Cats

I’ve griped about neighbor cats before on here.

The most recently griped about cats are no longer around.  One of the two disappeared, and the owners moved (and took the remaining one with them) back September-ish (I see I never posted about that, oh well).  When that cat was gone the neighborhood cats that had been coming around to visit them stopped coming around, it was a huge relief.  In addition, though we saw a dog when those folks were moving in, we haven’t seen it since, so I’m thinking it belonged to someone who was helping them.

Then, we started seeing a new cat.  I went back and checked the trail cam photos and he showed up on the trail cams just before the one across the street moved out, though I didn’t see him in person till a few weeks later.  Black and white tuxedo.  And by gawd F.A.T. fat.  Like, can barely walk fat.  Seriously.  When I first saw him in person I thought he was injured because he was walking so weird, it wasn’t until I’d seen him a few times that I realized he wasn’t injured, he was just that fat.   And I swear he’s getting fatter and fatter.  He’s definitely not getting any thinner.  This is an owned cat, there’s no way this cat is maintaining that level of pudge on a diet of mice.  Assuming he can even catch mice, I have my doubts, he’s that fat.  I’ve seen him waddle down our yard and off our back line more than once.  No clue how he hasn’t become a meal for someone yet.  I figure it’s a matter of time.

All of which is bad enough.  But as winter set in we started seeing cat tracks not only around the carport (again), but also around and under the porch.  And the dogs suddenly REALLY wanted under the porch.  It wasn’t until I started getting a whiff of cat pee every time I opened the front door that I realized what was happening.

He (or she) had decided my concrete patio was his litter box.  A sprinkle of cayenne powder around the area just pushed him into using the driveway instead.  When the snow melted in the recent thaw we found deposits of cat poo all around the driveway.

How this cat hasn’t already become a coyote meal I have no clue, but it’s just a matter of time.  There’s no way he could run away or climb a tree fast enough to escape one.  I checked, and my local shelter accepts “stray cats” though it’ll cost me $25 to drop him off.  So I’ve borrowed a live trap, maybe if they have to pay to get their cat out of hock they’ll think twice about letting him run loose……

So back in February I posted about the asshole that is Shadow.

Since then we managed to convince Trouble that the automated feeder isn’t evil, and she’s back to eating kibble out of it.

Shadow appeared to have mostly resigned himself to the fact that he wasn’t going to be able to get at that kibble, at least not most of the time (when the batteries die he gets some, but he hasn’t quite figured out the connection yet).

I thought we had this covered.

Then I had to buy a new bag of dog kibble.

Yes, my dogs are mostly raw fed, but we do keep a bag of kibble in the house for them, partially as a backup food source, partially because Arty burns calories at a rate that has to be seen to be believed and letting him supplement with kibble was easier than trying to stuff him on raw.  His kibble ball holds not quite a cup of kibble and then we put another cup of kibble in the raised dog bowl.

Other than Trouble showing puppy Apollo who was boss, by eating his kibble infront of him, we’ve never had any of the cats so much as look twice at the dog kibble.

The bag we finished was Acana, the new bag was Fromm.  The cats are fed Fromm, its a decent brand and I can get it local without worrying about shipping, or minimum orders, or the like.

Within 24hrs of putting out the first cup of Fromm kibble Shadow was stealing kibble out of both the kibble ball and the dog bowl.

He’s big enough that he doesn’t even really have to work at it.

Arg.

Went back to the local store, picked up a bag of something different, figuring that maybe the Fromm dog kibble was enough like their cat kibble to be tempting him.

Nope.

He’s now eating a completely different brand and shape kibble too.

To the point where he’s not even eating all of his (previously beloved) cat kibble ration!

*sigh* I guess the next step is to order a bag of Acana again and see if he still eats it…..

Well “hoped” is probably the wrong term.  I LIKE cats, and I’m sure those two cats are perfectly sweet family pets.

But their life expectancy as outdoor cats is really short, and the sooner they’re gone the less I have to deal with them.  After my last post I got confirmation that not only are they intact, but someone in the neighborhood is having kittens in a couple months.  I also got confirmation that they’re spraying in/around our carport.

Then yesterday I pulled the trail camera memory cards, which I haven’t done in a couple months.

Several photos of at least one of the cats:

Which is proof of how far they’re wandering from home, since both cameras are on my back line, over 100 yards from my house.

But then I got to this video:

[videojs mp4=”http://www.scaryyankeechick.com/picture-s/videos/cat%20fox.mp4″]

Now thats a fox, not a coyote, and no, that cat isn’t as big as he looks.  But really?  There are also several photos and videos of coyotes on both cameras.  How have they not taken care of this for me yet??

So, it worked very well for the first month or so.  The batteries in the base only last about a month, but thats live-able.

The problem:  Shadow is an asshole

He is clearly not deterred by the moving lid (like Trouble was), and clearly started getting pissed about the fact that there’s kibble RIGHT THERE and I CAN’T GET IT.  So every time Trouble would go get kibble he’d hop up behind her to try to horn in and get some while she was eating.  This would cause the lid to close.  Trouble HATES the moving lid.  Trouble now refuses to eat out of it unless we’re there to guard her because Shadow keeps causing the lid to move while she’s eating.

Moving things around to force him to come up from a different direction helped some, but only some.

Haven’t quite figured out the best way to handle it from here…..

Trouble was fine with a collar, so I bought THIS feeder.  Note, prices vary, shop around.  Also, be VERY careful ordering one of these things on Amazon.  As I browsed I saw some really blatant listings for either knock-offs or fake listings of identical feeders.  Like, 7 or 8 per page.

With the lid stood open Trouble would eat from it no problem.  As soon as I added the sensor tag to her collar and turned on the feeder she clearly decided it was EVIL and had to be killed (she repeatedly swatted the moving lid).  I could wait for her to adapt to it.  Or I could play around with it.

In THIS video the guy explains how he swapped the feeder controls so that it stands open all the time and CLOSES when the tag approaches.  This would allow me to put the tag on Shadow, and not care if the moving lid freaked him out.  Note, this modifications require a soldering iron and a screw driver, but are otherwise very simple to do.  This modification would also fix the issue mentioned in the reviews where the unit sometimes loses the tag while the cat is eating resulting in the lid trying to close on the cat.

The collar is now on Shadow, who decided I was torturing him by putting this THING on him, and Trouble is back to happily eating out of the feeder.

There’s one other issue mentioned in reviews.  Some tags don’t seem to close down tight enough, with the battery in them, to actually work properly.  The tag included in my set initially seemed to have this problem.  I fixed it by removing a plastic ring gasket from inside the tag.  I assume that the tag is now no longer water resistant, but since my cats are indoor cats I can live with that.