will my new cat come home?

[twinklytoes]

rehomed two cats this week. they've been upstairs since arrival as per intstructions.

seemed to have settled well, eating / drinking as normall pattern. even let boisterous dd2 stroke them.

went out 3hrs ago, leaving the dds at home with dh and come back after an hour to find dd2 has chased cat1 down stairs and by chance patio door open and he is away.

have searched the adjoining gardens and asked neighbours to keep a look out. will he really know where his home is and come back

Does it like you - ie are you its main person? Mine did a runner and we all piled out yelling its name, but it only came back when I went alone and sat quietly in the garden for ten minutes. I realised it hadn't gone far at all, in fact it was probably watching us all the whole time. Go out and give it a go now while it's still light.

yes i am. just going out to knock on a few more neighbours that weren't in earlier, then I;ll try the sitting alone. thanks smee.

Any luck?

When we first let our rehomed cats out one of them disappeared. After much calling, we saw what looked like our cat hiding in our neighbours garden in their shed. Neighbours weren't in, so we climbed the fence and emptied their shed of hoses, BBQ, tools etc to get the cat out. Luckily it was our cat after all that. He did the same thing when we moved house the next time too.

phew! she came back all by herself whilst I was in the direct neighbours garden. DH saw her jump over fence and bound into the house. pretty scared though and hid behind the tumble drier, managed to coax her out with a treat. she's now upstairs having her tuna in crab juice dinner {yum}. hopefully next time she goes out it'll be a bit more controlled.

now to deal with a very excited, won't listen to reason 3yr old. this is worst than introducing a new baby!

glad they came back

i was always told by friends who have cats to coat their paws with butter and dont let them out till they have licked it off

they then remember that your house was the nice place with butter and come back

seems to work - my cat friend has moved 4 times in 5 years and cats always come back