any advice? Cats and smokers

[Greydog]

I live in a mid terrace with a small back yard, and a small front garden. The yard has been my little space for years, full of pots and flowers. The house next door is a rental, we've had several neighbours, some good others not so much. The latest - who have been in two years, have a cat, and they smoke. The cat keeps coming in the yard, digging in the pots, crashing through plants, disturbing the birds that nest in the ivy. Is there anything I can possibly do to discourage it? And then there's the smoke. The neighbours smoke a lot, and because of the size of the yards, it all blows into our yard. I can't see that I can do anything about that, and it makes me so sad that I don't have my little space to enjoy any more. Any thoughts? The walls are 6ft high, but of course both cats and smoke flow over!!

You could ask them to smoke in a different spot but they're within the rights to refuse.

Get a natural citrus spray for your plants. Cats hate citrus so hopefully that will work. As for the smoking, I don't know what the answer is. You have my sympathies, though, it's fucking disgusting.

Put these on your wall?
cat spikes I have a cat and would have no problem if a neighbour wanted to deter her in this way.
I know you can also buy lion dung to scatter about to act as a deterrent, I believe it stinks so it may move your smokers to another spot too!

No answer for the disgusting smoking. But on GQT yesterday, cats can be deterred with Vick on a teabag apparently. Neighbours use Jeyes Fluid on teabags. DSD sloshed it about.

How do you mean?

Throw it at them?
Stick it on a stick?
Leave on the lawn?

No, you leave the treated tea bags in the areas they are causing a problem. Up to you if you want to fire them at filthy felines. Sloshing Jeyes Fluid similar, just around the plant pots.

Jeyes Fluid poisons cats - that’s an insane thing to do!!!

Also, spikes on top of fences can injure cats and other wildlife.

Try taping tinfoil on the fences you don’t want them to climb. This will deter them and after a time they won’t come near and you can remove it.

I wonder if vicks teabags would also work around Christmas trees

Fwiw my cat flipping loves citrus so I wouldnt start there.

Water pistol would be your best bet.

Not much to be done about smoking, I sympathise though. It's a disgusting habit

Now, on GQT this week, they talked about cats. One of the experts said they once had a radio (?) show in which they asked people to write in with their most successful cat deterrent. They said that the biggest pile, with about 60% of the responses, was decongestant soaked into something like teabags and scattered around. Might be worth checking out the latest episode and giving it a listen?

When i read that i get an image of a group of cats clustered around a radio laughing their heads off

Yes - I've read recently that things like Vicks and Deep Heat are hugely effective at deterring cats.

Jeyes Fluid might rather be overkill.

I spray troublesome cats with a hose. They don't often come back.

You could sprinkle oil as oil on the wall.

Oilbas

If you are a fresh coffee drinker, save your used coffee grounds and put that on the soil. Cats don't like the smell - and I believe it's good for the soil. If you don't drink coffee sometimes coffee shops will give you their grounds for free. I've used coffee to deter other cats from using our front garden as a litter tray. I'm a cat owner and would have no problem with other people using safe, harmelss deterrents including a water pistol.

Cats really are the biggest source of my rage when it comes to my garden. You could try putting chopsticks or skewers in the pots? They like having a place to lie or poop and the sticks prevent that.

The smoke? I dunno. I think breaking the chain of being immediately annoyed when you smell the smoke might be the only sane way through.

Thank you all for the comments. I shall be out with the coffee grounds tomorrow. I'll also try the citrus, and there's a tube of Deep Heat in the bathroom. And I'll cut up some tinfoil. With regards to the smoking, I think I'll start burning incense sticks!

Water pistol for the cat. We have a cat and use a water pistol to keep next door's cat from coming over to have a go at ours. He sits on the wall and watches now but doesn't come into the garden.

Please don't follow a pp advice sprinkle olbas oil on any areas where any animals could come into direct contact with it...including birds and squirrels etc. I know you don't like the cat in your garden but you wouldn't want it to get some on its paws, lick it off and die would you? I probably wouldn't do the vicks on a tea bag thing either for the same reason (eucalyptus in both is a poison if ingested).

How about friendly defensive methods of growing catnip in your gardeb to attract the cat to a certain area away from other beloved plants and birds. Once it discovers the catnip it will be too off it's face to bother ruining your garden or chasing anything :)

The local cats (and foxes) walk over those on my back wall everyday.

It really annoys my two cats who have to watch them stroll past in impotent fury, but I think the neighbours who put them up were most annoyed as it meant their sociopathic JRT doesn't merely confine his constant yapyapyapyapyapyapyapyapyapyapyapyapyapyap to people walking past their fence, birds, squirrels, the wind, voices of people in other gardens, people sitting silently in theirs, the binmen, postman, Amazon man, DPD, children on their way to school...

I sympathise. My cats are fenced in. I have a roller top fence. Cats are going missing round here so it's for their own safety and also to stop them going into the road.
You can use the roller fence to stop them getting in to but it's very expensive.
They jump up then fall off. They can't get a grip on the top.
My neighbour smokes too. I HATE it. Its a constant stench. I burn very strong incense but I can still smell it. I feel like going over the fence with the hose but I'd probably get arrested.

I tip my coffee grounds on my rose border outside my utility room. My cat chooses this exact border to do the majority of her poos in (she has half an acre; she’s not short on options). So I think the coffee idea is dead in the water.

Agree with pps you really shouldn’t put eucalyptus products around the garden as you could do a lot of harm.

Water pistols/hose/sprinkler systems are the most effective methods in my experience. You could also put up a trellis above the wall to stop the cat coming over. Obviously choose one with apertures smaller than the cat’s head.

As for the smoking, no suggestions there, but plenty of sympathy. So antisocial of them.

This sort of thing

Do you have electricity in your garden? An inexpensive fan might dissipate the smoke or blow it back toward the neighbors.