Anyone any suggestions please for a deterrent that really keeps cats at bay?
We have a feral cat that has taken a liking to the lawn immediately in front of the terrace and tonnelle where our guests in our gite eat.
The cat comes across the maize field at night and then marks around the bushes on the lawn. The smell lingers throughout the day.
Needless to say it’s not a great environment in which to be having a morning coffee or barbequing and sitting enjoying a meal.
Every evening I have been using the stuff in spray bottles that I can buy in supermarkets - spraying around all access points onto the lawn itself and around the bushes. But it doesn’t seem to make any difference.
Any ideas please for something that will actually work? Thanks
We have battery operated zappers, which emit whatever… which deters whatever is detected. Haven’t needed to replace the batteries for a few years, as the local cats got the message after a few weeks.
However, I’ve seen a newcomer strolling along our low wall and eye-ing up the gravel as a possible toilet spot… so OH will be putting batteries into at least one zapper, maybe two.
Incidentally, we cover the magic-eye thingy in the morning and uncover it at night (when they had batteries in 'em that is).
It was only ever cats which were deterred. Hedghogs, toads and all manner of small critters roam happily…
thinking about it… it was strange that our neighbour’s cat never fouled our terrace… it was always visitors who left us unwelcome presents… “Mimi” was always in or around our house… and we enjoyed one another’s company from the very first day we moved in.
Thanks everyone for your suggestions.
The cat is probably semi-feral and without doubt it’s what’s marking our lawn. Cat pee smell is very distinctive.
The people at the top of our farm track are probably feeding it. It is very wild though - vanishes into the corn whenever it sees us, but at the same time comes down the field to our garden. I suspect our organic land is good hunting ground for it.
Do you know what these zappers are doing @Stella? We have two dogs and if they are emitting a high pitched sound above human hearing that would cause them distress.
If you haven’t actually seen it on your property then you need to id it and a trail camera, which is activated by movement and produces short videos day or night, will do that. That is how I identified my rat night marauder and confirmed that it wasn’t a mouse.
As to how to deter it I can only think of dogs, which of course you already have.
I hate (male) cat smell. A neighbour’s cat marks our front door which is awful.
We wash it down regularly, but damn animal keeps returning, The most success we’ve had is with scattering chopped lemon and orange peel either side of the door. While it’s there and fresh it seems to deter him. But the second we forget to renew it, or have run out of citrus fruit, he is back. Despite our dog on the other side of the door!
Yup, we have a serious cat chaser who patrols our terrain assiduously during the day, but unfortunately believes it’s ok to curl up and sleep at night.
I’ll try the oranges/lemons - not least they smell nice.
We have four cats which look pretty wild. One in particular enjoys turning our security lights on and off. We watch him chasing the crickets at night. One seems to have peed on our utility door. We put a bowl of vinegar on the doorway which seems to work. We are going to buy a couple of ‘zappers’ but not sure which ones to get
These are used at the back of our house (mostly overnight), so no dogs are troubled… as proved by a neighbour’s dog who loves to visit, barks at the front door (calling us to come out and play) and proceeds to play with us on the front terrace… little scamp, absolutely adorable.
However, due to the amount of mess we find at the front, from one particular large dog who lives at the far end of the village…I’m seriously thinking of moving one zapper just a little, so it might echo off the buildings and deter that monster. His owner lets him run free all the time… I have mentioned that I’ve seen him “doing it” and would she please NOT let him out unleashed (as per the local byelaw) but she ignores me and others who similarly suffer from the huge unwanted presents.
Let’s be clear… I don’t want to distress any animals… but this poo all over the place is not acceptable.
If it works on that dog as it works on the cats, we’d only need to use it for a few weeks… just long enough to “break the habit” into which they fall so easily…
Anyway, OH has replaced the wornout batteries in 2 zappers and I’ll use them as and when (obviously as little as possible) they are only on when we are away from home or overnight.
We had a problem with a big dog leaving huge piles on our lawn a while back. I bought 2 of these and also sprinkled Jeyes fluid as recommended by some here across the end of our garden where it was entering. I’m not sure which option solved the issue, but no more faeces has appeared since.
Don’t cats tend to defaecate away from their places of eating - how about leaving food out to see if the beastie will eat with you and deposit elsewhere?
FWIW our repellers don’t seem to bother next doors dog, which would be in range in their garden.
I found doggy poo deposits on my grass outside my workshop, fronting onto the road, and I suspected a neighbour who takes his dog for regular walks, and who I nod to now and again. On bin day I took my black plastic bag to the wheely bin outside the workshop and saw a tiny black plastic sack tied up tightly at the bottom of the bin. Had no idea what it was until I opened it….it was a doggy poo-bag. Cheeky neighbour!
I think it is difficult to find a deterrent that works because cats differ - some might be repelled and others not. In the same way, some cats are attracted by slug pellets, eat them and die, while others won’t touch them.
All I can say is the zapper worked for us… Mimi (next door’s cat) had the run of our house throughout the years it was empty… and carried on that habit after we moved in… but she never soiled here… no idea where she went and never thought about it even… until more folk moved to the village bringing many cats with them.
For some reason we soon had all sorts/colours/sizes of cat … enjoying themselves on our terraces, but when they started half-burying poo-stuff in the gravel… that was IT.
A few weeks of zapping and they left, never to return but Mimi continued to visit us and we made a great fuss of her.
Jock is our doggie best-friend…
I have no love of pets generally, although I’d never wish to see them hurt. But it seems to me that ‘making friends’ at a low cost would be a relative bargain if it stopped the fouling.
