to dislike cats ALOT long rant alert

[snoozealot]

the S**t in the garden is what's really p-ing me off - fine, have a cat; not for me but if it floats your boat - not doing me any harm but THEY DON'T SHIT IN YOUR OWN GARDEN DO THEY??????????? rant extinguished by simple yes they do response.lol.

it bloody stinks- it's in my herb garden, in the lawn, in the borders - i planted a baby plant - one of the last seedlings started from a friends mum who died and guess what - a cat dug it up so they could SHIT in my plant nursery! I feel like I can't take my own two little ones in the garden as it's literally a health hazard. on the one time my daughter did get out lately she managed to step in some poo before I realised - trodden into the carpet - you know just such a pain when you've then got to put everything else on hold to deal with that. I've bought some sort of cat repellent granules - but haven't used them yet because of the rain and I'm wondering about worsening the health hazard to LO's (and basically got guilts re environment, should just read the label - proabably fine but can't find the bloomin thing now.)

seriously though, in a built up urban area - does anyone think iabu to think that it's actually just irresponsible to have cats in terraced streets? esp as ppl seem to have at least 2 now. there are at least 5 that come to our garden regularly - since the wind blew down some of our back fence our garden seemed to become cat M25, we've fixed the fence but we're an established route/cat watford gap now. I don't have a lot of spare time to do anything by myself with a toddling 10mo and busy manic 3yo, and I don't want to spend it picking up cat shit. - esp when i can just smell it but not find it!!quite apart from the impact on the wildlife - I don't have any science to back it up but i reckon there's definitely been a decline in birds in our back gardens since there have been more cats in the area.

I'm not an animal hater. I had pets as a child and my parents always had a dog and still do. I flat and house shared with ppl who had cats - some were cool some were frankly vile. (the cats that is not the owners!) there are a couple of cats that live nearby that are actually really nice in and of themselves - quite friendly (cheeky - have that look of can i come in your kitchen and nick some food) and the daily troop thru the garden entertain my little 10 mo who watches them from her high chair as she eats brekkie. it's just their bad habits as a collective group - i don't get the positives.

aargh sorry too longx

I love hyperbole and a half she just doesn't do enough blogs though! One a day would be sufficient!

A LOT

(sorry)

Well I never knew that!

Really Purity? I rescued a hedgehog once, but never studied its poo.

Second, third, fourth whatever the notion of getting your own cat to deter others.

Cats are fab

Oh a cat poo thread. Well it's been a week or so since the last one I suppose.

YANBU OP- and I say that as a cat owner. My cat always buried her own shit....until she got old. Now she leaves ENORMOUS stinking turds on the patio for my 2 year old to find. I am at people who say cat shit doesn't smell- it's horrendous! As she's my cat, though, it's my responsibility to pick up and bury the shit- and be relieved that at least she's not inflicting it on the neighbours.`

Lentillyfart's suggestion about the little sticks is a sound one, but you'd have to cover the entire dug-over area with them.

You can channel your rage by getting a supersoaker and using the cats for target practice- should hopefully dissuade all but the most determined.

Or, yes, the best deterrent is getting a cat of your own...if you can't beat 'em, join 'em!

I used to moan about the horribly stinky cat poo down the bottom of my garden - but after a friend saw some of it she told me it was fox poo. Apparently that smells much worse (and this stinks, believe me)

Don't know any way of stopping it though.

Not all cats bury their poo. Some do just poo and walk off - I've seen them do it.

I don't like cats, but ultimately they are a minor irritation and pose a minor health risk, which is true of a variety of things that people do that have an impact on other people.

They bring a lot of happiness and health benefits to the people who actually own them, and I think the rest of us have to accept that we put up with minor irritations so that others can own a pet that makes them happy, as other put up with other minor irritations from us.

YANBU. Manky bastards.

YABU cats are lovely. Where I live there's more dog shit on the pavements/grass etc than cat shit (I love dogs too btw). That's just how it is with cats, you can't train them and they don't shit where they do to piss people off, they just shit when they need to lol. My cats are indoor cats so they poo in their litter tray and they are not guilty of the bird killing shitting in other peoples gardens etc but if cats go outside that's just what they do. They are animals!

Cats like newly raked soil, nicely prepared flower-beds and so on. Maybe not all cats, but every house I've lived in in a built-up area had this problem. You move in, you sort out the garden, the multitudinous neighbourhood cats think you're making a toilet for them. Some bury it, some don't and I can tell the difference between catpoo and foxpoo.

I cannot understand the selfishness of choosing a pet that you KNOW will go and do this, in a built-up area. Foxes are wild: people actively CHOOSE to bring cats into an area. For all you people who are so sure your cats are trained and perfect and never make your neighbours garden into a toilet, whose cats are actually doing this then - because the evidence is there.

It's not just disgusting - it's a health hazard. I go to weed and put my hand in some buried poo then there is a risk to me and my unborn child. If my 1yr old finds poo when pottering around then goodness knows what he might do before I get to him. YANBU for being furious and frustrated. Perhaps cat-lovers think we shouldn't care about these things?

I suggest buying cheapy bamboo skewers, breaking them in half and making a bed of nails around where the cats are pooing. Of course, I doubt I'll be able to use even this strategy (the only one that's worked around here with the super-tough city cats) around my new vegetable patch because my 2 toddlers will pull them up until we've trained them not to. So YOUR cat, that you want because they're soooo cute and soft and cuddly, costs me extra expense, extra time, extra rules for my kids to learn - what a sense of community welfare you must have.

Oh and here, dog poo is very rare - there are signs up EVERYWHERE reminding people to clear up after their pets. Oh oops, sorry - not every pet - cats are exempt because their owners can't control them.

Someone will be along to tell you that you should wear gardening gloves in a moment. Because of course shit all over your gardening gloves is no problem at all....

YANBU. We had the only grass in the street in our terrace garden, the cats just thought we'd made them a litter tray - I know there's not much the owners could do about that, which is exactly why I wouldn't have a cat in that situation, knowing someone else would have to deal with its shit.

The best was when one was sick all over the place, and left streaks of half-digested cat biscuits and vom all over the place. Oh and when we netted the base of the sweet peas so the cats wouldn't dig them up, and they just diarhea'd through and on and all over the netting.