People who let their cats outside: Please tell me how it works. How do you know when they want to come in? Do you always let them out? I want to understand bc i cant imagine letting my cats outside 🌳 🐈 🐈‍⬛️🌳 - ThreadSky

gsarafan.bsky.social • 26 days ago

People who let their cats outside: Please tell me how it works. How do you know when they want to come in? Do you always let them out?

I want to understand bc i cant imagine letting my cats outside

🌳 🐈 🐈‍⬛️🌳

Comments

earlhicks.bsky.social•26 days ago

I live in the woods and bottle-raised my buddy, so he has always gone out first thing. And knows to come back in for dinner. He'll come when called, as well, if I'm ready before he is. After a close call with a bobcat one winter evening, he seems to understand that the night life just isn't for him.

dannixbananni.bsky.social•25 days ago

We had an indoor/outdoor cat that a friend couldn't take care of anymore and our old neighbors poisoned him after we had him for a few months. Never ever again will I let a cat go outside. The rest of ours are strictly indoor.

xerimichael.bsky.social•26 days ago

Can you build a catio?

gsarafan.bsky.social•26 days ago

I want to

xerimichael.bsky.social•26 days ago

Those seem to be a good compromise. My last cat was a semi feral cat that I found outside and she needed the outdoors and thrived in it. For many cats, though, a safe space is good.

musicboxonline.bsky.social•26 days ago

Yeah I cant do that. I'd be terrified if they got out. Urban, rural, suburban... idc. Cars are bad news. Coyotes are bad news.

p-shunkallstar.bsky.social•26 days ago

I think it all depends on where a person lives & how comfortable they are with the cat being outside. A heavy traffic area would be a no for me. If it’s out in the country I’d be worried about other animals, and fleas & ticks. I’m a fan of the idea of a catio personally

sleopold.bsky.social•25 days ago

Lost cats to being hit by cars. My cats are now indoors only!

scottmik104.bsky.social•26 days ago

So, we had two inside cats for years. When Covid hit, they were both starting out the glass door and we just said fuck it and let em out. They rarely leave the yard. They know where they get fed, where their litter boxes are, and where they are safe. They always come back and rarely ever stray far

scottmik104.bsky.social•26 days ago

*staring

gsarafan.bsky.social•26 days ago

Hmm. You make a good case. I just know if I trust my cats to come back. How old were they?

scottmik104.bsky.social•26 days ago

This was like 5 years ago now. They might be like 8 and 15 currently? Close to those ages so we let the youngest out at 3ish years old. If you have a yard, they probably won’t leave it. Shake a bag of treats works well to get them back inside when it gets dark.

ritaman.bsky.social•25 days ago

My neighbors trained them to understand their space using a leash in the backyard.

elleoftengood.bsky.social•25 days ago

We just adopted 3 wild feral/kitties who we met at C.C. Park -
They have totally been ignored by the park for over 3 years and a few of us were feeding them. Grey was horribly injured and still ignored by the Park.

They are acclimating fairly well.

elleoftengood.bsky.social•25 days ago

Right now, in Kitty Kitty condo’s and learning to be around us 🙂 We have 3 indoor kitties, 2 inside outside and now these 3 🙂

gsarafan.bsky.social•25 days ago

but now you keep them inside all of the time?

elleoftengood.bsky.social•25 days ago

I apologize … I still learning how to post messages 🙏🙂

mulberrysdream.bsky.social•26 days ago

when i lived in kentucky, i had an inside / outside boy. he would spend 75-80% of his time inside. i'd let him out whenever he wanted to go out. he knew where his litter box / food / buddies were and he always came back

mulberrysdream.bsky.social•26 days ago

he'd wander occasionally but usually would be within a couple hundred feet of the property

gsarafan.bsky.social•26 days ago

Were there other houses and people around? I would be worried about cars and other cats. My cats are soft and live a life of luxury. I can't imagine they would fair well outside

mulberrysdream.bsky.social•25 days ago

there were houses and people around, yeah. but if i'd lived in a big city he probably would've been inside-only 😺

erniesdad2001.bsky.social•26 days ago

I have friends who let their cat out all the time. They call him in, and he comes running in from wherever. He doesn't go far.

sulkirk.bsky.social•26 days ago

haven’t had cats since I was a kid but they were always outside. They’d scratch at window to come in. I use to leave my bedroom window open in good weather and one of them carried a rabbit (alive) into bed bed to dispatch it but I woke and ended that slaying

silvered.bsky.social•25 days ago

There's a cat flap... They just go in and out.

silvered.bsky.social•25 days ago

Doesn't sound like an American thing, you're such a car centric country.

gsarafan.bsky.social•25 days ago

Yeah, that worries me most

funkybass13.bsky.social•25 days ago

My old cat ran the whole damn neighborhood. If we were out, she chilled on the porch or just came back later. Fantastic setup.

batted1000.bsky.social•26 days ago

Mine goes up on hind legs and scratches glass sliding door…but she is also quite dog-like in other ways

gsarafan.bsky.social•26 days ago

If you dont mind, Do you worry about her? How often does she come back? Do you think she is cheating on you with your neighbor?

ritaman.bsky.social•26 days ago

Cat door that only opens for her bc it's paired to her microchip. She usually comes in for dinner, when she doesn't we call her but like you know how it is with cats. Everything on their own time...

And yes I worry about her ALL THE TIME. But I prefer indoor/outdoor cat life and so does she.

gsarafan.bsky.social•26 days ago

I did not know that kind of door was and option. But makes sense 🤔

ritaman.bsky.social•26 days ago

We could also set the door so that it lets her in but not out so if we want to lock her in at night or control when she goes out we can.

batted1000.bsky.social•26 days ago

Just got one and definitely took some training. We set it up on a cardboard box in the house with her food in the box.

ritaman.bsky.social•26 days ago

Hee hee

batted1000.bsky.social•26 days ago

It does seem like that lately, because she isn’t coming in voraciously hungry first thing in morning. We are ok with this, but makes diet monitoring hard.

dtownbiscuits.bsky.social•26 days ago

We had a cat near us named pizza who was having affairs with every house on the block

gsarafan.bsky.social•26 days ago

There is a cst in my hood which also stops by all the houses

jmonkeycrisp.bsky.social•25 days ago

Ours have always been indoors, but we live next to a busy road and have seen a few flat cats over the years.
Ours haven't really shown much interest in going outside either.
My parents cat used to spend the majority of his time ruling the neighborhood, but it was a much quieter area.

gsarafan.bsky.social•25 days ago

my older cat really loves being on our deck but i dont let her off of it. I am scared we will never see her again. my younger cats i dont even let outside at all

sugarmaggz.bsky.social•26 days ago

I think that people who let their cats outside shouldn’t be allowed to have cats 🫣

quebeckie.bsky.social•25 days ago

This^

sugarmaggz.bsky.social•25 days ago

too much of a risk! cars, coyotes, bird flu, falls, violent people. my neighbor had a wonderful little black cat named Puma but he only lived to be three years old because one of our neighbors POISONED him?! I guess that she didn’t like that he walked through her garden? so terrible!

quebeckie.bsky.social•25 days ago

That’s fucking awful mags

sugarmaggz.bsky.social•25 days ago

I know! we miss him! his siblings always stayed inside and both of them are still alive after many years. Someday I want enough money to have cats and build them a cat patio.

quebeckie.bsky.social•25 days ago

When I lived in Vermont there was a man in our neighborhood who would leave antifreeze out to kill animals who would come into his yard. It tastes sweet to most animals. We had cats and dogs at the time that roamed freely - that stopped quickly after meeting this person.

quebeckie.bsky.social•25 days ago

The number of cats harmed by people….. no no no❌
Plus I am very pro bird and those kitties can’t help their instincts. Losing a lot of birds due to domestic kittehs

sugarmaggz.bsky.social•25 days ago

yeah!

gsarafan.bsky.social•26 days ago

I can't imagine letting my cats outside

billybaroo68.bsky.social•26 days ago

So you have a cat prison?

gsarafan.bsky.social•26 days ago

Yes. But my cats are soft. They would never survive. Well maybe one of them but I have three and don't like those odds.

phastenough.bsky.social•26 days ago

when i got my cat i wanted it to be an indoor/outdoor cat. i would let her outside when i was home. well, one day, she decided to go explore the neighbors yard and found a dog, which ran her 30ft up into a tree. well, she quickly learned that she shouldn't go beyond the fence line as she fell.

phastenough.bsky.social•26 days ago

she was ok, but that was her hard lesson. she comes back pretty easily, sometimes she's gone for 1 hour, sometimes 5 minutes, sometimes 3 hours. but she's smart enough to come back home and hop into bed with her dad.

gsarafan.bsky.social•26 days ago

Sounds nice for her. I want to let my oldest cat out. Mostly bc she is old and I don't think she can out run me. But my young ones idk if they would know to come back.

phastenough.bsky.social•26 days ago

Can you fence off a part of the yard to start? When you let them outside in that spot they know this is a safe spot. Then after like a week you can let the fence up and they will know where home is.

ladym1.bsky.social•25 days ago

kevinhamel.bsky.social•25 days ago

Kitty/doggie door. Doggie, however, will still use his amazingly piercing bark to say “I don’t wanna use the damn cat door! OPEN UP!!”

kevinhamel.bsky.social•25 days ago

The door DOES get locked at night, though. So there is sometimes a bit of ‘Fred Flintsone and the kitty” action when it’s time to lock up.

marjowil.bsky.social•25 days ago

Cats who go outside catch diseases and kill birds. No go.

mickeyprowe.bsky.social•25 days ago

Anyone thinking of letting cats outside might want to read this

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/moral-cost-of-cats-180960505/

katzenfrauen.bsky.social•25 days ago

mine just run in when a loud sound scares them 😂 I usually supervise though and they’re pretty good at coming in when I ask

stxalq.dev•25 days ago

it's a fully fenced in yard and her time is supervised. she also doesn't dig or climb her way out. if any of that was different i wouldn't let her out

i mean, we have outdoor cats and raccoons in the neighborhood that pick fights. plus on rare occasions you'll see coyotes in town

wayneclifford.bsky.social•25 days ago

Don’t forget big ass eagles and hawks!

gsarafan.bsky.social•25 days ago

Indeed

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