o christmas tree, o christmas tree, thy leaves are so unchanging - MY EYE

splishsplash

I have one Christmas Tree.

I have seven cats, including four six month old horrid little monsters.

No contest.

It occurs to me, now that I've spent my ENTIRE Sunday restoring the tree to lovely sparkliness YET again, that there must be some way to train the kitties to lose interest.

We have decided we are not going to go the water spray route because a) I have no wish to have water/fairy light accidents and b) we feel we would be attacking our little babies which we think would confuse both them and us:o c)would be useless when we're not at home anyway.

I'm thinking a homemade cat repellent spray - has anyone used one before? What are the best ingredients to put in and how strong should it be?
I want to spray the floor underneath and the bottom branches to foil the ground attack - maybe cayenne or tabasco?
I'm also thinking lavender +/- lemon & orange zest for the higher branches to counter the air strike from the back of the couch/coffee table.

Any help with this would be very much appreciated as we are currently taking it in rotation guarding the tree and solemnly passing on the Ceremonial Laser Light of Protection which is the last safeguard of serenity here at chez splish at the moment... and we all have work and school tomorrow!

rising_from_the_ashes

Sorry but :rotfl:- you'll not like this but a simple solution is to not have one.

I gave up a couple of years ago as it was continually being pulled over / climbed up / decs pulled off etc.

Fridaycat

rising_from_the_ashes wrote: »

Sorry but :rotfl:- you'll not like this but a simple solution is to not have one.

I gave up a couple of years ago as it was continually being pulled over / climbed up / decs pulled off etc.

Completely agree - I have five cats, including two 7 month old Bengal kittens and I have only a small (2 foot) artificial LED tree. Would not have risked anything else!

dizziblonde

I have an artificial one, and I fold the ends of the branches over the lower baubles to stop the cat knocking them off for a game (and usually taking half the tree with her). Other than that, apart from a few climbing incidents when she was a young un (nowt like coming home to find a three legged cat curled up around halfway up a tree thats now stood at a 45 degree angle and missing half its tinsel) - she's just gradually lost interest in it over the years.

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

I have a 10 week old [strike]monster[/strike] and he spent the hours between 3.30 and 5.15am constantly launching himself at the bottom of the tree.

He's looked at it about twice today - because he's been given his own sacrificial bauble and various other toys have been launched at him everytime he has approached. So he's gone and run after them instead as they are so much more interesting than the tree (just in case someone thought that I was actually hurting the little so and so ).


This is the first time I have ever had more than a bottom bauble moved - I guess that's more because I always got spring kittens rather than autumn ones. I shall know for next time...

splishsplash

Well, I just know I'm going to jinx myself, but as no-one came back with horrible warnings about the things I had mentioned (which was my fear), I mixed some water and tabasco and spritzed the floor and the lower branches, then I got an old eyeshadow brush and painted lavender oil on the nicest baubles which we wanted to save. I've also doused some cotton make-up removing pads with lavender oil and secreted them at various levels in the tree.

SO, since I did all this well over an hour ago, each of the kitties has come to the tree, had a good sniff of everything, and each of them in turn HAS WALKED AWAY:j:j.

All four are now curled up sleeping and for the first time since the decs went up last weekend, it actually looks like we made an effort, instead of the macabre skeletal tree leaning crazily in the middle of the room with a drunken angel swaying on top mocking us.

NOW I can relax for the evening!


I just need to figure out how often to repeat the spraying.

splishsplash

dizziblonde wrote: »

I have an artificial one, and I fold the ends of the branches over the lower baubles to stop the cat knocking them off for a game (and usually taking half the tree with her). Other than that, apart from a few climbing incidents when she was a young un (nowt like coming home to find a three legged cat curled up around halfway up a tree thats now stood at a 45 degree angle and missing half its tinsel) - she's just gradually lost interest in it over the years.

This is what we were thinking - it's only going to be a problem this year - by next Christmas, they'll be completely disinterested, like our older cats who haven't so much as batted a bauble.

Fridaycat wrote: »

Completely agree - I have five cats, including two 7 month old Bengal kittens and I have only a small (2 foot) artificial LED tree. Would not have risked anything else!

The irony is this year I bought a fake tree for the first time since the kids were born (19 years) - I thought it would last years and years .

rising_from_the_ashes wrote: »

Sorry but :rotfl:- you'll not like this but a simple solution is to not have one.

I gave up a couple of years ago as it was continually being pulled over / climbed up / decs pulled off etc.

I would have been happy to leave the tree this year, but I was overruled by the kids - a bit like tree vs cats, no contest :rotfl:.

rising_from_the_ashes

Glad it's worked .......

splishsplash

Jojo_the_Tightfisted wrote: »

I have a 10 week old [strike]monster[/strike] and he spent the hours between 3.30 and 5.15am constantly launching himself at the bottom of the tree.

He's looked at it about twice today - because he's been given his own sacrificial bauble and various other toys have been launched at him everytime he has approached. So he's gone and run after them instead as they are so much more interesting than the tree (just in case someone thought that I was actually hurting the little so and so ).


This is the first time I have ever had more than a bottom bauble moved - I guess that's more because I always got spring kittens rather than autumn ones. I shall know for next time...

Aww, see, a 10 week old kitten playing with a Christmas tree is just adorable .
Four adult-sized cats working together with deadly precision to take the tree out in a battle of annihilation is a bit different:eek:.

rising_from_the_ashes

I wonder if JoJo's hit on something ...... neither of mine were spring babies (late summer & beg Nov) - Archie was only around 6 weeks when the 1st tree arrived (I had him from 4 weeks old) and wonder if he remembers how much fun he had...... Mia was slightly older but still very much a baby ......

gettingready

My tree is still standing - 48 hours after it was put up.

Teddy walked in, sniffed it and went on his cat tree.



George is in the cage so no chance of him getting to it.

Macius - hmmmm he picks one thingy of a trea at a time and teases Fred with it. They play with it till I take it off them and exchange for a cat toy....

Macius tried to climb up the tree few times, he is tiney - the problem is Fred tries to follow him... sigh......

Had to untangle them both few min ago ... sigh....