How to Stop Cats entering Garden Without being harmful

PowerHouseDan

I am after buying a House and obviously the previous owner feed the cats or something, And there are Fouling all over the Garden etc, whats the best way of preventing them entering the Garden, I heard they Hate Citrus smell.

mikemac

I see many people putting out plastic bottles of water. Could be some sort of urban myth and realy I've no idea how it works
But it's popular

PowerHouseDan

I heard the Water was for Dogs?

Maggie.23

I heard that they see their reflection in the water bottles and they think it's another cat and they leave -- like mikemac said, could be a myth.

phelixoflaherty

Any reflective stuff. Now you have a perfect use for all the free CDs from the newspapers.

The Sweeper

This has been done repeatedly on the gardening forum. The upshot is that different things work for different cats, but the application of citrus scent is difficult to keep up in the Irish rain, as is any topical substance like pepper dust, and bottles and other things similar to them won't discourage bolder cats at all.

Chicken wire laid down under a layer of bark mulch chippings seems to work very well to protect your beds, because they can't dig into it, and the other option is a sonar device - ask your local garden centre about noise-emitting devices to keep cats away. The noisy device will probably be expensive, but you could spend quite a few quid on citrus sprays and pepper dust and chicken wire and other solutions only to find they don't work.

Other options include getting a dog (possibly not practical!) and asking your neighbours to keep their cats either indoors or in a restricted outdoor area because their animal persists on crapping in your garden.

Last suggestion is to make them a cat litter patch so they leave the rest of your garden alone - gardeners take similar 'sacrificial' methods with plants (e.g. planting one thing so the snails and slugs and rabbits will eat it and leave your other plants alone), but frankly unless you get that *just right* they'll ignore it, leaving you with a garden full of cat crap and an unused litter corner.

(As a cat owner, I can tell you that if my guys wanted to crap in someone else's garden, nothing short of either a large dog or some horrible sound would stop them. You'd most likely look out your window to find them sitting on your water bottle, flicking your citrus peel up into the air. I don't let my guys have unrestricted outdoor access and that's one of the reasons.)

PowerHouseDan

Yeah well there is about 4 different cats in the area and all the neighbours complain about them not as the new guy i dont want to complain, And sorry i dunno how i didnt think or the Gardening Forum my bad.

The Sweeper

If you've got four different cats, I'd go straight for the noise-emitting device (sorry I can't be more specific).

To be honest - shiny things - I can't understand how people believe these things work. Cats are timid in any new surrounding, so something reflective might work the first time they see it, they'll be more curious the second time, braver the third time and by the end of the week it'll be useless. Especially if these are someone's house pets - if they're inside a house at all during the day, you can be sure they see their own reflection all the time - in house mirrors, in shiny appliances in the kitchen and so on.

Unusual objects will work better with stray cats, who are nervier and more likely to be intimidated, but if you have strays in your area you'd be best to call your local cat protection people and discuss trapping them - or else four cats will quickly multiply into vast numbers of homeless moggies.

ISDW

I know this isn't very practical, but I've heard that lion dung works. Some zoos will sell it to the public, or if you know anybody that works in the zoo!!! A friend of mine used to swear by it, she volunteered in an animal park and would come home with bags every couple of weeks. Had to drive home with all the windows open mind. Now the lion dung may be worse than the cat mess, but maybe after a few weeks, they'd start avoiding your garden.

freida

sc*nt off will work if you apply it regularly, like the previous poster said it can be less effective if the weather is bad, also chopped up garlic sprinkled around the place. Basically the cats have a habit formed. you have to break that habit and then ensure that it stays broken. So make sure its difficult to get into the garden with netting down the walls, use a deterrent like sc8nt off, or garlic and then once the habit is broken check the garden at regular intervals to ensure they don't re-offend. It sounds sooooooo simple!
f.

The Sweeper

Ooo - or get a motion-triggered sprinkler system. And then don't forget you have it when you go to hang the washing out.

Cherryice

Ive heard that cats dont like the smell of jeyes fluid and wont cross it. so if you pour this around the perimeter of your garden they'll stay away from it and wont enter.