Neighbour’s vicious cat

[Firsttimetrier]

Our neighbour bought a bengal cat which they started letting out this summer. It’s caused us and our other neighbours nothing but grief by attacking our cats resulting in vet visits due to bite wounds, coming into our houses, spraying urine everywhere in gardens and on back doors etc.

This afternoon, I had our backdoor ajar and our baby in the bouncer in the kitchen. Next thing I know, their cat comes flying into the kitchen trying to attack our cat right by our baby in the bouncer. I manage to break up the fight and their cat then goes towards the baby still in attack mode.

This has completely shaken me up and my husband has messaged the neighbour to discuss as their cat is starting to become nuisance.

We’ve offered them solutions in the past such as alternating days/times when each cat goes out, but they never hold their side.

Are we being unreasonable asking them to stick to a timetable?

Any tips welcome and greatly appreciated.

What on earth did you do to enrage a jack russell so much that it launched itself at your throat?

(And how tall are you?)

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll
No need to bother teaching them empathy at all if they've already been killed as a baby by a vicious, aggressive cat.
You'll be pleased to hear my children survived childhood (despite a thug cat next door,) and for an added bonus they don't feel the need to take pleasure in injuring or killing other people's domestic pets.
Clearly however I accept without question your thesis that death by cat in the UK is a massive risk requiring extreme action to combat the problem.

I didnt do anything I wasn't even in the room... the dog was startled awake by a noise ran through the house and launched... 1 bite and over in seconds.

No idea why you would think a cat can attack for no reason but a dog wouldn't, small dogs are notoriously aggressive and jumpy and where bred to hunt and kill, there are litrally thosands of attacks every year.

I was on a surgical ward full of dog attack victims its common enough to be its own medical demographic (cat attack wards not something I have ever come across though in my many years of studying medicine).

No help with the cat @Firsttimetrier but we have roller blind fly screens on all of our windows (from Newblinds) and they would stop the issue of not being able to have windows open .

No she shouldn't. She should have left it alone. There was no reason for her to threaten it like that. No wonder it defended itself.

I hop it hurt!

You could try some essential oil spray like a lavender spray on him

It didn't attack "for no reason". You said yourself - it was startled by a noise and ran through - to defend it's home. Were you a visitor there? Sitting? Standing? In a way that may look threatening to a dog?

There is always a reason (NB I AM NOT DEFENDING SAVAGE DOGS) even if we, as humans, can't recognise ir.

And I didn't say that cats were more dangerous than dogs in general - I said that I, personally, would rather deal with a small dog attacking me than a cat.

Absolutely.
But a small terrier-sized dog would 1) respond very differently than a cat would and 2) would not keep coming back, time and again.

Cats and dogs are very different you know.
And if a terrier dog came at me in that fashion, I would have no hesitation using a weapon on it.

Can it not be reported ? Surely you can't own a cat that goes around attacking things and what if it had hurt a baby
Its about time cat owners also have to become responsible like dog owners ,

That cat, wasn’t doing anything!

But yes, if you have to resort to kicking a cat (and she didn’t) then that’s not the way to do it.

Where has anybody said they would take pleasure in this? Nobody has. Not once!

You keep coming back with more and more rubbish! Honestly.

Why have dogs, a completely different animal obviously to cats, and who need to be under control and with an owner at all times, suddenly being discussed here.

We are taking about an unneuteres, semi-feral partially wild ‘domestic’ cat whose owners don’t have a clue.

There is no comparison at all.

If this was a dog 🤷🏻‍♀️

We also love cats (and have two very nice natured ones of our own) but used to live next to a one eyed Bengal so bad-tempered he was known locally as the Asbo cat...until the other tom in the area moved away with his family, and Asbo-boy transformed. (They were both neutered allegedly...)

We used to keep a loaded water pistol, would clap loudly, run down and chase him out of the garden etc - he was finally cured of coming in through our cat flap when the two female moggies we had (one's still with us, the other sadly died) ganged up on him. One of them chased him in and got him tangled in the curtains, and the second one pounced on him from a great height. She was not a light cat and has the ability to make herself much heavier when she wants to. We could see this from the doorway, all taking place in the space of a few seconds, far faster than we could deal!

He mainly stuck to his own house after that...(and actually got quite nice natured as he got older and more medicated. More than I can say for the truly evil female Bengal on the opposite side of the same road though. It's a breed I'd never, ever have. I'll stick with our nice natured moggies, thanks!

On a serious note, we did think about getting a cat flap with a chip so the little terror couldn't get in; in your situation, is there any way you could put some kind of door guard or curtain up? I know people will suggest citrus and all kinds of other cat scarers but in my experience they don't really work...

This is all by the by by you plank and has got absolutely nothing to do with the OPs problem at hand, which is cat wandering into her house, in a way that dogs, small or or the else do not.

So fuck off with your straw man’s and don’t address me again.

I suspect there are many people here who have never encountered a bengal!

Which ai the specific breed of cat the IP is talking about.

Unless you have had this kind of a problem with one who is allowed to roam, you can’t possibly comment as they ARE NOTHING like your standard moggy.

TBH a lot of non cat owners think cats are a nuisance generally. Pooing in gardens, killing birds and other small mammals in gardens, noisy fights at 3am outside the window.

So YANBU to be annoyed by this cat but YABU for also owning a bloody car who probably annoys someone else

@Quincythequince
You keep coming back with more and more rubbish! Honestly.
I'm terribly sorry, I'm clearly unworthy to have my own opinions that are clearly so inferior to yours.

Why have dogs, a completely different animal obviously to cats, and who need to be under control and with an owner at all times, suddenly being discussed here.
I haven't mentioned dogs once. One could almost say that "you keep coming back with more and more rubbish! Honestly"

The dog was a general statement, within the same post.

That part not directed at you! Different paragraph

How many people have been killed by domestic cats?

Clearly however I accept without question your thesis that death by cat in the UK is a massive risk requiring extreme action to combat the problem.

Nobody has said that it's common, but I'm going on the report of OP as to how this vicious cat acted after intruding.

People are going on about the size differential between cats/dogs/humans - they do realise, don't they, that babies are very small, as humans go - and not very able to defend themselves?

I don't hold with the old chestnut about people only having pets because they're unable to find friends in their own species, but some people on here really don't do anything to dispel it.

I'll address whoever I want to.

Please feel free not to respond.

Meant to add* that that must have been a horrible experience for you, and I'm sorry you had to go through it - I wasn't trying to diminish the seriousness of what happened.

*My cooker alarm went off

I think the legal route is worth exploring. Of course the OP can't continue to put up with this and it's the owner's responsibility to do something about it.

However there are some disgusting suggestions on here re hurting the cat and even hurting cats in general.

I know you shouldn’t have to, but could you get one of those strong mesh door screens and maybe mesh window covers so you could open them without worrying about the feline intruder? If the cat knows it’s able to access your house, it will think of it as part of its territory and you’ll have a constant fight on your hands.