Eek cat damaging furniture - any advice please?

[JackieWeaversLaptop]

I’ve been looking after a relative’s cat in their home while relative is away.

The cat is lovely, but unfortunately he also scratches everything in sight… he has a scratching post, and does use that, but will scratch everything else he can get hold of. When I see/hear him scratching, I’ll distract him/clap loudly, which does tend to get his attention and then he stops.

You can probably see where this story is going, but this afternoon, I came into the living room and saw he’d scratched the back of a chair quite badly. The scratch marks don’t look very deep, but there’s quite a few of them, and there weren’t any scratch marks there before.

I’m pretty nervous about how to explain this to my relative - any suggestions on how to go about it?

Was planning a message along the lines of:

Hi X,

I just wanted to let you know that unfortunately I saw DCat clawing one of the dining chairs earlier this afternoon. I managed to stop him from scratching further but there are a lot of scratch-marks on the chair.

I’ve attached some photos here to show you what’s happened.

I’m really sorry about this. I’ve now put a coat over the back of the chair to stop it being affected by any further scratching.

Please let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.

JWL

The cat belongs to your relative, and is in that person's home? It won't be the first (or last) thing the cat has scratched and it's not your responsibility.

For starters don’t apologise, you can’t realistically stop a cat from doing anything and it’s not your fault! He’ll probably just come back to his new scratching post when you’re in another room or asleep. Draping something over the chair was a good idea, you cold also try moving the scratching post to put it in that location. My cat has a scratching post in each room so you could buy more and you could try a Feliway plug in case it’s a stress response to his human being away but that shouldn’t be at your expense. I’d message the relative and say ‘I’ve caught Cat scratching so I’ve draped something over the chair to try to protect it from further damage, what else would you suggest I try’.

Thanks Hirples. I’m finding it tricky to handle the situation as I know scratching is natural behaviour for cats (and cat is quite young still, so he can’t go out yet and has lots of energy which he releases by clawing things), but equally I feel like I’m to blame.

I’ve looked after him loads before, and haven’t seen him scratch anything too badly. Maybe that’s why I feel guilty, I don’t know.

I know it sounds daft, but I feel like I need eyes at the back of my head to keep tabs on him!!

Yes, surely it won't be the first time this has happened? I have two cats and lots of shredded bits on my furniture - I always buy second hand furniture so I don't have to worry about it. It's a hazard of owning cats.

Not your fault. My cats like to use my stair carpet as a scratch post. They've wrecked it. It's not my mum's fault when she looks after them if we're away!

If its in their house and it's their cat and their furniture I wouldn't bother saying anything tbh

It's a cat. You can't reason with them.

You could try putting things over your furniture to protect them.

My cat jumped on my leather dining room chairs and scratched them. I had been so careful with them too. I was a bit gutted
But.....they are my cats and I had let them in there. So ho hum. I'm sure your relative will forgive their little darling.....

Just to illustrate the point that you can’t control the little buggers, mine often scratches more when something is draped over the target… you could try putting the chair up against the wall so the scratching surface is out of reach.

Unless there was a scratching post or cat tree there that is no longer there, I can't see you can do anything.

Tin foil or citrus skin for deterrence? But will probably just send the claws in a different direction. There are also some transparent sticky strips (Sticky Paws?) you can buy that don't damage furniture but will make the surface feel unpleasant to claws.

Thanks all! Frustratingly, there is a cat tree and a scratching post right next to the chair he scratched. Sigh.

I’ve messaged relative and they replied; they were very understanding and nice about it.