We have a beautiful 2 year old Tonkinese cat that we are looking after for a few months, maybe keeping if all goes well. The problem is, its a roamer who seems to find itself on neighbours roofs and can't get down, goes wandering into other peoples homes and snuggles up on their beds etc...
We have already had three phonecalls to come and pick her up and somebody rang the fire brigade to get her off the roof.

When we got her, we kept her in for 2 days so she was familiar with her new home - and most days she seems to find her way back but her wandering is starting to cause a few issues around the neighbourhood.

Does butter on the paws work?

Any ideas to keep her close to home?

Sounds rather like you might have to keep her as an indoor cat IngridO, unless you go to the expense of one of those outside cat enclosures.

Last night the cat was delivered back by a neighbour - I told her to shoo it out of the house when it comes wandering rather than allowing it to snuggle on her couch.
She was worried it wouldn't find its way back - 5 doors down!

I'm pretty sure this is normal cat behaviour - isn't it?

Ingrid when we lived in Melbourne we had Zac The Cat.... We both worked, and I was the last to leave in the mornings and Zac promptly would head outside, and when hubby came home, Zac would be at the back door. We thought he was outside all day.. or so we thought.

Until one day Mr and Mrs Immaculate next door (nice retired couple with beautiful gardens) informed us, that when I left Zac would head over there and promptly after 4 when hubby was home, he would hear his car, want out and head home. Zac The Cat spent all day stuffing himself full at theirs (they were buying food for him!), sleeping on their bed, and moving to sleeping on the sofa when Mrs Immaculate watched daytime soaps.We had no idea they were feeding him, and we were feeding him breakfast and dinner. And come weekends - he would stay with us.

He had it sussed and worked out how to have the best of both worlds

We had a tabby who behaved the same as Irene's Zac. He got fatter and fatter and after about three years we realised that he was living a double life with a household across the (very busy) road and three doors down. When we moved to an adjacent suburb he ran away all the time, regularly turned up at the house across the road and eventually that household formally adopted him and we never saw him again.

IMO it can be normal, but that doesn't mean it's not highly aggravating for other people. I'd check with those (who you know) the cat is visiting and get their honest opinions. If it works for everyone, such as Irene and TPANDAV's case, then all the better - cat has lots of people to love him. Otherwise it could just start neighbourhood tension that no one needs. It'll also depend on how he gets long with other cats in the neighbourhood.

We live out of town and have 3 cats. We know 2 of them occasionally visit the house across the road - not surprising because the boy that lives here is good friends with our sons and spends a lot of time here and the cats know him. They also have 2 cats, but they don't visit us and ours don't fight with theirs. Our cats don't go inside their house, but do prowl around. They've got 100 acres so the cats all go and sniff the cows, chase the ducks, rabbits etc.

On the other hand, new neighbours moved in the next property to us last winter and their cat has been a pain in the ass. He regularly comes in our cat door at night, causing all manner of ruckus in the wee hours. He's sprayed on the shoes in the entryway, sits outside the front door howling, fights with our cats (all girls), he's even sprayed on the fireplace. We've gone through locking the cat door, but our older cat needs to go out to pee in the night and be blowed if I'm standing there at 2am waiting for her to come in.

Jenna, we had similar problems with male cats coming in the cat door and terrorising our two tortie girls. In the end we got a cat door which lets only them in (it reads the chip in the backs of their necks). I put off getting this for ages as a) they're not cheap and b) when they first came out they needed a power supply, but now they take two D batteries and I find those last more than a year. It's been a huge success and the cats are much happier now. I particularly love it for when we go away as I know that the cats aren't going to get attacked when we're not around. We used to arrive home to the house reeking of urine.

Good to know that those doors work well, Carolyn. I've debated it, but you're right, the cost is right up there. We've just spent more than that on a light sensing door system for our chicken coop as the same neighbour's dog isn't locked up at night and we've seen him around the coop at night. Can you guess how we feel about these people?

We'll see how things go over winter.. but thanks for posting, as I'd wondered how effective those doors really are. All our cats are already microchipped, so that is at least one less expense to add in!

Can you track the cat if its been microchipped? Or is that just for identification if you find the cat?

No, butter on the paws doesn't work.

In a young cat this kind of behaviour is difficult to change, cats do tend to wander, and have a large range. When we shifted here from the country we were worried about our girls but they don't leave our property here, we have a big fence around that defines their territory quite clearly and they were already quite mature when we got here (about 8 I think).

If the neighbours are having issues with cat on their property then I suggest you arm them with a water pistol and ask them to shoot the cat when they see it, eventually the cat will get the message that that is not a nice place to go and stop going there.

The oriental breeds are also quite sociable and may be looking for company, so if that seems to be the issue then either you need to keep her locked up or provide stimulation and company for her (another cat perhaps?) at home.

Yes you'd be surprised how far the little critters do wander, especially if there are no other cats in the vicinity. As I've always said, the best way to keep other peoples' cats off your property is to get your own cat! Otherwise agree with Griz that the water pistol treatment is pretty effective.

We adopted a wandering cat many years ago when we lived in Auckland. We used to find her lying on the bed in the afternoon sun on occasions and she started to spend more and more time at our place. She was very timid at first - we couldn't touch her - and our own cat was very protective of her. Turns out she was being badly treated at her own home over the back by a couple of boisterous teenage boys, so our place was obviously a safe haven. When we found out that the family was selling up and moving to Wellington we asked the people if we could keep her and they happily obliged even giving us her vet records and some food.

When we moved north, we flew the two cats up here and they spent many happy years together.

Regards,

Barbara Anne



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/12/2017 11:37PM by Barbara Anne.

Ingrid, no, alas, you can't track the cat through the microchip, it's just for identification. I wish! I've seen docos where they fit cats with cameras hanging from collars so they could track them and it was fascinating to see how far and where they went. I don't think mine go far from my property, but who knows with cats?

Friends have a GPS tracker collar on their cat - but it was very expensive and purchased overseas (cheaper than purchasing here). I think those tile trackers they fit to cars/key rings etc would work as well, and Noel L currently have packs of 4 for $120. They have a keyhole ring on them [www.noelleeming.co.nz]

Irene, the problem with using a Tile tracker (or others of that sort) is that they only work to the edge of bluetooth range, which is about 30m. After that it becomes a "community find" thing, which only works if other people near the Tile have the tile app running on their phone. If they do, the app auto updates the location of any tile it sees.

Quote

Help someone out without even lifting a finger!

It’s no secret how satisfying it is to help someone out. And Tile makes helping others effortless!

When you’re running the Tile app on your device, your app isn’t just looking for your Tiles, it’s looking for everyone’s! When you pass within range of a Tile, your app will automatically update the location of that Tile on whichever account it’s registered to.

Community find is always working; if you want to be notified when someone updates the location of your Tile, simply tap “Notify When Found” in the app.



Community Find is safe and anonymous.

You won’t be able to see where other people’s Tiles are, and they won’t be able to see yours either!

Location updates are automatic and anonymous, so it’s completely secure.

Thanks Jenna. I didn't know much about the tile trackers, and haven't really researched them either, as have no need of one. If it's only 30m that's a waste of money isn't it.

Back tot he collar that our friends had, I know that worked well but as I said it was extremely expensive - but purchased about 3 or 4 years ago now?

There are many devices used for keeping track of people with autism and alzheimer's that could be adapted for pets.

[www.friendshipcircle.org]

interesting topic

i have two cats