Outdoor Cat owners - pls read

Dutchie

I live in the northeast, a neighbor of mine was cutting a rather large tree that fell in his back yard and found a hawks nest in it. Inside the nest he found 12 cat collars!!!! Pls be careful if you let your cats outside (despite the other million reasons cats get harmed outside). I assume if the hawks could take an adult cat they could take a small dog too - so be aware.

IslandMutts

wow 12 cat collars that's pretty amazing!

Puppy_love_122

Wow and thats just the cats that were wearing collars. I hope this keeps people from letting their cats out. I would never let mine out even though they want out all the time

tsorcus

I reckon that if it was me I would rather live a year being allowed out than my whole long life being locked up in a house. Anyhow, we don't have hawks. Besides, I have a very independent stray cat who's used to coming and going around the place and has a few friendly houses she visits, she definitely wouldn't choose me over freedom, despite the fact that i have the really good cat kibble...

Puppy_love_122

Lucky, here we have hawks the size of Eagles and Eagles lol I swear there wing span has to be like 6 ft its amazing and scary at the same time since I have a small dog.

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freki

Maybe I should let the cat out more often...

bluesbarby

I have 3 cats. All indoor. I have tried to get them to wear collars just in case they slip outside which they have done. But they know how to get them off and then they hide them. If the cats had been taken there would have been bones. At least the skull. But hawks love pretty things to make up the nest with. I was taking a walk at work during my lunch break and a hawk tried to take a hunk of my hair (blonde). Actually he took it and almost knocked me to the ground. I am very leary of hawks now.

Mdawn

I used to let Max and Gus outside during the day. We started getting a huge amount of stray cats around and I stopped letting them out. Tonight, I had a scare with a stray (Fred) we had taken in and as of tonight, he's an inside cat. There are plenty of things for them to do and play with inside. Max and Gus seem very content inside and Fred has taken to being inside well so far. He made himself at home on the couch right away and seems happy. I'm a little worried about Fred fighting with my other cats as I caught him and Max in a flat eared starting contest a little while ago. They all have to adjust because there is no other alternative for them in my opinion. They are all staying inside and that is that! LOL! The coyotes are just too bad in my area for anything else.

Lorina

One of my cats was a feral stray when I got her. She was very thin, matted fur, had a wound on her foot, and way undersized for her age when I found her. She's now purring in my front window in the sunshine, maybe a little too wellfed, with the most amazingly soft coat, and not a care in the world. I'm pretty sure she prefers indoor life to outdoor life, and has never tried to sneak out of the house since she's been tamed. Playing with catnip mice seems a lot more up her alley now than catching real mice for food.

She's a lucky girl. In addition to cars, hawks, raccoons and skunks, I know feline leukemia is pretty common among strays around here.

tsorcus

I actually had my stray indoors for nearly three weeks while she was waiting to be spayed (her breasts weren't small enough for them to do the op earlier) and I swear she nearly got drowned by us in the meantime - she never shut up all the 24 hours. Of course she was in heat as well, but she gets extrememly upset if you lock her in. She's one tough cat anyhow and I'd back her against anything around here. Of course, we don't have anything bigger than rats - the only danger is cars. The babies are vaccinated against leukemia, but the vet said it would be safer not to vaccinate her for a year in case someone else had had it done already - makes you wonder about the vaccines really!

My last cat lived for 12 years while being allowed out and the last two years of her life were her happiest since her first two (when we used to live out the country) as she had her own cat flap and could come and go all day. (She died of kidney failure following an operation for her teeth by the way, nothing to do with going out!)

You do worry about them more when they are allowed out, but I think it's worth it for both of us.

MegaMuttMom

My cat has always been inside. One day our neighbor boy called to say Sonia was standing at the open door looking out. I thought back to when the door must have been left open and that was at least an hour earlier. I guess she votes on staying inside.

Love's_Sophie

Awwww...I hope those kitties were just kitties who lost their collars, not their lives...not likely though!!! Makes me glad my kitties are indoor only, right now!!!

OneCrazyDogOwner

i'm also in the northwest.. watch out for the baled Eagles they have also been known to take small dogs

Taz Monkey

I can't count how many times that the family room door has been blown open by the wind, and I've come home to all 6 of my cats sitting INSIDE, looking out into the yard. They couldn't care less about being inside. And most of my cats came to me as a former outdoor cat. The one that came to me as an adult that used to live outside is actually the least likely to dart out an open door. I guess he knows what its like, and prefers where he lives now.

Betty

I do know a guy who lost his small cat to an owl that scooped kitty off the back porch on front of his eyes. Poor thing.

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