What would stop cats using the garden as a toilet?

Fruball

fletch3163 wrote: »

I too struggled very much with cat drama in my garden (and in my shoes, and in my potato patch, and in my...............) and someone suggested I get a cat of my own to deter them. Not ideal you might think......but I did! it worked (after a while) plus I love her now. Me a cat person, who knew? To quantify actually, I'm not talking the odd poop here, I have a neighbour who had nearly 25 cats - down to around 18 at the moment. She treats them well and loves them all dearly but they have some anti social habits

25 cats / 18 cats :eek::eek::eek: OMG I'm sorry but its not just the cats who are antisocial in my opinion but the owner too.

I would have a nervous breakdown if I lived nextdoor to her or anyone who had so many :eek::eek::eek:

ppolly

I think cat owners have to be a bit responsible about the number of cats an area can stand -we had two and are down to one at the moment and don't plan on getting another because there is enough in our area as it is - much as I love them, they are not garden or wildlife friendly at all.
Also, water is fine as a deterrent! (my brother used upturned drawing pins lined along the fence to deter the local cats when I was young - not recommended!)

shimypop

there are about 10 cats that wander through my garden when ever they please not only is my eldest son alergic to them but i dont like them. i woke up the other morning to find one of the cats in my garden which both front and bk are all green so i got me an my kids ready to leave for school opened my front door and found a runny cat !!!! on my door step that was full of worms so i spent 25 min puttin pure bleach and boiled water on my path way out my front is a huge patch of green which my eldest son plays on and almost walking baby.my son came down this morn an said he thinks he got worms the only thing i can think of is where we did gardening the other week or the field out the front does anyone know if the council would do anything if i report this to them im trying all the ideas given on here so far for my gardens but what about the field there are too many kids that play on it that live in this st to do nothing about it please help

kimmy112

ive found in the past that a water pistol has been very useful... - they have not been back since and it didn't hurt them

leoniestacy

hi i have a cat problem, it keeps weeing and pooing in my front garden and the other day i found it in my kitchen, how do i get this cat away before it ends up in the bin i have a young baby in the house and scared it may attack her

babyshoes

If you see it in the house, a water spray bottle and loud voice with clapping hands/stamping feet should scare it away. You can also get stuff to put in the garden that it won't like the smell of - not sure what it is called, but I am sure a garden centre would be able to advise!

leoniestacy

thanks i did buy some powder down but it walked straight over my garden whilst i was stood there

Carolyntia

Do you know how it got in your house? Do you have other cats or a cat flap? Most cats don't like citrus some lemon or orange peel on the garden might help....it's not foolproof apparently as some cats seem to be immune. As babyshoes suggested a water spray maybe the best thing.

If you have cats and this one has used the cat flap to get in then yours might be seeing it as 'top cat' and won't challenge it unless you make a stand.

C x

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

1. Water pistol will persuade puss to try elsewhere without you getting death threats or visits from the RSPCA.

2. It's being friendly. It probably hasn't occurred to it that there are people who think it wants to hurt babies or want to torture it by shutting it into a bin to slowly roast to death/suffocate/delete as applicable. If you don't want to be friends, use suggestion 1.

3. It won't murderise your baby. Unless it's a safari park lion. Then I would suggest not trying suggestion 1. but phoning the police instead.

4. It won't murderise your baby.

valk_scot

If you want to leave your baby sleeping in a pram in the garden, get a cat net to go over the pram.

Really though any self respecting cat knows that as soon as a baby sits up, it's best to avoid them. Babies grab and pull fur and squeeze. None of my cats (all friendly souls) would willingly go anywhere near my three kids when they were small. Why would a cat attack a baby unless the baby was attacking it?

As to keeping the cat out the kitchen...shut the door? It's just being nosy and hoping for free food. If you shoo it out a few times it will get the message. Or keep a plant misting bottle there to squoosh the cat. They don't much like that.

As to the garden, cats don't belive in private property. They just think of territory. If you want to keep a cat out your garden, get a bigger cat! You can't keep them out and the law in fact recognises this fact about cats. It's definately against the law to harm one in any way trying to keep it out, as the recent court case involving that woman putting a cat in a wheelie bin demonstrates.

However even I, a confirmed cat lover, know that sometimes you need to discourage them ( thinking of my neighbours mad Siamese and my blue tit nest box here) and the best way to do this is to buy a good pump action water gun. You can squoosh them out of upstairs windows with this and they think it's the Hand of God smiting them, and start avoiding the area.

You can also buy various powders etc in the garden centre to scatter in flower beds to discourage cats. Best option though is some good ground cover plants...cats prefer bare soil for a toilet.