Indoor Cat or Outdoor Cat?

midnightraven3

I always thought it "not fair" to have indoor cats
We adopted 2brothers

One went out and roamed till all hours
One sat on the mat by the open door and never crssed the threshold

I'd love to know why people think its the owner who have the choice:rotfl:

Beckyy

My cats are mainly indoors cats. They both came to us as rescues. One was a stray who was living outside 24/7 and found it hard to adapt to living indoors all theme while settling in. After a few months he was allowed to go outside, but sticks to the garden and surrounding area and always returns within the hour. Our other cat was used to going outside regularly, but lived in the middle of no-where, and although we don't live in a busy area, she was petrified of cars and anything loud. She stays indoors almost all the time, and is totally adapted to it, but occassionally ventures out for an hour into the garden shed - never outside the garden.

I do feel slightly irresponsible letting my cats out to roam, they could be stolen/hurt and I don't want them going to the toilet in neighbours gardens. If I had a kitten I would more than likely go for indoor cat, but provide a lot of stimulation.

yorkie18

Ours is an outdoor cat. At the moment though, he literally goes out to poo then comes in again think it's a bit cold out there bless him.

We did have a tray for him inside too but he's begun eating the litter so he has to go outside now.

roguebrogue

Beckyy wrote: »

I do feel slightly irresponsible letting my cats out to roam, they could be stolen/hurt and I don't want them going to the toilet in neighbours gardens. If I had a kitten I would more than likely go for indoor cat, but provide a lot of stimulation.

My cat is an indoor only cat and has been since I got her as a kitten, for the reasons above.

FatVonD

ukphd wrote: »

I have catproofed my garden so my 3 cats can be inside or outside but they're always safe in the garden (and they're not annoying my neighbours by using their gardens as litter trays!). They all have litter trays indoors too. By cat proofing the garden it means other cats can't get in either. It's not unsightly and since doing it I've felt so much better about the cats when they're out. A lot of cats have gone missing in my area so at least I know that my cats can enjoy the outside but can't wander off/get nicked/get hit by a car or whatever.

How did you manage to (successfully) cat proof your garden?? I tried this when we moved, we have a 6ft high brick wall at the end and I replaced the wooden fencing with 6ft high PVC fencing. Our weak spot was the double gates which we covered with PVC trellis. One cat is far too lazy to go out anyway but the other managed to climb spiderman-like up the plastic trellis and squeeze through one of the diamond shapes (where the 2 gates met), I had to take it off in the end for her own safety.

Now she's kept indoors during the day (when the road is busy) but allowed out at night.

Buttonmoons

Both mine are indoors and have never been outside bar trips to the vet.
I live in a skyscraper so there is no easy access, I have debated with the idea of taking them out on a lead, but not sure.

When the front door is open, 1 cat will try and escape to explore the new area, and I let her play in the drying room :rotfl:

The other cat is the destructive one in the house, but there is noway he would go outside, he's extremely nervy, you drop a fork and he gets a scare and runs face first into a wall, I kinda pushed him out into the drying room with the other cat, and he started crying and scratching at front door to get back in. When we took him to vets he curled his big butt up in the corner and shook, was so scared. It's a shame as going for jaunts outside would benefit him, and me as I wouldn't have to stop him swinging off my curtains (hopefully lol)

wilykit

midnightraven3 wrote: »

I always thought it "not fair" to have indoor cats
We adopted 2brothers

One went out and roamed till all hours
One sat on the mat by the open door and never crssed the threshold

I'd love to know why people think its the owner who have the choice:rotfl:

If you read through the posts sometimes it is the cat that has the choice - my cat won't go out, I have given him many chances etc but he just doesn't want to go outside!

ellay864

If you saw my cat now you'd think she was an indoor cat. She spends most of her time curled up on a bed or under a radiator and hovers by the catflap when she needs to go for the toilet, bolts across the lawn at high speed, does her business under a tree at the end of the garden and lfies back in at high speed. But come summer it's another matter as she spends hours outdoors, and we know she has a very big territory. She has free rein of the house and a catflap so she can come and go as she pleases, but even in winter she will not use a litter tray, always goes to the garden. She also won't drink from a water bowl but jumps into an empty bath, sits by the taps and shouts until we turn it on for her (and she has been known to adopt a really inelegant position and just drink from the toilet!!). She's a cat - I gave up trying to understand her a very long time ago!

ukphd

FatVonD wrote: »

How did you manage to (successfully) cat proof your garden?? I tried this when we moved, we have a 6ft high brick wall at the end and I replaced the wooden fencing with 6ft high PVC fencing. Our weak spot was the double gates which we covered with PVC trellis. One cat is far too lazy to go out anyway but the other managed to climb spiderman-like up the plastic trellis and squeeze through one of the diamond shapes (where the 2 gates met), I had to take it off in the end for her own safety.

Now she's kept indoors during the day (when the road is busy) but allowed out at night.

Sorry I only just saw this.

It was really easy to cat proof the garden. We just bought a roll of wire mesh from Wickes (green coated mesh so it isn't very obvious). It's about a metre wide. We then got some angled brackets (we actually made these out of plaster board bracket things cut to size but you can also buy them). The brackets are fixed to the fence (our fence is about 5ft tall (maybe a little more) so that they are bending inwards to the garden. we had about 15 cm attached to the fence, and 30 cm in the air (you could do more). These are fixed every 1 - 2 m as needed. The wire mesh is then fixed along the fence in a similar way - so 15cm of the mesh is on the fence, the rest in the air with the brackets supporting it. Wire mesh is stapled to the fence at the bottom and wired to the brackets. That's it! You end up with the mesh overhanging into the garden and the cats can't jump over it. We had a number of trees so we also put mesh in those - it wasn't that hard, just a cone of mesh up the trunk or on the bigger branches. Because it's green it doesn't show up for most of the year. It's visible in winter but it's not too bad.

Over our gate we did the same and where we had trellis we put a length of wire across the gaps so the cats can't squeeze out. If they're is an overhang into the garden then even if they climb up the trellis they can't then climb out over the overhang.


I hope that sort of makes sense! It cost us under £100 for our garden (which is about 15m x 5m maybe) and it took a day to install (just my husband doing it).

There are companies that will do it too but it's rather more expensive. A garden our size worked out to about £400 I think.

juliethemuse

i keep my 4 cats inside, so the old hag 2 doors down cant accuse them of trespassing, its a communal alley but she thinks she owns it, also i have seen at least 2 other black and white cats about very similar to mine, who could have been the trespassers but oh no it couldnt be them it had to be my cats:mad::mad:
so to save any aggro i just keep them in and she can go and find something else to complain about, also , even though i have litter trays i dont want them pooping in other peoples gardens,