Monday October 18, 2004

Cats in the garden...

I have today had the pleasure of clearing up after someone else's cat. The owner will not be aware of it and will at this minute be enjoying the animals company. I would ask the owner to be a bit more careful what they are feeding their cat. Clearly this animal is suffering from some kind of intestinal problems. I have been retrieving the evidence from my soil in my garden but I am now undergoing the pleasure of having to extract the same evidence from my grass and today from a heather plant. If you do not realise it is there it is a unpleasant experience when you find it I can tell you.

The RHS magazine The Garden has said in a recent magazine that certain cats are not fazed by any attempts to remove them from the garden. They also discuss several ways of getting around the problem.

So what have I done about it ? I have tried;

Audio devices that emit sounds that cats do not appreciate. With a reasonable sized garden I would need a lot of these to give me decent coverage but I do not have the evidence these work anyway.

Various smelling substances. I have used various types of powder, gel all that do not have any effect. Of course they do end up need replemishing after any rain. A feature of the UK climate .

Sticks of various sizes including cocktails sticks in the ground.

Netting. This does work and in the winter when there are large amounts of bare soil in my garden I usually end up covering these areas with plastic netting. It looks horrible but does the job..

My wife got lucky one day and managed to spray a cat with a hose and scored a direct hit. I fear many more pot shots at this cat would be needed to put it off for good.

What I have not done...

Physically harmed any cat or owner. Purchased lion dung which is meant to put cats off. Getting your own cat is meant to help. But I am not inflicting what I detest on someone else. I have also not resorted to getting a predator animal like a rottweiller dog.

So any ideas folks ?