Cat destroying garden - help?

Vojera

I know this problem has come up countless times, but here we go again. I've read the previous threads and none of the solutions seem to be suitable for this situation.

My mum's neighbours (semi-detached house) started feeding these stray cats back around Christmas or so. They don't treat them as pets in any other way, other than throwing them a bowl of food every day. That would be fine except the cats (and their inevitable kittens) have decided that my mum's garden is much nicer to hang around in. They sleep on top of her bins and get aggressive when she goes out near them (hissing and swiping), she can't leave the back door open even to hang out the washing but they're trying to get into the house, they've started digging up all her plants and sh1tting everywhere, and (what annoys her the most) they've taken a few swipes at our family dog and hurt him (he's quite old and not able to take them on, and he ended up on antibiotics the last time he got hurt as they caught him near his eye :mad:).

She's tried talking to the neighbours to get them to stop feeding them so that they'll move on, but they won't. At the same time, the neighbours refuse to neuter them or treat their horrible gummy eyes because "they're not [their] cats". She lives in Donegal and there doesn't seem to be any TNR programme, and even if there was, the feral cat population seems to be exploding at the minute so there'll always be more cats to take their place so long as the neighbours keep attracting them with food.

Is a super-soaker her best option here? From the previous threads I've read, a motion-sensor sprinkler seems to be a good solution, but that would annoy our dog. He's not able to go for walks any more, so getting out the back yard a few times a day is sort of his little exercise now. We also can't put anything down that would irritate him as it's not fair on him. We have fences like this so it's not like we can leave pellets or whatever along the top of a wall.

Any help would be appreciated!

Nody

Put in the motion sensor sprayer; turn it off when you let the dog out; problem solved.

mymo

How high are your fences?
You could try reverse cat proofing the fences, normally to cat proof your garden to keep cats in, you place around 2ft of fencing on top of existing fencing, but tilt it inwards by about 45degrees. This means the cat can't jump up and over as the overhang stops this, if you reversed this so the overhang was facing outwards they wouldn't be able to get in. There needs to be no garden furniture, sheds etc, close enough to fence to allow them to get over the top.
I know it's probably a big job to do this, and may be expensive depending on size of your garden, but it's all I can think of.

Vojera

The fences are only about maybe four feet tall, but the length between the two properties is only about maybe twenty feet at the most and the other sides wouldn't need to be done because there's a significant drop behind them (the houses are built on a weird height) so only the one side would need to be done so that's definitely an option. Maybe a bit more height would be needed, though.

I'm not sure the sprinkler would work as there's a shed between the bins and grass (weird layout) so it would only stop the cats going on the grass but not sleeping on the bins or getting in the house. I'll price it, though and see what mum thinks of it.

Thanks for the responses!

irelandspurs

Contact Donegal pet rescue,tell them the situation and ask have they any traps that you cold set and would they cover the cost of neutering and just set the traps yourself.Once neutered release them back to where you trapped them otherwise new ferals will move in.
It's best to start there first and get them healthy then deal with the other problem.