Yes raggies are usually laid back loveable cats that follow you around like lost puppies. What you do have to remember is that ragdolls are cats at the end of the day, so yes you will get the odd few that act like ferals.when a cat goes to bite you or scratch you move the cat and walk away, I know its hard but the key to it is to totally not react at all, wear gloves and trousers and don't scream when they do attack you. They will soon get bored and do something else. The reason they often do it is that they get a reaction off you like when their prey cries out , and of course that just makes them want to do it more.

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These two sound just like my raggie Beau. He can be loving one minute and going for your eyes the next. We've tried tried feliway, zyklene bach flower remedies etc. Have found that hissing at him diffuses him though. He makes some of the other cats lives a misery. We are currenly considering an outdoor run to give everyone a bit more space.

A quick update:

Obviously we would prefer to keep him or at worst, rehome him and we are trying some behavioural approaches that have been recommended by a few people here and elsewhere with what seems initially to be some success. We have an appointment with the vet on Thursday and have been unable to contact the breeder by phone. He's as sweet as pie occasionally, but truly vicious more often and he can switch from sweet to savage in a millisecond. Getting back is a slower process, though...

I've had cats since I was about 4 years old and I've never seen anything like it in a domestic cat. Even some siamese a friend had (which until now I considered the most vicious cats I had ever met) have nothing on this boy.

With regard any concerns that our house may be a noisy "kid crazy" house, my daughter has been brought up to respect animals and is very good with regard to noise, and startling, doesn't interfere with the food, etc.

I genuinely don't know anybody at the moment who would be a suitable rehomee although I am starting to ask around.

Thanks to all for your concern and offer of help. We are planning on continuing with a few management protocols that we have noticed seem to be working. Hopefully these will have some long term benefits to all of us =)

Well, not so quick, perhaps. I'll keep updating periodically =)

Cheers

We have a male and a female Ragdoll, a male persian and a female exotic.

Our male raggy is normally a lovely cuddly boy but sometimes hes a proper little rogue. He's 3 yrs old now and we have a spindled staircase. If hes laid at the top of the stairs as we are walking up or down he will swipe through the spindles for us also if hes laid in the living room and our foot goes near him he sticks his claws in and tries to bite our feet. He also picks on our other raggy and the exotic sometimes.

He has been neutered and we hoped this would calm him down but it hasnt. We just put up with but would be nice if we could calm him down a little bit as it does get depressing when hes bullying the other 2 ladies as theyre quite calm cats.

Raggy's arent the docile , sleepy cats everyone thinks they are. Our 4 cats charge around the house like a herd of elephants and our 8 month old Pug puppy follows them and tries to join in. Its a mad house sometimes.

Well, two weeks later and while there has been (some) progress with the human side of interacting with this ragdoll, there has been no improvement with the way he treats our two older female cats. He still beats them up whenever he feels like it.

The vet said (after being caught with very quick claws - twice) that he couldn't find anything physical that might explain the behaviour and the breeders have apparently moved interstate. I doubt they'd say anything other than "How strange, that's NEVER happened with any of our cats before..." anyway, so I don't really see any point chasing them up.

While we have decided that we want to keep him and work with him, he has ensured that I will not buy or recommend a ragdoll ever again. In Australia they are sold as being very quiet cats, suitable for therapy or young families. Obviously they are not. Even the positive posts in this thread describe cats that are quite different to how they are pitched. It's terrible to think about how many must be purchased under mistaken assumptions then euthanased (as happens to pretty much any animal labelled vicious in Australia). In addition, I'm pretty angry that something that was supposed to be a positive, responsible, loving and reciprocal experience for my daughter (i.e. her first pet) has turned out so badly.

I am sorry you have had such a bad time from owning a ragdoll,They are usually the sweetest natured cats.One of mine is such a baby,follows me everywhere and sleeps round my head at night and I would say he is the most loving cat I have ever had in my life.He not got much up top bless him,he thinks he is a girl and loves to mummy any babies that come into the house be it a kitten,puppy and even baby rabbits.The babies really do well with him acting as mum and its funny to see some of them that I have kept still think he is mum even now they are older.I could never not own at least one raggie now.
Like I have said that ragdoll and indeed any other cat breed are still cats and all come from wild cats which means that any cat can inherit the wild cats behaviours and temperaments,having said that a lot of these cats come from bad breeding,usually back street breeders that don't breed for temperament, they breed for money and it doesn't matter about health in temperament to them,just how many kittens they can churn out and what price they can get for them. The thing is these breeders do produce kittens like yours and give the said breed a bad name,which is very sad

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I've sadly decided to rehome my ragdoll as myself, his breeder and my vet are sure his problems are due to the fact he is in a multi cat home. He's been out in our secure garden all day and has been lovely but moment he comes back in the house he changes. Not looking forward to having say goodbye at all to him though.