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Cats in the garden
A local cat has found my garden. It was only a matter of time, I suppose, after I had made the frogs, birds and mouse so welcome.
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Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 12:40
Is that a pic of the cat that frequents your garden? Scruffy looking so and so isn't he!
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 12:41
We've had nothing but trouble from cats in our garden. They dig up our rare snowdrops, and leave unspeakable messes in their place; they chase the birds; torture the frogs and drive my mother demented. (The last bit is the worst, really.)
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 12:48
So glad you wrote about this Kate. Like you I encourage wildlife. The neighbours cats kills pretty much anything that is too slow to get out of its way. Plus our raised beds are used as a litter tray, seedlings are disturbed despite hard wire netting and bamboo poles being placed around. Apologies to the queasy but I urinate in a bucket and tip it where I know several cats enter the back garden. It seems to act as a deterrent..but difficult to quantify. Good on Chris Packham. Lets hear more about it, it has become a bit of a dodgy subject for fear of upsetting cat owners. Perhaps the electronic bleeper should be compulsory along with a cat licence.
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 12:49
I have two outside cats, and they are both kept in at night. I have no idea what they do all day but they rarely bring things near/into my home. When they do, they are alive - usually small frogs or mice, the odd bird. The cats get a good telling off, shut upstairs and victims released to fight another day.
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 12:55
and dog hater ever sene the mess dogs make on pavements? and although they should, the owners never clean up after their dogs. Cats are killers, and a bit sadistic cos they play with they're pray, but it's their instinct, how they tick. I think it's better to reduce powerlines into which birds and bats fly, just like wind turbines, they are killing morewildlife than anything furry. I keep my cats in at night, cos i couldn't sleep if they were out...and they always come home to use the litterbox and then go out again. i take them to lottie and they never do a business except a wee, but i don't care, it's all compost ;-)
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 13:03
I have 3 cats and after a few baby birds were brought in in the spring (I'd find them when I woke up in the morning on the kitchen floor :-( ) I decided to shut them in at night!! I love my cats but hate what they do to nature. I'd love to build a pond but feel they would have a field day!! Maybe when they are too old to care....
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 13:07
Hate cats in the garden they are forever using it as their loo & it stinks ! I have to go round picking it all up so my children can play out. The Cat who comes alot is so cheeky & fearless until it gets something thrown in its general direction!
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 13:24
I didn't think that there was anyone who had a garden not used as a litter tray by cats! Mine is better now that the neighbours have gone with their 2 cats, but even my dog fails to keep them out. PS @ catlover, I always, always clean up after my dog. I don't even let her wee on the pavement.
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 13:25
Six neighbours up one side of my garden and one on the other so lots of cat visitors. They are all well fed at home so do not seem to care for my wildlife which has lots of hiding places anyway, but come for a bit of company when their carers are out. The pub used to have two huge dogs who used to bound in over the fence and butt me. I did not like that one bit but read their names off their collars and used what I had gleaned from a dog training course on the BBC to discipline them, so I would carry on gardening with two very subdued dogs sitting obediently on the path watching me.
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 13:36
i have a cat cause my kids wanted a pet when they was younger ,so i knew few years down the line i be left with her.shes does her stuff in my garden with her bit .at least i know my cat not going to bite anyone or bark at local kids playing or waking past she might chase the birds but she has her bell to warn other shes coming i have a allotment with tys for foxs pond for wildlife as well as my crops its called sharing
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 14:15
No cats don't catch rats or even squirrels if they have any sence visous nastie things greys I am talking about. but they kill everything else in site, the endangered slowworm is so at risk seen cats mauling them to death and veering up out of nowhere to kill all sorts of birds and the terrible smell when you get their muck over your hands on your shoes and in plant pots, and cats always do it in someone elses garden never their own.
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 14:32
im just glad i don't have a garden, my kitties can go on the balcony and from there onto the rooftop of our building, which is horseshoe shaped, if i had a garden i still would let them out alone cos of all the cars and nasty cat haters. our neighourhood has dozens of posters at anytime of missing cats and the papers are full of tortured and mistreated cats in the dumpsters...and our donwstairsneighbouring cat is very agrrssive to other cats, so no way...just me being overprotective. at the allotment they can chase butterflies and i have 1 frog in my minipond, but they havent seen it yet or sont care about it. if i have a garden i would make it cat-er-thight ;-)
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 15:13
My young cat brings in mice and birds all the time, but they're alive and I always rescue them and give her a good telling off. Spring just gone she found a nest of very young birds and brought them to us 1 at a time, we managed ro save them and take them to a wildlife rescue centre where they were very well looked after. I feel that everyting my cats does is my responsibility to try to put right and think more cat owners should do the same.
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 15:30
Since my neighbours' housebound cat has taken to going outside, I've had no more trouble with rats, and I used to have lots of them. I don't know if she catches them or not, but she's earning her keep as far as I'm concerned. I know she catches mice but I think she's too elderly for birds. If only she could develop a taste for those big brown slugs which I've had a plague of this year!
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 16:15
Cats ar the guv'nors. Thw cat in the pic is female, torty, the worst kind. They kill? so what, at least they aren't dogs, now they are awful.
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 16:32
I dont have a problem cats are welcome in my garden ok they use it as a litter tray so I cover the newly planted bits with netting really not much effort. What they do is keep the rabbits and mice out before them sweet peas and bean seed wa always being ruined by mice now the cats do a good job in keeping out the vermin
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 16:34
My cat (now 13 yrs 80 in human years) catches grey squirrels on a regular basis. This last week he has had a family of young ones. He catches voles, mice, rats and the odd bird. In all of his 13 years I think he has caught about 10 birds. And he now uses my new flower bed as a litter tray, annoying but at least it is my cat.
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 17:33
Cat people - that's cat owners, not people with tails and furry ears and whiskers - like to send their cats out at night to wreck the gardens of non-cat people. They teach them yo uproot seedlings and generally mess with the worms. It's their way of getting back at us, because they know that we know that their houses stink of pee.
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 19:08
My 'girls' are only let out when I'm home. When I go to work or out, they're called in and the flap locked. They also have to be in at night before it gets dark and aren't let out till it's light in the morning. They're collared (with safety buckles which snap open if they get snagged) and have bells so all wildlife is warned of their proximity. My old boy cat, who I lost recently (nearly 20yrs old) used to lie on our shed roof and the sparrows used to hop around him. He was an exceptional cat who only ever bothered with mice.
Gardeners' World Web User
07/10/2011 at 22:07
arhhhhhhhhh sj your moggie boy sounded sweet....good old age as well. my sister lost her cat recently [he was 23yrs old, human years as well] so a very very old boy and he would love chasing spiders...he would catch them in his mouth and you could see the spiders legs moving as it hung from the cats mouth,he would then spit it out and keep doing the same thing to the spider for ages how cruel is that....yuk......but was funny to watch...arhh such memories getting choked up now.
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