Fed up of cats pooing in my garden. What can I do to deter them?

[Rosemaryandlavender1]

As the title says I am so tired of picking up cat poo from my garden. I don't have a cat but one of the neighbours a few doors down has quite a few and they have increasingly taken to using my garden and new flower bed as their litter tray. I purchased one of those green solar powered machines that is supposed to scare away cats with their noise and while it was effective for a short while it isn't anymore. Does anyone have tried and tested methods that worked? Thank you

We have 4 cats. We keep them in our garden.
If they managed to get out, though, it wouldn’t bother me if you sprayed them with water.

We planted a couple of thousand cocktail sticks in the front flowerbeds.

Are they pooing somewhere in particular? When a neighbour's cat was pooing in our flower beds I used some thorny rose bush off-cuts to cover the soil.

Orange peel/something with a citrus smell is also meant to deter them?

They love freshly dug soil. You could tamp it down a bit and lay thorny cuttings on the bare patches as @Icarus40 did. And you could fill the spaces with short lived bedding plants until the longer lived ones have established and start to spread.

Thorny things.

But as a previous poster stated a water pistol. I wouldn't mind someone wetting mine.

As people have said. Keep the soil covered if you can.
Water, noise are good deterrents if you catch them..a couple of pebbles in a plastic bottle make a good noise when shaken.

I love my cats but if they poo in a neighbour's garden I would a) collect it and b) recommend a water pistol, a loud noise (I think the pebbles in a bottle is genius) or shaking a spray can near them.

Obviously it won't stop them if you're not there but they are quick learners.

You have to be there to administer that. It’s not practical.

Old fashioned moth balls. Possibly not a solution if you have small children.

It is both in the beds and in the grass. I will put some prickly ivy I have growing on the bare patches on the bed and orange peel. Not sure what to do about the rest of the garden as it is quite big and I keep spotting poo. My DH is going to hopefully cut the grass which I'm hoping will help

You only need to catch them once or twice.

Here are two cats I spotted the other day having a catch up session whilst my expensive amazon cat deterrent tool is sat in the background as useful as a chocolate teapot!

Coffee grounds. You can shake them everywhere.

Also that is a nicely ironed garment

Water scarecrow if you have an outdoor tap.
Scatter granules - wilkos used to do cheap ones.
FIL had small gravel area and found Gel worked well for him.
I can't find them at the moment but there used to be citrus rods - you could stick in ground.

Didn't find lion poo or the audio deterrents had any effect.

Last house were were unlucky only house with no pets cats or dogs so our garden space was very popular. I actually do like cats - have two now - but with very young kids it did get annoying dealing with other people cat poo - (I know it was cats as could see them doing it - but two locked doors and young kids under foot or in arms couldn't get out to warn them off fast enough.

Haha no idea how that got posted!

Apparently, lion poo will frighten off most animal visitors.

Will prickly Holly leaves hurt them? I want to deter them but not hurt them either.

Get a dog.

Did you really do that?

As you can see from this picture they seem quite at home lounging on a Sunday morning in the middle of the garden. I think being very friendly to them at the start was a mistake on my part.

For the flowerbeds: layer of chicken wire across the whole flowerbed (cut around the plants), then cover with a thin layer of bark to hide the chicken wire. Source: this is how we stop our cats using the flower beds as a toilet as they like to dig but can't because the wire prevents them.
No idea about the lawn, sorry. Ours are particular about where they go and only like loose soil!
As a side note, I've never met a cat who was in the least deterred by those noise things 😂

We use thisThis in a spray bottle.
They hate citronella!

They are attracted to the smell of fresh dug soil and your lovely new flowerbed is to them a lovely new facility in what is their territory whether you like it or not!

They don't like citrussy garlicky smells. Also I've read that lion droppings can deter them ...

And anything inconvenient. We 'plant' awkward twisty spiky sticks in fresh dug flowerbeds and pots to make a physical barrier.

Lion droppings - I knew I wasn't going mad! And RHS recommends, too.

https://www.rhsplants.co.uk/product/_/silent-roar-lion-manure/classid.2000004185/

Yes, once 😺. Not really, they'll probably avoid soil that is covered and the holly being prickly will prevent them from moving it out of the way.

I love the photo of the cats enjoying the company of your deterrent 😄