Butter a cat's paws and it will always come home. True or False?

When we got our rescue kitten from the RSPCA we weren't told to butter her paws but we were told to keep her indoors for 6 weeks. I had thought 2 would be enough but we did as we were told and she has not strayed.

We have had many cats over the years and My Mum always buttered their paws so I have followed suit. It has always seemed to work.

I think it's thought that because they wash their paws immediately, it settles them and as they like the taste it encourages them to stay in the hope of more!

We have always had cats and that's going back 41 years since marriage. At first we moved loads, Navy married quarters. Our first cat Davy moved with us a total of 8 times, the others not as often. We have never buttered a cats paws. Kept them inside for a good number of days yes, then let them out before they have eaten. Never yet had one go missing. (Fingers crossed as I write that).

I have heard this but have never tried it.
When I worked at a vets our advice was to keep them in 4-6 wks. This was also the advice from CPL for our current and previous cat. Neither of them have ever gone far and have never been out more than 1/2 hr at a time.

Our present cats dislike butter, so it wouldn't help. I think the idea was that if you treated the cat to something it didn't usually get, when you moved it would hang around, hoping for more.

We moved from a flat on board our boat with to 7 year old cats and only let them on shore on leads for the 2 years we were away.

Moved into our new house a year ago and kept the cats in for a fortnight to give them time to explore the house, then took the one out on his lead to inspect the garden. The other ran and hid indoors when he saw the lead, so I didn't force him out. First time out, the bolder brother only kept where he could see the house, even with me on the end of the lead, then went back inside rather than risk the far end of the garden. Kept up the walks with me on the lead for a fortnight or so, then took the cats out without the lead, but stayed with them.

After a further month they were happy in the garden, and to my trepidation ventured onto the road and into the neighbours' gardens. Fortunately we are in a village where plenty of neighbours have cats, so we leave the cats to sort out who goes into whose garden themselves.

Both cats go out in summer for hours at a time, climb trees, hunt, and tease the neighbouring dogs.

I think the point is to make sure they know where they live before letting them out.

I am [shocked] amazed at the threads which start with what is clearly an old wives' tale. Like the one about not bringing the pram into the house before the baby is born which ran for PAGES when there is clearly no medical foundation nowadays for such a superstition .
In the same way my late Mum would probably have nodded her head wisely at this, but stop, think, what logical reason is there? And if the cat did come straight back into the house, think of the mess on the carpets!! It might even be cruel to cats who would presumably lick the butter off with predictable results ! ?
We are mature adults, not OLD WIVES surely we know better?

When we moved north my two cats were shut in the conservatory while we settled in. The ginger one was quite happy but the black one made such a fuss that we just opened the door and let them explore. They never once strayed in 12 years. Another time, just after I got married we transferred my cats to my then husband's compound. Orlando, the marmalade cat, stayed put but Stevenson, the grey one, decided to explore and we thought he had gone for good, but about four days later, he turned up, looking for his dinner. As this was East Africa, I was sure he had encountered a pack of rabid dogs, but there he was, as good as new. I have never wasted butter on my cats' paws!

It works!

Yes we definitely did this for our cats when I was a child and it worked. So an old Wives tale for some but not for others.

Completely false! That old wives' tale was because it was thought that a cat would spend so much time licking the butter off its paws, it wouldn't have time to wander off. I've had cats for 40 years, and one once went missing for 5 days - she turned up one morning, never went off again.

My one grandmother maintained you could catch a hen by pouring salt on its tail. Remember the salt boxes with the picture of the child pouring salt on the hen?

I was nearly grown up before I realised that grannie was talking with her tongue in her cheek.

After all, if you are near enough to the hen to pour salt on it, you are near enough to grab it.

My great grandparents lived in the London Docklands in the early part of the 1900s. They had a cat that would regularly disappear for weeks on end and then calmly stroll back in as if it had just been for a walk up the street. After a while, my great-granddad who worked in the docks realised that when a certain ship was in, the cat was at home with them. When the ship went, the cat disappeared. It transpired that the cat spent it’s shore leave with them and then went aboard to be the ship’s cat for the duration of the voyage. They said they could tell when the ship was due to sail as the cat would disappear. How it knew the ship was going was a complete mystery to them.

It has to be said carlswans that you can't know if it worked as the cat may have stayed anyway, butter or no butter.
Anyone that really understands cat mentality would know that if a cat wants to stay it will. If it doesn't, it won't.

I've lost cats before. Two after years of living in a house.

I only have house cats now.

I was about 3 years old in 1944 and the family story handed down accused me of putting the whole week's butter ration all over the new kitten after I had seen my Mum buttering it's paws

When I was a child we moved house and our cat kept going back yo the ole house. We buttered her paws and she never did it again. On the subject of cats I’m so upset to hear that Bob the cat has died just when they’d Bradenton a new film about him. I assumed he’d died suddenly of an illness but it said in the paper today that he escaped from the house and he was run over. That’s why I’ll never have another cat as I started to get terrified whenever they were out.

I'd like to see anyone try to put butter on my cat's paws - I have to have her sedated just to have her claws clipped!! I've had cats for nearly 40 years and have never put butter on their feet - the mess would be horrendous! When we've had new ones (usually strays who stay anyway) I've kept them inside for a couple of weeks which seems to have worked.

Haha Willow500, same here. Trying to give my female cat a pill is a fate worse than death. The lovely, friendly, cuddly fluff ball turns into a bag of nails and claws at the suggestion of a pill. As did my previous female cat. The boys have always been easily pilled. Just the females that are vicious.