Cat now living elsewhere

You do not own a cat - the cat owns you - I speak from experience as the sister of a dedicated cat owner. If your cat does not want to stay with you then there is nothing you can - or should - do. Cats are independent creatures and choose where they want to live. You cannot force a cat to stay with you - ownership be damned! I do wonder why people who are out at work all day long bother getting a pet - cats and dogs both need socialisation and if you cannot provide this then don't bother bringing a pet into your household. I hear a lot of entitlement - ooh so and so shouldn't let my cat in, feed my cat etc etc. If your cat was totally happy at home then it would not be going elsewhere for companionship and food.

Cats like to be ignored. Suits their feelings of royalty. If they want something, they will come to you. A quiet voice does wonders.

I’m a dog person! However have also had 3 beautiful cats in my life. First one Sammy arrived at our house when I was very young. A large ginger tabby. He just stayed until he was very old and moved house with us. Second one also ginger but half Siamese when I was in a flat in London. We had mice! He was a real ‘gentleman’ used to catch them but let them go. Very loving and was the most amazing cat ever. Used to travel home with me on the train and in car and moved house several times. Saw the birth of of two children with no problems apart from a bit of jealousy and was the best cat ever. Third one unfortunately was a beautiful tortoiseshell cat who wasn’t with us very long she disappeared while young.

I totally understand how frustrated some cat owners are when other people feed them. In on the other hand am on the other side of the fence. Our neighbours have 3 young children and go through "fads". First it was guinea pigs, which lasted 2 weeks before they escaped never to be seen again. Then it was chickens. The first two died of lice infestation, the next two were killed by the foxes they couldn't be bothered to shut them away at night. Then they had a fig from the RSPCA which is NEVER walked, and left for up to 9 hours a day on it's own (before cov7d). Finally they had a kitten which was apparently going to be a house cat. That lasted 2 weeks before she was turned out. She is semi long haired and so full of knots it was pulling her skin tight. They asked me to feed her when they went away for 3 weeks, (didn't leave any food) and then she wouldn't go back . I've tried to ignore her but she sits outside the patio door crying. They are vile people who dont treat their children any better. I no longer doesk to them , so this lastyear when they went away they left a bowl of biscuits on their yard for her.. Nowhere to shelter . She now lives in my summer house, but occasionally they catch her and keep her on fir a day or two. It's horrible, I wish they would just look after her .

I had a young (neutered) male cat to keep my dog company who was pining her puppies. Dog and cat got on really well, cat always grooming the dog.

A year later we got a kitten, and my original cat made it his business to teach her all he knew. Pouncing, stalking, grooming, play-fighting. It was lovely to watch.

However, kitten became a young adult and finally spurned his attention.

Then he went missing!

Long story, short (or is it too late to say that now?!) I finally located him at a neighbours - where he was teaching her two kittens how to behave!

He never came back to me, but the two kittens, even as adults, treated him more kindly than my she-cat.

Neighbours asked if they could adopt him, and some years later took him with them when they retired to the coast.

He was obviously born to be a nanny!

I am a cat person and alsovwork for a animal rescue. Cats will not stay with you if they are not happy or are stressed. I found your post a bit strange, and couldn't quite understand the bit about the cats being on the roof! Also cats are not capable of sneering, they have very few facial muscles so give the impression wrongly of being aloof. They are actually very loving and loyal and far more intelligent than dogs. I love dogs too btw. I thinkvyour daughter will have to accept that this cat does not want to live with her for reasons only known to the cat ?

We had a neighbour's cat adopt us. It was most embarrassing having to take him back all the time. We weren't feeding him; but if the weather was fine and the windows open, he would come over and pinch our existing cat's food if it had been left out unfinished. Eventually, all the humans involved decided to let him make up his own mind where he wanted to be.
It has not ruined a good friendship.

Ha ha ...dont you just love cats ........we had three over the years arrive at our house and decide to stay ....no chips on them ....one had three kittens just after she came in through the cat flap ...found her asleep on a chair in the consevatory ......we had her spayed and she stayed ............one other was a kitten from the cat who lived opposite ....every day she used to bring herself and two kittens over the road to ours for food and a sleep on a comfy chair (the neighbour was lovely, but she had three small children, so we think the cat was escaping ! She never tried to stay, but the kitten did .......then we acquired one from the vet when we took one of the others ....it was sitting in a cage on the counter looking for a home ......that was alongside the cat my late husband transported years ago, when his first wife died, from London to Menorca, then twice when we moved areas in France. He lived till he was around 23 ............its like 'Six Dinner Sid' (a children's book about a cat who went visiting six people in the road each giving him dinner !

Gill33

She’s definitely not pregnant as my daughter managed to get her spayed after the kittens were born ! It just seems a bit sad she’s so overweight but there’s nothing we can do about it.

Cat has already been spayed.

My area of approx 100 houses has a cat that visits just about everyone. Very tempting to feed him but I don't as I think if everyone did that he would be massive. If your DD hasn't had the cat spayed since the litter of kittens and has been wandering could be it is pregnant again. Capture it, get it spayed and it will be more inclined to stay home at least that's the theory. Apparently the UK is polluted with cats. And that's from a cat lover.

The very reason I wouldn’t have a cat - like having a stroppy teenager, just coming and going as they please.

Came back to say that we were happy to "share" our cat with her adopted "owners". Both were elderly widowed ladies who enjoyed her company, one was convinced the cat was a reincarnation of her dear deperted hubby as she would make a beeline for his favourite chair!

We had a cat years ago who.decided to.get adopted elsewhere. We think it was because we were all out all.day and the house he chose was full of people. We did all.we could to.entice him back but nothing doing. Cats, as any fule kno, have a mind of their own. So.we got two replacement cats so.they could keep.each other company, same litter obviously. We are on.our second pair now, they are 86.

We got a kitten once. One time at it got out and wandered to a neighbours house. As they didn’t have a cat themselves they opened a tin of red salmon. I didn’t see kitten again for a few days. Finally it decided it liked red salmon best of all and left us for good. They loved dear little thing so was happy to leave it there. It’s a devils job to get a kitten these days I find.

We had a cat who would sneak into next door and eat the dogs food even though she hated the dogs and the neighbour would chase her away so when we relocated abroad and were worried about quarantine and if she would settle we agreed with next door that we would stop feeding her and they would let her eat there and we left her behind and she was very happy.
4 years later we returned for a quick visit and as soon as we arrived she turned up to say hello. Lived until she was 18, we still talk about her.

A lot of these stories remind me of a lovely book called Six Dinner Sid...

I would never encourage someone else’s cat to move home. Unless I was absolutely sure something was a stray I wouldn’t dream of feeding it.

We had a blue Burmese kitten some years ago. A neighbour who likes to think she is some kind of cat whisperer kept letting her into her house and feeding her, claiming our kitten loved her best. After a lot of wrangling I eventually told this damn woman that OK, she could keep the cat if she paid me the £400 that the kitten had cost. She never let her in again, amazingly! (We still have the "kitten". She's 14 now)

A large black cat arrived on our road and was taken in by an animal lover, he stayed in her shed as he didn’t like her dogs and cats. As winter approached a young couple on the road rehomed him but he wasn’t the cuddle cat they envisaged. He used to come round and enjoyed the company of my young sons, the couple asked if we’d have him as they were getting kittens. 2 years later another cat started coming and loved the fuss from my sons and the existing pet, who hated any other cats, tolerated him. We’d take him home or his owner would come and get him but he’d be straight out the cat flap and back. His owner said her other 4 cats bullied him and she was at work 9 hours a day so would we have him as he obviously needed more attention. Both cats visited several homes on the road but always came home after a few hours. They were inseparable, gave us a lot of love and pleasure and died within weeks of each other, both aged 17+. I think the reality is cats choose where they want to live. Someone once told me ‘you don’t own a cat-they own you’

We had a cat who was quite happy with us until an elderly neighbour catnapped him. This irritating man loved cats but liked to spend weeks away with his family, so he decided to have ours when it suited him. Definitely fed him huge amounts, even renamed him Tom. The cat, once in, had no cat flap, so he was a fairly willing prisoner. However the cat used to sit in his bay window so we would go over and demand his return...when we went away, and neighbours fed our cats, the two ladies went over and put the fear of god into the kidnapper, so he stopped, for a while...

Jillybird you are right it was “6 Dinner Sid.” Long time ago since I read it. Lovely story.

Not nice though if someone is enticing your cat away on purpose. In the book it is cunning Sid who gets extra food.

There are cats who take a dislike to their home and find a new one.

There is nothing you can do about it - if she won't come home, then she won't.

In the natural course of events, a mother cat will chase some or all of her kittens away when they are old enough to fend for themselves.

This may mean that as your daughter decided to keep the kittens Mummy Cat has moved to get awsy from them.

I believe it is actually against the law to feed somebody else's cat and encourage them to leave home. Of course, proving it is something else.
It does rather sound like it is a combination of things that is causing the cat to up sticks. Many cats are solitary, territorial creatures who don't ever get used to other cats in the house even if they are their offspring. Combine that with a solitary home with food on tap and it must be very attractive to the cat! If your daughter gets the chance, she could get a Feliway plug-in which might make her home more attractive to the mother cat. You can also get a cat tracker so you can immediately collect the cat before it makes itself comfortable in the neighbour's house!
My advice to anybody who starts to lose the cat to another household is to immediately make it clear that whilst you prefer to handle things amicably, you will consider any feeding or handling of your cat as enticement so you will act accordingly within the law.
However, you can't stop a cat entering an open window. My neighbour regularly woke up with a sleeping cat on her bed even though our cat had a comfortable place on mine. We had bought a dog (which wasn't allowed upstairs) and the cat took umbrage. Ironically, next door had a dog too!
I love the idea of a sneering cat!!!

Dogs are more loyal because the owners supply their food, cats can hunt their own so are not reliant on their owners.

When my children were young We lived in a flat in London so I used used to spend the school holidays with them in our caravan in Kent while my husband stayed at home. We had two cats we took to the caravan but one got very nervous so we left her with my husband. Then my husband said she hadn’t come home all week. When I returned home after the holidays I went into our local corner shop and in walked Tibby. A customer said it was her cat that she adopted when it walked in a couple of weeks previously. I explained that it was my missing cat. Tibby followed me home which proved whose cat she was.