Cat bringing home dead things

TomsMom

Our cat brought home a baby bunny this morning, fortunately it was alive and well, we think she was just playing at being a mother :rotfl:
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I didn't appreciate the live rat she brought home last year which I found running round the kitchen and dining room :eek:. And we've found half a mouse on numerous occasions. During the summer we look through the window before we let her in to see if she's carrying anything!

My son's cat tried to get half a seagull through their cat flap - not sure what happened to the other half :eek:.

She must really love you to be bringing pressies home every day .

catieeb06

It's just Wierd because she really is a scaredy cat. My 2 yr old godson was over at the weekend and as soon as she heard him she shot off in the opposite direction. Any noise and she's off, doesn't like new people etc...

Eh dear!

EHL123

We've had to start locking our two cats in at night, the final straw was a live mouse being dropped on my chest in the middle of the night! :eek:

During the day is still fair game though. Last year the neighbours had a mouse nest under their shed and one of the cats was in heaven, it was like a conveyor belt - she'd drop the dead mouse in the hall, do her daft chirpy chirpy chirp thing to let me know it was there and that she was very pleased with herself, and then run off outside to catch another one! It was literally another mouse every ten minutes. When I realised the pattern would continue until every last mouse was sitting in my hallway, I decided to lock her out for the rest of the day!

Like everyone says, cats consider their offerings a gift. If you give any reaction to the gift, be it negative or positive (even cleaning it up while they're watching), they'll keep bring them! The best thing to do is completely ignore whatever they brought in and go on as normal (even if that means stepping over a dead mouse in the hallway!) and then deal with it once they're out of sight. Eventually they'll get bored and stop bringing them in. Saying that, recently I've been getting a lot of butterflies off one of mine! She doesn't kill them, she just comes running in with them held ever so softly in her mouth, and then lets them go right in front of me. Even I can't ignore that because it's very, very cute to watch your cat burp a butterfly for you :rotfl:

Pollycat

I've never put collars on my cats (all have been indoor/outdoor cats) as I've always worried about them getting caught up on something and being strangled.

All the cats I've had over the years (6 over 33 years but I had 4 at the same time once) have been hunters.

It's what they do.

My old boy used to spread his presents around to his favourite neighbours as well as bringing them home to me.

My current one (coming up to 11 years of age and creaky with arthritis) has been a phenomenal hunter.
He was a farm kitten and still retains feral tendencies.

We have 2 allotments close by and fields for miles around.

He's caught lots of mice, voles and rats in his time as well as a few birds.
On a bad day (for the wildlife) he's brought 5 voles home.

He brings them home (they're always dead) and after yowling at the back door to let me know he's got something, he eats them.
Pretty much all of them - claws, teeth, fur - apart from a small internal organ that we think maybe the bile duct or gall bladder.
He doesn't play with them at all.
We once saw him dragging a dead rat up the road by the scruff of the neck, dragging it along like a lion would carry an antelope.

I don't like to think my cats are killing other creatures but I believe it's in their nature.

You may just have to put up with it.

£2coinsaver

Hi, I've got two cats. Thankfully I don't get that many presents certainly not rabbits or anything thank god! I have fitted 2 bells on one of my cats collars for maximum effect, and don't allow him out when birds are most active which I think is an hour after sunrise and an hour before sunset. Also they are both in at night as this is when i think the mouse attacks occur.

MrsE_2

I put a collar & bell on George in the spring & summer, he's even beheaded & brought home squirrels:eek::eek::eek::eek:

Pollycat

MrsE wrote: »

I put a collar & bell on George in the spring & summer, he's even beheaded & brought home squirrels:eek::eek::eek::eek:

MrsE
I tried collars & bells on the first kittens I got, they could stalk without making a sound - which is why I decided not to bother with collars.

My cat (see my earlier post) always starts with the head - I'm not going to go into more detail as it's lunchtime. :eek:

TomsMom

And there was me thinking my cat was being motherly bringing home a live baby rabbit yesterday. This morning's offering was a dead one, cold and stiff, she must have caught it last night and there was no-one around to let her in so she just abandoned it outside .

tanith

TomsMom wrote: »

And there was me thinking my cat was being motherly bringing home a live baby rabbit yesterday. This morning's offering was a dead one, cold and stiff, she must have caught it last night and there was no-one around to let her in so she just abandoned it outside .

Oh my!! I could cope with dead mice, frogs and birds but a small fluffy baby rabbit, I'd be bawling my eyes out... good job I don't live in the countryside:D

catieeb06

My OH has reported another dead mouse this morning that's sine been eaten.