Cat Training

We've always had rescue cats and I'm afraid they tend to train you not the other way round! We've never had cat flaps. When we moved to our current house last year our cat Darcy was very put out as he obviously wasn't used to the new layout of the house and would manage to open our bedroom door (still don't know how he did it) and wake us in the middle of the night. He'd always been used to living in our dining room and kitchen at nights in our previous house (without a cap flap) so we never had a problem. Now, we have to make sure that the kitchen door is clicked tight shut (he was able to open that as well (!) and now he's as happy as Larry, as are we. However, during the summer months he wants to be outside at night and sits by the front door until he's let out and if it doesn't happen quickly enough he lets us know in no uncertain terms - we are very firmly put in our place and the glare we get when we finally open the door has to be seen to be believed.

It's a long time now since I had cats, but after I found my two in Kenya torturing a small rat under my bed in the middle of the night, they were banned from the bedroom, and that applied to my English cats too.

I had my first cat in Dubai and he used to have great fun eating cockroaches and leaving their shells under my wooden bath mat!!!!

My black cat, Sam, now long deceased, as a kitten was a dab paw at catching daddy long legs which he then crunched with relish. Sadly, as a sober, adult cat, he abandoned this useful task.

Just realised - Cat training - definitely an oxymoron.

My daughter has just brought me a souvenir fridge magnet from her holiday. It shows a contented cat, with the verse: "I'm just a cat/and we'll get along fine/as long as you remember/I'm not yours, you're MINE!"

A fairly accurate summary of the actual situation, I thought.

I'm not so sure. My six all know their names so a screeched "Fishpaste" as she claws one of the sofas puts a stop to it. They all know "This way", whether I'm shooing them indoors before locking the back door or Mr absent is shooing them out of the sitting room at bedtime. "Get down" and "Stop that" – or at least the slightly stern tone – works. As far as hunting other creatures is concerned, they're pretty much past that now. The serious hunter used to bring in rabbits, rats and squirrels but he's an old boy now. The others have never managed anything bigger than a frog, which they didn't kill but popped into a pile of washing. (I didn't wash the frog but asked one of my daughter's friends to climb over the back wall of the garden and put it near a neighbour's pond.) A couple are ace at catching – and, disgustingly, eating flies – so I have to watch out for wasps and bees. I haven't trained them and they haven't trained me – we have a mutually acceptable modus operandi – except I think my big black boy and I would have been burned at the stake in the Middle Ages, so close is our understanding of each other.

I think my cats know their names, but they always seem most responsive to them when I yell "Wesley/Albert - it's breakfast/teatime!"

Nice to read all previous notes. We've not had a cat for years due to circumstances beyond our control, but now we're dare I say "settled"... we took our eldest grand-daughter to the local cat rescue centre this week to help us choose a cat. We are all so excited but have to wait a couple of weeks as we are away. We went straight to the local pet store to buy all new things. He's going to be so spoiled. He's a handsome tabby with a white bib and white sox and his name is HEINZ, I know, I know, there are 57 varieties! Any tips will be much appreciated.

OTHill, good luck with your new moggie, I hope he brings you years of fun and contentment.
I have recently adopted a brother and sister cat from Cats protection and they are a joy. I too bought new toys, beds etc, and they have used none of them, prefering to play with bottle tops and sleeping on/in my bed!

For goodness sake open the cat flap! Cats are night-hunting animals. They are alert and awake at night and keeping them in, if they have once known the freedom to stroll about at night is cruel. Then in the day every Tom is satisfied and ready to be spoiled and stroked, but come darkness he will ready to be off again - living his own life. A healthy cat must be able to defend himself against a fox. He will know where there are trees and walls to climb.

Not all cat's like to go out at night my DGs cat like's to curl up and sleep after 9pm and does not like to be disturbed a bit like me really.He is a very big Tom cat and enjoy's his creature comfort's

As some of you know, my cat had to be put to sleep a couple of weeks ago. He was a 'rescue cat' and brought so much love and mischief with him! We always left the cat flap open for him to come and go as he liked - in fact we've done that with all of our cats over the years. We're due to go on holiday next month, and when we come back, we'll be heading for the local Cats' Protection Shelter - we miss having a wee moggie organising the household for us. OTHill, you've made me think now - I'll nip along to the local pet store and get some toys etc for the new 'arrival', whoever he/she may be! I'm sure Heinz will be a happy, happy cat and so lucky to be with you!

My cat flap stays unlocked so that the cats can come and go as they please. They all have different habits, but each seems to end up on my bed at some point most nights.
In my garden foxes, muntjac, badgers and cats tolerate each other and show no aggression. I occasionally see all species at the same time.

shysal you must live in a beautiful place!

I actually have a tiny terraced house with a small garden (see my photos), but it backs onto farmland so the wildlife visits all the time, as I leave out peanuts and water.

Not entirely sure about the cat flap open all the time idea. It is true that cats want it that way, but - outdoor cats can be in danger of cat haters (one of mine has a permanent pellet lodged in his thigh); traffic (I had one cat injured that way) and getting lost (again, this happened, although I suspect that one of his admirers had decided to take him for a walk and he escaped).

Also, cats are hunters, and sometimes they hunt endangered species. I lock my cats in at night, but I believe that the most dangerous time for hunted animals is dusk and dawn - that is when most cats do the hunting, rather than in the hours of total darkness.

You cannot train cats, but you can restrict them in their own interests.

No jangran you restrict them in YOUR interest.

They usually only catch sick and frail birds and if we didn't have the millions of cats keeping the mice down we would be overrun with them.

Squirrels kill off endangered species but we don't lock them up.

It is not in a cat's interest to be lost, injured or dead.

As for sick or frail birds only - I wish someone could explain that to the cats. They have never managed to catch a mouse, so perhaps we don't have them? Hah! I remember the cats used to catch field voles (when we lived near a field), but I don't think voles are pests.

Squirrels are not domestic pets, so it would be hard to lock them up, but there are areas where grey squirrels are culled in the interests of native red squirrels. In some areas too, it is permanent open season on grey squirrels.

I was going to ask about cat flaps, and luckily this thread has cropped up - though not as black and white as I'd hoped. We have our 'boys' who have cat flap access in and out during the day but at night I've been locking it so that if they're out they can come in but not go out again. I always send them out for a wee before I go to bed and they have a tray indoors just in case....
It's been worrying me though that they might get followed by a cat / fox as they hurtle / creep through during the night - and that the 'enemy' wouldn't be able to get out again. I've left the cat flap open both ways on occasion [which must have been confusing for them!] but then have lain awake worrying in case they'll get hurt [one has already had a nasty experience with a car, fortunately before I had him].
Touch wood, [so I am superstitious after all ] so far they don't seem to be hunters and I understand they were mostly indoor cats originally.
So, to leave locked or unlocked - that is the question

The question of the flap is a tricky one. Fortunately I am set back from the road and the cats tend to stay to the rear of the house where they have access to farmland. I tried the 'in but not out' option, but as you say goldengirl they have been pursued by neighbours' cats who were then unable to get out. Together with the howling and scratching of the closed flap by one of my Bengals led me to let them do their own thing , which is usually to spend most of the night indoors.

shysal, I used to leave my catflap open all the time. If I didn't my cat was more distressed because he couldn't get out. Once he'd been out and checked the area, he used to come in and sleep on our bed all night. Like you, we sit back from the road a bit and have a long garden with a large expanse of fields beyond the garden wall. (I've just looked at your pictures! What a lovely garden - and how wonderful to have visiting badgers! Beautiful cats!

My daughter had a cat flap because she and her husband were out at work all day, but on two occasions she wished that the cat flap wasn`t there. On one occasion they came home to find that the cats had half devoured a joint of beef that was defrosting for tea. Another time, they arrived home to find that Ivan and his girlfriend were having a bit of nookie in the kitchen!

goldengirl about cat-flaps - we had a problem with a neighbours cat coming in through our cat-flap, terrorising our 2 cats and spraying everywhere! We did some research and found a cat-flap that reads the cat's microchip (I'm assuming that your cat is micro chipped) and only allows our cats to come in. It took us a couple of days to teach them how to use it but it was worthwhile. It actually did us a favour because we discovered that our male cat's microchip had either failed or fallen out - we had to get him chipped again.
Now our cats can come and go as they please.