"She's an indoor kitty..."

Yeah same, my cat would bolt (and has tried to) when Ive let her out back. THough I'm sure she'd not go far, I'm too concerned to try. Also, our new house is raised up and looks like a determined cat could squeeze under there... and then get stuck, knowing my idiot cat. And she'd get into biffo with a possum.

i can totally understand keeping your cat indoors if you live in an urban area. my family has 3 cats, all of which are allowed outside as they please (this is the suburbs) and they come back just fine - your cat will come back if it likes you. my one cat is pretty badass and likes hunting a lot so we won't see her for days at a time sometimes but we know she's fine

keeping it inside if you live in a safe, suburban community is fuckin cruel tho

my friend tried this.
went well for about 2 weeks until his neighbour asked him to come out and clean his cat up off the street.

keeping it inside if you live in a safe, suburban community is fuckin cruel tho

oh fuck you!

we've had our cat in the house for 12 years now and she's fine.

and yeah letting your cat outdoors is great until they come back with some disease or get run over. which happened to our previous cats and it's why my family has kept our other cats indoor.

i mean, just fuck this whole "keeping them indoors is cruel because they can't unleash their inner jungle beast and be happy" romantic bullshit.

i mean, not that i''m saying it's bad to let them outside or anything, just, i just really, really resent the insinuation that i'm being cruel to my kitty, who has overall been a pretty healthy, outgoing, very sweet and happy cat.

it's not like they're orcas or wildebeest. they're cats!

declawing is some bullshit though.

Anyway, I'll bow out before I embarrass myself further.

Remember to spay and neuter your pets!

i had both inside and outside cats growing up. The inside ones seemed pretty well adjusted, it was the outside dudes that would get themselves fucked up someway or another.

I wanna apologize to k3vin k. upthread. Even though I disagree with his post that was a dumb thing for me to blow up over.

the claws really came out there.

The shelter we adopted our cats from made us sign a legal agreement that the cats would be indoor only. Is this common these days? To be honest, the heavy four lane traffic on our street directly outside would probably mean that our cats would be run over within a day.

Declawing cats is illegal in the UK.

There is a big US/UK divide on the issue of indoor cats. Our 2 cats are pretty much indoors, we let them out into the backyard occasionally when it's a nice day, but one doesn't really like to go any further than the steps outside the back door.

When we wanted to get our 2nd cat we tried to get a rescue cat from various shelters and they wouldn't let us have one because (at the time) we lived in a flat and didn't have a garden - they would rather put a cat down than have it be an indoor cat, which I thought was pretty stupid, but there you go. We had to buy a kitten from an online ad instead.

I had a declawed kitty once, the beautiful and elegant Mephistopheles. She came that way, however (she also came with the name of "Fluffy," two strikes against her former owner). At the same time, we had a bitchy, obese, but elegant orange cat, John Conner. John Conner had all of his claws and a proclivity for honky-tonkin' all summer long. No matter how well we secured the house, he'd be bitching outside the door the next morning, whining for food. I felt bad for poor young Meph, whose lack of claws meant she could never go find midnight poetry readings in the big kitty outdoors.

John Conner the cat!

My roommate is watching his parents ancient, arthritic doggie for two weeks. My cats reaction to this dogs arrival was a bit troubling. First he ran out back & hid in the weeds, and then when the dog walked towards him he jumped to the top of the fence (chain link fence covered in vines.) If he had hopped down to the other side of the fence, he may have gotten stuck in the neighbors yard or run away, or any other scary possibility. What does a man do? I just moved into this place abt three weeks ago, and Ivan has been very good about not trying to escape the backyard, but seeing him on the top of the fence made me nervous.

Also, I just moved his litter box to the backyard (under the roof) for the next few weeks while the dog is here. His box was in the basement, but we have to keep the basement door closed so the dog doesn't fall down the stairs and break itself. Is it possible that he will feel like I am rejecting him by moving his box? The other option was to keep the box in my bedroom. I was doing that for the first week or so of living here but moved it to the basement when I made the realization that I was never ever going to get laid if I had a litter box in my bedroom.

Despite the poison that the city puts out, there are still rats in our alleys bigger than our cats, so even if it weren't for the traffic and the high probability of some hateful abusive jerk hurting my very friendly cats, I would neverevereverever let them outside.

I've thought about getting a harness and taking them into the courtyard, but our eldest is a total bitch about any kind of restraint, by which I mean she will turn from being the sweetest and most even tempered animal ever to a murderous, blood thirsty fiend when I try to put a collar on her or put her in a carrier or remove her from the bathroom or push her off the coffee table, and our youngest is terrified of sudden movements, loud noises, strangers, bugs, or change of any kind, so I just think it would be folly to even try.

Indoor kitties, the both.

San Francisco wants to ban de-clawing

When we wanted to get our 2nd cat we tried to get a rescue cat from various shelters and they wouldn't let us have one because (at the time) we lived in a flat and didn't have a garden - they would rather put a cat down than have it be an indoor cat, which I thought was pretty stupid, but there you go. We had to buy a kitten from an online ad instead.

Are you in the UK? Because friends of mine got two kittens from a rescue shelter and they were told they weren't allowed to have them if they were going to make them outside cats because they there is a busy road directly outside their front door.

both of the people i got my cats from, and every vet i've taken them to, have warned me against letting them outside. not that i would anyway. i had 3 cats growing up - and 2 out of 3 of them met a violent death before they lived 6 years. one from a car, the other from FIV. and both happened in the suburbs. the third has been an indoor cat for the past two years, and nearly died twice - once from eating some kind of poison shit, and once from having a garage door closed on him.

current cats are very happpy and exhibit very little desire to go outside (they get nutty when there are a lot of birds hanging around). i live in SF by a busy street, and would freak out if they escaped. OP of this thread really comes off like a pious dick. i hope his gf's cat is still ok.

actually i forgot about our first cat, who also got smashed by a car. so that's 3 out of 4. :(

once my boyfriend got home and the cat was sitting on the front stoop in brooklyn

The last of my childhood pets alive was the first we kept indoors, and she's now coming into 12-13 years old without ever having to see the vet for being sick. All the previous outdoor cats were lost to disease or disappearance.

She (and my two current cats) have never exhibited any desire to go outside. Spike got out one time and spent a couple of hours on my apartment porch. Then promptly cried to come inside.

i finally live in a place where i could theoretically let my cat out but as she's gone ten years inside it's prob not a good idea to start

oh haha also... the other day... i was in the back and she started mewing like crazy like when she finds one of my socks on the floor. i ignored it but finally went to the front and i had accidentally left the door open (which i NEVER do for fear of her taking off)... but she was just sitting in the doorway looking at the street with a worried look on her face.

Where we live now has really deep window ledges and I'll open the windows over the fire escape balcony to let the boys amuse themselves outside. The city birds just torment the cats - seagulls swoop past right over their heads, crows dive bomb them, and this cheeky flock of english sparrows would sit on the railing of the fire escape and chitter at them for long frustrating minutes. They've survived with FeLV for 10 years this month, though Morrie is really creaky and decrepit now. Also bad tempered - he charged after a houseguest on Saturday, claws out and hissing, snagged her pants leg but didn't scratch her fortunately. I've never seen him in such a murderous rage. And what had she done to deserve this? Only opened 1 of the 2 windows, apparently. And then had the temerity to look him in the eye.

sounds fair in cat terms

I got them a roomba - it's great to watch Morrie stalk it. Drac keeps trying to stare it down as it comes straight at him.

Haha I wanna get one of those for my cat to freak out at :D

Are you in the UK? Because friends of mine got two kittens from a rescue shelter and they were told they weren't allowed to have them if they were going to make them outside cats because they there is a busy road directly outside their front door.

Yeah, in London. We tried a few different places and they all said the same thing - no indoor cats for you.

ITT America gets touchy about how weak and complacent its cats are

Cosmo & Bob are indoor cats.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2611/3894263526_224bc84575.jpg

We researched breeds that were suited to being kept indoors pretty thoroughly before we got them, though; we're on the 2nd & 3rd floor of a building near a main road, with only a small communal yard at the back - we couldn't let a cat out, and it'd be cruel to keep a moggy in.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3580/3564087426_de7ca866d9.jpg

The breeders we got them from were both very keen to check that we weren't going to let them out, actually; the second breeder had a pen built into her (extensive) garden that was 'fed' via a tunnel over their garage from the house, meaning that her ragdolls COULD get out into the outdoors, but couldn't roam free. As a breed they've got no territoriality and very little instinct for self-preservation, so they'd get lost / run over / beaten up very quickly.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3474/3370560312_8afed08a3b.jpg

It's fair to say that we go to pretty extreme lengths to keep them happy.

Took me five minutes to find the cat face in that first picture, and I'm still not sure what's going on in the rest of it. It's freaking me out a little bit.

Split it right down the middle; Cosmo's on the left, Bob on the right - they're curled up together, and Cosmo's frontleft paw is outstretched towards the camera. Bob's face is hidden under Cosmo's frontright paw-elbow.

OHHH ok I see.

Thank you. Really. :)

Our neighbor's cat was hit by a car a few weeks back and we found her next to our house around 10 pm. She was in rough shape, but probably could have made it with some surgery and some care. They are poor and couldn't afford surgery and also couldn't even afford to take her to the emergency vet to have her put down quickly. So they waited for hours for animal control to come put her down (apparently, there is only one animal control officer who works night shifts in all of Baltimore County).

Basically, don't have a pet if you can't afford to care for it, but especially don't have an outdoor pet if you can't afford to care for it. :' (

That's awfully sad.

Every time I see a cat dart across a major street (especially without a collar) my first instinct is to follow it and pick it up and bring it home and feed it and get it out of the fucking street. Even if it belongs to someone. When you live somewhere with a density of 23,000 people per square mile, don't let your cat out. You idiot.

When you live somewhere with a density of 23,000 people per square mile, don't let your cat out. You idiot.

ts: cat used to going outdoors and aware of phenomenon of 'main road' vs. indoor cat that accidentally gets out and has no idea how to function in big wide world

i get that you've had bad experiences or whatever but, uh, not every outdoor-going cat dies of cars or contagions or coyotes? I mean, sometimes they also die of kitty leukemia.

It's pretty much an accepted fact that if a cat goes outside a house it will be dead within four minutes.

Some will, probably. Depends on how well they know what they're doing. The longer you keep a cat in the house, the more you should not let it out.

My cat is a mean bitch with a well-developed defense mechanism against, say, innocent guests. (Sorry, innocent guests.) But I don't think she's ever seen a car driving on a road. For all I know, she would try to pick a fight with it. Cats are not too bright, they're honestly not.

I think your cat is honestly not very bright.

I think most cats are generally capable of discerning that they are unlikely to win a fight against this big thing coming toward it quickly, and therefore the best plan is to scamper out of the way. Not always, of course.

I'm not saying that anyone whose cat is outside is a bad person. I grew up with cats that were indoor/outdoor, and some just outdoor. We lived in the country. However, living in the middle of a damn metropolis and deciding that this is a great place to have an outside cat, because cats are all smart and shit and can care of themselves... this is reckless. This displays far too much faith in a kitty's little walnut brain, and, if I may be so bold, something of a lack of regard for what becomes of said kitty. Particularly when kitty will be just fine inside, all the time, forever. Walnut brain.

(That last fragment was meant to re-emphasize that this is not an advanced animal. Not to imply that N1ck has a walnut brain.)

Eh, I've been accused of worse. In all honesty, I think there can be no general rule for this. My cat has lived his entire life with free reign of the outdoors, with my house backing onto fields and opening onto a pretty busy road. I used to worry like mad about him escaping out the front door but then I'd get home from school and he'd've come round the side of the house, sitting in the front garden wearing this "s'up homes" expression. Nothing I could do about it, but he's still alive so clearly at least a bit streetwise.

He could never be an indoor cat but unless they're scratching like crazy at doors or mournfully gazing out the window you are not being cruel by keeping them inside.