Interesting "presents" your cat has brought home!

Lillylilly

We installed a cat flap a few weeks ago, and our little fellas love it, always popping in and out as they please!

Yesterday morning, we were rudely awoken by a screeching sound downstairs. When we went down, we found a bird flying around our hall! Our seven month old male cat, Bear, had brought it through the cat flap for us!

Then this morning, I heard him struggling to get in the cat flap and saw that he had something covered in tin foil. When I went out to the garden to see what it was, he had ripped open to tin foil to reveal that it was a demi- baguette with salad on it... freshly made and all! He'd obviously stole someone's lunch!!

It got me thinking, what is the most interesting/ wierd thing that you're cats have brought you home??

morgana

Assorted mice and occasional birds (alive and not), one or two rats (one alive (not nice, but got it out) one not, ewwww) - we especially love it when they bring them in alive and promptly loose interest resulting in occasional sightings of a mouse before they eventually dispatch it or a certain smell develops (followed by humans crawling under sofas and moving stuff to locate the source :P) - oh the fun

morganafay

My cat once brought a mouse into my room at 4am and let it go (still alive). I was tired so I went back to sleep but she was chasing it around under my bed for ages, and in the morning it was dead on my carpet :eek:

And when I was away one night she went in my sister's window with a live mouse instead! My sister caught it in a sock (with the help of the cat cornering it) and let it free outdoors . . . and I'm meant to be the one who likes animals and I just let the cat kill the one in my room . . .

And one of my cats caught a frog once, we had a stream at the back of the garden where I sometimes saw them. But they didn't eat it.

And one of them caught a hare before, which was massive. I got such a shock when I saw it dead on the lawn, cos I thought it was a cat but I didn't have a cat that colour. I have no idea how they caught it, it was bigger than any of them, and hares must be pretty fast. They didn't eat it either, but while I was picking it up on a shovel one of my dogs stole its leg and ran away . . . gross I know.

So yeah none of my stories are really funny because they killed the animals, but one of my cats did have a live mouse once and was playing with it to teach her kittens to hunt and my puppy picked it up and brought it over to me. She put it on the ground in front of her and just stood there looking at the mouse and at me, really confused. The mouse was so scared it just stood there frozen. So I picked it up and took it into the fields to release it. It didn't seem injured so hopefully it survived!

morganafay

morgana wrote: »

Assorted mice and occasional birds (alive and not), one or two rats (one alive (not nice, but got it out) one not, ewwww) - we especially love it when they bring them in alive and promptly loose interest resulting in occasional sightings of a mouse before they eventually dispatch it or a certain smell develops (followed by humans crawling under sofas and moving stuff to locate the source :P) - oh the fun

Oh yeah, once of mine brought a dead rat into my room before too :eek: it was horrible. I actually have pet rodents so I don't mind them at all, but don't want a dead rat in my room! Thankfully no live ones though.

foodaholic

loads of birds, came home one day and the bird was playing dead, but was still alive. Really felt sorry for the little thing.

We also got gifted a large rat (too big to come throught the flap) so it was left on the backdoor step.

Dont you just love pressies:D

Victor

Put a bell on the cat.

morganafay

The best thing is when they eat the rat but just leave its head! When one of my cats had babies she used to bring them a rat or a crow everyday and leave the rat's head, or one time I found a crow's beak and feet and a few feathers, but no body. :eek:

Lillylilly

Ew, I'm dreading the mice coming. We leave the cat flap open all the time, now I'm thinking of monitoring them coming in. We have a three month old female kitten and I know once she gets big enough, she'll be trouble too!!!!

morganafay

Victor wrote: »

Put a bell on the cat.

That doesn't neccessarily work unfortunately. There's not really much you can do to stop a cat from hunting. At least most cats don't hunt a lot, just the odd thing.

morganafay

Lillylilly wrote: »

Ew, I'm dreading the mice coming. We leave the cat flap open all the time, now I'm thinking of monitoring them coming in. We have a three month old female kitten and I know once she gets big enough, she'll be trouble too!!!!

Watch out for neighbour's tom cats coming in your cat flap to get to the kitten before she's spayed! My neighbours tom cat came in the cat flap I had in my bedroom window (because I had young females) and got tangled up in the net curtain and sprayed everywhere. I had to set him free while he tried to scratch me. I'm surprise my two tom cats and one aggressive female didn't attack him while he was there because they used to always beat him up!

convert

We had a cat a few years back who used to leave us presents on the doorstep every so often. However, we had a French girl (who lived in a city) who came to stay with us for two weeks as part of an exchange and he really seemed to take a shine to her as pretty much every day we received a present on the back doorstep. And it varied, too. For the first few days we received mice. Then we received a rat, well, the head and tail of a rat, and then for the remainder of the time we received rabbits. For about 4 days we received baby bunnies, and on the last day he obviously caught the mother as we were gifted the head and hind legs of a fully grown rabbit. Needless to say our French girl was not impressed with her gifts. Poor cat, he had gone to such effort for her (we never received that many gifts in such a short space of time again, nor did we receive a rabbit, either!!) :pac:

Lillylilly

morganafay wrote: »

Watch out for neighbour's tom cats coming in your cat flap to get to the kitten before she's spayed!

Good advice, thanks for that. Couldn't cope with any more kittens at the mo!

convert wrote: »

We had a cat a few years back who used to leave us presents on the doorstep every so often. However, we had a French girl (who lived in a city) who came to stay with us for two weeks as part of an exchange and he really seemed to take a shine to her as pretty much every day we received a present on the back doorstep. And it varied, too. For the first few days we received mice. Then we received a rat, well, the head and tail of a rat, and then for the remainder of the time we received rabbits. For about 4 days we received baby bunnies, and on the last day he obviously caught the mother as we were gifted the head and hind legs of a fully grown rabbit. Needless to say our French girl was not impressed with her gifts. Poor cat, he had gone to such effort for her (we never received that many gifts in such a short space of time again, nor did we receive a rabbit, either!!) :pac:

Oh my God. That is all.

Whispered

I have 2 indoor/outdoor kitties. The male has never caught anything except for bringing home a baby rabbit, in perfect health, carried by the nape of the neck and placed gently at my feet in the kitchen bunny was fine and was released in the nearest fields. He also brought home a live bird once which also was fine when he put it down, although obviously shaken. He lived in my box room for a night so I could be sure it was ok and he woke me up singing out the window so I opened it and out he flew. Out of ten years, I think 2 healthy pressies is not too bad.

The female is a different story, I have dead rabbits, rats, mice, frogs, birds on a regular basis. She's a right little hunter and you'd never tell by looking at her. She looks really sweet and cuddly. I took the following steps to limit damage.

They are allowed out about an hour before treat time so I know they will come back when she is called. Limiting their time outside.

The back garden has a lot of overgrown parts for them to lounge around in and explore and a chest level platform for them to sunbathe on. They rarely bother to leave it.

They are not allowed out around dawn or dusk. (they are at their most dangerous). When we have hatching birds, they are only out with constant supervision.

They are well fed and get tasty treats along with their food to give some variety, I'm not sure if it works, but I would hope if they are not bored of thier food they might not bother trying to kill things to eat.

I free feed now, cats don't naturally have "meals" and snack around 30 times a day. So their normal kibble is down most of the time. Their "meal" times is usually a treat like a sardine or a piece of chicken.

I play with them a lot, hopefully it gives them their hunting and pouncing fix before they go out.

I encourage them to be lazy when I'm not playing with them, not that it takes a lot of encouragement! Nice kitty cushions all over the place. specially on window sills and other places they can lie around and watch things happening. Trying to make their house more comfortable and interesting than being out hunting.

I'm sure I could take further steps but I think this is a good compromise to keeping them indoors all the time. I've had no pressies in about a year so we're doing well.

padimus2

A couple of years ago myself and the GF lived in Rathmines, A stray cat lived in our Garden and used to climb in the window to say hello every so often, After a few weeks we got used to her and began feeding her, after that she turned up every evening to get some food. When we were home in the evenings we would leave the window open and she would come in to curl up on the sofa beside us, one evening we heard an almighty howl from her and she climbed in the window with a hot dog! She ran over to us with the hot dog in her mouth and laid it in front of us, proud as punch. She did the same thing a few weeks later with a chicken fillet! We later moved out of the apartment and brought her with us to our new place after getting her neutered etc, She's turned out to be a lovely pet but extremely shy of strangers

planetX

usually my presents are mice, often just heads without brains. Sometimes alive as an extra special treat (I think the cat likes to watch the chaos that follows). About a year ago we got a few bats, mostly released unharmed. Now that cat has got older and fatter, he seems to have lost his bat-hunting ability thank goodness.
My long-haired cat is always bringing tiny slugs into the house - they hitch a ride in her fur. I find them all over the place:mad:

storm2811

Shrews,constant shrews:pac:

Caught 6 in one day a while back,no idea where she finds em because I've never seen a shrew around here before!

One of my dogs brought home this lovely baby rabbit a few weeks ago,dead unfortunately:(
But I looked out the window and seen him with the rabbit,looked back 2 mins later and it was gone!
He either ate it or the other dog stole it off him:pac:

buckshotbrolan

storm2811 wrote: »

Shrews,constant shrews:pac:

Caught 6 in one day a while back,no idea where she finds em because I've never seen a shrew around here before!

One of my dogs brought home this lovely baby rabbit a few weeks ago,dead unfortunately:(
But I looked out the window and seen him with the rabbit,looked back 2 mins later and it was gone!
He either ate it or the other dog stole it off him:pac:

You let your dog out unattended to roam? Im not having a pop here but it annoys me how people can be so flippant about there cats bringing wild birds home. Song birds are in a decline and i have seen cats killing them for fun and then just discarding them. If ur cat is bringing you presents then maybe its time to keep them in. Cheers.

yellowlabrador

I once left the boyfriend in charge of feeding the cat for a couple of days, while I was on holiday. He forgot. As a result the cat started bringing mice, rabbits, rats and squirrels. She would wait until he was asleep and then deposit them on his chest.
He was furious and I explained to him that the cat must have thought he was hungry as there seemed to be no food in the house.
Needless to say that relationship didn't last.

Alicat

Our cats (now deceased) used to bring back loads of shrews, mice and birds.

One cat caught a frog, and left in lying on the floor in the conservatory. When my mum picked up the 'body' it leapt out of her hand! She almost had a heart attack.

Another cat used to catch rats all the time. My mum (again!) was going out to the conservatory very early in the morning (it was still kinda dark) to feed the cats. She stepped out in her bare feet and felt something hairy, soft, wet and squishy underfoot! A great big dirty rat! Still makes me shudder. She always wore shoes after that!

PirateShampoo

Mice both dead and alive, shrews, rats and on 1 occasion a Juvenal hare.

He also has the strange habit of biting off the head, paws and tales of the rats and eating the body and leaving the remains in a nice neat pile.

mymo

The oddest so far have been, washing up sponges, hair scrunchies and a lacy thong:eek:
I didn't ask him where he got them(or ask the neighbours if they were missing any undies) and disposed of them in much the same way I do the odd rat or mouse.
We do get frogs occasionally, always alive, sometimes in the dogs water bowl.
Never a mark on them so we release them in a safe place.

morganafay

convert wrote: »

Then we received a rat, well, the head and tail of a rat

Oh yeah, I've found the tail of a rat too. And I think rats are kinda cute, but don't really like the tails . . .

storm2811

buckshotbrolan wrote: »

You let your dog out unattended to roam? Im not having a pop here but it annoys me how people can be so flippant about there cats bringing wild birds home. Song birds are in a decline and i have seen cats killing them for fun and then just discarding them. If ur cat is bringing you presents then maybe its time to keep them in. Cheers.

Eh yes,my two dogs live outside,and they don't go killing sheep or calves or anything,the only time they've caught and killed anything was that rabbit.

My cat doesn't catch birds,and sometimes you cannot keep them in all the time,e.g if they are in heat(which my cat currently is) they will go and spray all over your furniture and everywhere,it's a constant cleaning job if you keep them in and they are in heat.

morganafay

buckshotbrolan wrote: »

Im not having a pop here but it annoys me how people can be so flippant about there cats bringing wild birds home. Song birds are in a decline and i have seen cats killing them for fun and then just discarding them. If ur cat is bringing you presents then maybe its time to keep them in. Cheers.

I don't think people are being flippant exactly, just that they accept that it's a cats' natural instinct and will sometimes happen. Death is natural, and predators are natural.

I know what you mean, but I really don't like if my cats kill animals. They very rarely do (only 2 of the 5 do, and only maybe a mouse or small bird every few months) and I'd prefer if they didn't, but they are just doing what's natural to them. They're not killing them for fun, well they don't know what they are doing really, it's instinct. Maybe they have to keep their hunting skills sharp in case they are ever left to fend for themselves. I really think cats don't trust that you'll keep looking after them, the same way dogs seem to.

I also think that killing birds is no worse than killing mice and rats (just my opinion). Also cats eat meat, whether it's beef or chicken or wild birds. And those could have been the slower or sickly birds that they caught. And even if they don't eat it, well something will, like flies or something, so it's not exactly going to waste. (Flies are important too.)

I definitely understand what you mean, but it's easier to say to keep a cat in than it is to do it.


Oh and there are already a few threads about cats killing birds, so maybe it'd be best to discuss it there, because when loads of people start arguing about it, it gets really annoying. What you said was pretty respectful and a good point, but some people get really immature in these threads.

morganafay

mymo wrote: »

The oddest so far have been, washing up sponges, /QUOTE]

One of my kittens used to steal make up sponges and run away with them!

morganafay

storm2811 wrote: »

My cat doesn't catch birds,and sometimes you cannot keep them in all the time,e.g if they are in heat(which my cat currently is) they will go and spray all over your furniture and everywhere,it's a constant cleaning job if you keep them in and they are in heat.

Is your cat male or female? (I don't think males come into heat? but some people say they do) If it's male then you could just get it neutered to stop it spraying. And if it's female I guess you want kittens then.

ghost_ie

Over the years my father's cats have brought home many presents - mainly mice and the occasional bird and shrew. There was one memorable occasion when one of the cats brought home a very nice trout. Ma met a neighbour the next day who was wondering where the fish she'd been preparing for her husband's dinner the day before had gone (it was summer, she'd gone to answer the phone and the kitchen window was open - came back to find the fish gone). Ma beat a hasty retreat without commenting.

Cats aren't the only ones to bring home presents, unfortunately. My youngest Jack Russell trotted happily in from the back garden last year with a baby sparrow in her mouth. The bird didn't have a mark on it but died of shock within minutes, unfortunately

storm2811

morganafay wrote: »

Is your cat male or female? (I don't think males come into heat? but some people say they do) If it's male then you could just get it neutered to stop it spraying. And if it's female I guess you want kittens then.

Female,getting her spayed asap though,just waiting for her to be not in heat!

morganafay

storm2811 wrote: »

Female,getting her spayed asap though,just waiting for her to be not in heat!

Oh that's good. I never knew females sprayed when in heat, that's just why I asked.

morganafay

My kitten has just started to hunt . . . bumblebees! She's always after them. :rolleyes: I think she will probably be a hunter when she's older because she hangs out with my other young cat who does hunt (not very good at it though!) I have no choice but for her to live outside though because I live with my parents. And anyway she gets far too hyper if she's inside for too long and she's very loud so she just meows to be let out.

storm2811

morganafay wrote: »

Oh that's good. I never knew females sprayed when in heat, that's just why I asked.

Oh it's really bad:pac:
She just meows and meows if we don't let her out,then decides to spray inside instead,so we have to let her out really!

I lol'd at the kitten catching bumble bees,sounds cute:pac: