Advice about training/ keeping indoor cats in general.

The washing line systems sounds great Ncarver thanks so much for all the info! So much to take in :-) We don't have enough bugs invading our houses to justify putting screens over our doors and windows in the UK.

I'll start off with getting him used to the harness indoors, then when he's used to that i'll have him in the garden attached to a rope. If he likes it outside i'll think about setting up something more sophisticated like you've done!

The harness training certainly sounds interesting i'll have to get my partner to help me with that one! Will be worth it in the end though i'm sure.

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Originally Posted by jckkerrison

I was going to add onto my post that the screens we had made looked like the ones you see on houses in USA but thought that was being a bit personal against you all,they were brilliant though & while we were using them no nasty flies or wasps invaded our space...

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I remembered somebody on here talking about having screens made. You say, "while we were using them," does that mean you quit? I certainly don't want flies or wasps in our house, but the worst things are mosquitoes. Do you not have mosquitoes in the UK? If you do, then how do you sleep at night with them buzzing you? It takes only a few in the entire house to disturb one's sleep.

We went on our holidays last year to America and I can quite understand for the need of nets/screens there. I don't know if the American's amongs us will know what I mean but when we were flying home we had to stay in the airport because there was a infestation of 'Love Bugs' ???? Luckily we don't have that problem in the UK with a lot of flying insects, on the odd occasion that we get a fly in the house they don't last very long with two cats who make it their mission to track and attack ! - I wouldn't want to spoil their fun.

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Originally Posted by Becky

We don't have enough bugs invading our houses to justify putting screens over our doors and windows in the UK.

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I suspect this is more that Americans don't want any bugs in their homes. I grew up in northern climes here, and we still had plenty of bugs to justify screens IMO. I doubt most Americans would think you didn't have enough bugs to justify screens. Screens are hardly costly or difficult to deal with here since windows and doors are designed with them in mind, so there is no reason that anyone should have to have bugs bugging them in their homes. :LOL:

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Originally Posted by Becky

The harness training certainly sounds interesting i'll have to get my partner to help me with that one! Will be worth it in the end though i'm sure.

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Some cats take right to the harness while others require quite a bit of time to get used to it. We had one guy that at first would just lie down and try to bite it off. He pretty much chewed through his first harness and wrecked it. The scariest thing is if they freak out with a lead tugging on them and shoot away from you (pull the lead out of your hand) and race around the house or away from you outside. This is why I suggest having a second person to assist the first time or twp. I wish I had done this.

The outside "dog run" setup worked great for us. One note of caution I haven't mentioned is that you have to make certain their aren't large dogs coming into your yard that might attack the cat, since when they are on the rope, they might not be able to get away. We were fine while we had Karma, but there are a couple of problem dogs now. If we still had Karma, I would be training them to stay out of our yard using pepper spray (or calling animal control).

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Originally Posted by NCarver

I remembered somebody on here talking about having screens made. You say, "while we were using them," does that mean you quit? I certainly don't want flies or wasps in our house, but the worst things are mosquitoes. Do you not have mosquitoes in the UK? If you do, then how do you sleep at night with them buzzing you? It takes only a few in the entire house to disturb one's sleep.

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No NCarver we don't get the mozzies quite like you although can quite understand where you are coming from,nothing more annoying than when you go abroad & because its so hot you open windows & in the little darlings come,on one holiday it was the talk down by the pool next day who had come up with the neatest idea of trying to zap them.
I think it was most probaly me who mentioned having had screens made in another thread,they were for my daughter who at that point lived in a house with no garden so nowhere to have an outside pen for the cats & she found the screens a double bonus for letting air plus keeping cats in but also flies out,we are lucky because as well as having a pen the back garden is catproof so we can open up the patio doors without worrying,we do have a fly screen hanging over them though....!