Cats Coming Into Yard

[~Shepherd~]

AL what have you actively done about this pussy cat?

Surely it didnt hold you up at the door of your house?

We had one hanging around for a while and unfortunately my WGSD and Whippet dont have issues with cats so I had to use my human leadership and deter it. I blasted it with the hose on the first instance, 2nd I hissed and chucked the kids ball at it. It has never wandered on my boundary again.

Its not rocket science to scare off a cat.

[*Avanti*]

Thanks for posting aussielover because I have had a similar issue with some unwelcome cat/s (killing birds in my yard) and I have found some of the feedback informative and helpful.

[haylz27]

We're lucky here, I've never seen ONE single cat in my street!

I reckon do what other people have suggested... squirt it with a hose or a water gun when ever you see it and it will soon associate coming into your yard with being blasted by water.

[Staranais]

Absolutely nothing wrong with this. You know the law and are following it. Cat owners in this situation have every opportunity to follow the law by containing their cats, as do dog owners. So, if you choose to have a cat, you choose to take on the responsibility of containing it. As I said, we all have the right and the responsibility to protect our pets and others' pets within the bounds of the law. However, currently cat containment is not the law everywhere.

My only problem is in situations where cats are not required to be contained but are punished for leaving their yards, based on individual opinions.

Depends where you live, I guess. Very few people around here keep their cats inside, there is no legal obligation to do so, and most people would think it overprotective to do so. And if you impounded a pet cat belonging to a neighbour because it entered your yard, the ranger would think you were a bit loopy.

It's just a cultural thing, I guess. I've been to & lived in places where dogs are allowed to roam freely & people would consider it a little strange to tie your dog up all day or fence it in. Whereas here you're considered very irresponsible if you let your dog roam. Same with cattle & chickens.

Perhaps it will change here over the next few decades. There are already calls to ban cats from certain areas here which have higher than normal native bird life, which makes sense to me (so long as it's grandfathered in!)

[SpotTheDog]

My six cats are contained in my yard. Last Monday week, one escaped - my neighbour's dog had dug into the gravel on her side of the fence at the rear of the yard, and my cat squeezed under the hole the dog had dug under the fence boundary.

My cats don't roam, so I didn't wait - after two hours of searching, I called both local vets and the rangers and reported him missing, and I leafletted my neighbours' postboxes with a picture and an explanation. They probably thought I was way overreacting but I knew, when he didn't return when called, that something was wrong. My neighbour's dog is a large crossbreed - maybe mastiff x lab, about 40kgs. Nobody was home next door and the dog is poorly socialised - never walked - so I wasn't going into their large yard to hunt for the cat - I figured he was either hiding out in her shed, which was partially open, or under her pool, but I was pretty sure he was in there.

At 11.30pm that night the cat returned. He had a scalping wound on his outer flank and a clean, deep puncture in his groin, about a half an inch from his urethra. The inside of the thigh that was scalped was a deep purple, completely bruised, under the fur. We spoke to the OOH vet and took him in the following morning because his breath sounds were good and he was eating and benefitted more from being settled overnight than an hour-long car ride to the OOH vet (with an hour-long transfer back to a local vet the next day no doubt).

However, the point of this - before I found the puncture and the bruising, I initially checked to see if the cat had been hit by a car by gently squeezing his paws to flex his nails - the impact will knock the cat and they often reflexively try to stop their progress across the ashphalt by extending their claws, so nails will be scuffed and broken.

His claws weren't scuffed or broken, but they were thick with blood - and it's not his. Whatever caught him and bit him, he gave as good as he got and it let him go.

The problem - we have asked our neighbour twice to check that her dog is okay, because despite the fact that her dog dug the fences out, my cat most probably started the fight and it was in her yard, so I was going to offer her the vet bill for her dog. However, even though I explained my cat is fine ($113 at the vet is a reasonable vet bill for me - exam, wound clean, anti-inflammatory painkiller and antibiotic shot, and I've insurance with a $100 excess so I could always claim the $13 back), she keeps denying that her dog is responsible for his injuries. I don't know why, and I'm concerned that her dog, who's black, lives outdoors and is never walked, hasn't been properly examined for damage which might not show up obviously on a black dog.

There's not much else I can do though - my and DH have thrown another $300 at our cat-proofing, digging treated pine into the fence bases in 6m lengths and hammering in star pickets to make sure it really can't be dug out, and then wiring over any parts we're not 100% sure of.

Saying all that, if one of my cats escaped and a neighbour who opportunistically traps cats on their property hosed my cat in a cage because it was caught (and it WOULD be a one-time property invasion), I'm really not sure what I'd do, especially if they hadn't spoken to me first. A highly stressful incident in a cat can cost a fortune in vet bills. My dog-bit guy currently has an upper respiratory tract infection as a result of the stress of what he went through, and in my experience with fostering cats this can happen as a secondary problem in cats who've been very stressed - their immune systems take a nose-dive and they can end up falling ill with sneezes, coughs and cystitis quite easily, all of which costs money to treat.

So yeah, knock on your neighbour's door first.

[aussielover]

AL what have you actively done about this pussy cat?

Surely it didnt hold you up at the door of your house?

We had one hanging around for a while and unfortunately my WGSD and Whippet dont have issues with cats so I had to use my human leadership and deter it. I blasted it with the hose on the first instance, 2nd I hissed and chucked the kids ball at it. It has never wandered on my boundary again.

Its not rocket science to scare off a cat.

No it was just hanging around in the garden, it wasn't particularly concerned about me until i approached it. I went to shoo it away- you know, make loud noises, calp my hands etc and it just stared at me Then i went to pick it up (i know many cats don't appreciate this) and it started hissing and trying to swipe me. Then Mindy saw what was happening and came over and the cat got all upset but didn't run off, obviously its one of those brave ones that knows it will probably win a fight with a dog. So i took Mindy inside. It left after that, but I have seen it since in the garden.

I think it also craps in the yard and the dog likes to eat that (as dogs do).

[Woogies]

In the same situation Neighbour has 10 cats moved in few months ago the cat used backyard as a kitty litter , u have to make it as unpleasant and a inconvenience to come in definately try getting close enough to hose them (I can't since they r mainly feral n take off when the c me) , 1st I boarded up all the holes in the fence if ther is allot of dirt in back yard cover with chicken wire until grass grows since they like to poop in soil n dirt, if u hav friends with citrus trees(lemon lime orange ect) grab hole bunch put it blender rinds and all and sprinkle it over ground round fence line and dirt patches(cats hate the smell) n they might go elsewhere nicer any leftover stick in fridge or freezer for next time , also I use cheap water crystals n soak them in citronella or citrus oils n sprinkle them round too (cheaper then get off my garden) doesn't last as long but u get 10 times as much out of it also with the windows put vasoline with powdered pepper mixed in on the outside sills when cat comes through it gets it on his feet then when he cleans them he gets awful taste n remembers where he got it frm and won't want to go back there . All these things are harmless n worth a try before u trap it . They seem to b working for me ATM good luck