one or two-fingered pop and a "no", would generally get her to settle. Then she'd come park her big carcass on my lap and purr at me like at lawn mower (at her heaviest, she weighed 21 pounds, was a foot tall at the shoulder, and was 32 inches long from head to tail).

I want to emphasize that you DO NOT have to make this any kind of a hurtful process... just one or two fingers when you do it, with the command, should do quite nicely. Your status as "mom cat"(She Who Feeds Us the Food) should cause her to react just as any kitten would, even though she's in a mostly-grown body now.

I think she just needs to know that, even if she is the alpha cat-cat, you are the Top Cat, and won't allow her to behave from her fears of scarcity.

[Cataholic]

I had this with Cali for about 5 or so months. Feeding time was ridiculous. The growls, the swipes, the nips to get the food back. She eventually outgrew it. But, I don't think they always do.

The discipline mentioned above might work. When we took in our last four, two of whom we kept, I nearly stopped feeding cats wet food all together. It was just WAY too much to deal with. It should have been a horror film or something. Then two got adopted out, and I now deal with just one crazed kitty. I have to 'pop' him on the bottom, (again, one finger, just looking for the contact to redirect), and mostly sit there while they all finish up their 1 tablespoon of wet food, or he goes on to everyone else's bowl. Funny, I can train 7 cats to sit in their assigned places....but one bad egg sends us over the edge.

Cats...can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em.

[Kevalin]

Cats...can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em.

Well, you could... but then, what would be the point of living?

[carrie]

I would work very hard to not let this become an issue if that doesn't sound too weird!!!
You could wait and see if she (very cute!) grows out of it or another cat gets fed up with her and disciplines her but I would not want to allow this to become a habit.
I also allow free access to dried food for cats and feed meat just once a day. When meat time comes around it has to be at the same time every day - Years ago this was at 11 am but then my children started to grow up and go to nursery, school, college, university . . . . and I had to go back to work.
I now give the cat meat feed at 8pm and if you are here you get fed, if you are not then you wait until tomorrow! Each cat that shows up gets a bowl of their own and a space of their own, seperate rooms where possible with closed doors between. They have ten minutes to eat and then all bowls are picked up, all doors opened and nobody is upset with anyone else!