Holidays - Cattery v cat sitter v ??

[Badgerlady]

Just wondering what arrangements fellow MN cat owners make for their cats when you go away.

We have two kittens, now 4 months old. We are going away in early February for five days. Original plan was for DSS (23) to move in for that time. However, he is now going away for work that week so and I need to make other arrangements for the cats. I've been going round in circles about the options!

When I had cats previously, I had a neighbour with teenage children that I knew very well and I would pay them to come in a twice a day. The cat was an adult. Where I live now neighbours work very long hours and I don't know them that well (I've never seen them in daylight and am nursing a secret theory that they may be vampires ). Other family live too far away to pop in on a daily basis.

So my options seem to be (1) a cattery or (2) cat sitter to come to the house.

There are local catterys who would house them together. They seem to have reasonable reviews and I would go and look at them before committing. Kittens are fully vaccinated and neutered.

OR

There is a local cat sitter who would come over for 30 minutes twice a day. I'm meeting him on Friday. He has provided details of various local vets who can provide a reference/assurance that he is who he says he is! (which I obviously check out).

The rates for each are comparable.

I'm leaning towards cat sitter as they then won't have to go to strange place.

So, what do you all do when you go away? Have a missed an obvious option? Any questions I should ask the cat sitter/cattery?

(badger lady - who has probably overthought this massively!)

Only the neighbour's cat who goes missing every time Arch.

I have a very sensitive cat that suffers from over grooming and cystitis when he gets stressed. For this reason we always get a sitter, as the stress of moving out of his territory is too much for him. They can also water plants and open and close curtains too which is an added bonus

Always have a cat sitter for our two old girls when we go away. We did try a cattery a couple of times but they seemed v unhappy and caught bugs (which meant we ended up paying for vets fees on top). Much better for them to have their own house, sofas, familiar stuff around them.

Ours are a bit aloof for the first few hours when they get back from the cattery, but no other signs of stress or revenge pissing.

It obviously depends on the cat(s) and the type of cattery you use, but a friend of mine works in a cat rescue and is adamant that cats should not be "abandoned" at home, even with a pet sitter.

Some catteries are awful cat prisons, though. Have you seen these cat hotels? Longcroft Luxury Cat Hotels
Looks amazing!

I've used a website for sitters- you can get people to stay in the house for free. Worked fine. My cats are always a bit weird with strangers staying but I think it's preferable to a cattery.

I think it really depends on the cat. Our cat hated the cattery - the one time she went, she didn't really eat and just hid away for the whole time. Being a cat she would have had no idea it was only temporary and that we were coming back for her. New places stressed her out anyway - we've had to move twice and each time she spent the first week mostly hiding.

So we had friends or cat sitters since then depending on the length of time we've been away (feels a bit cheeky to ask a friend to come round twice daily for a week). She was much calmer and more settled that way.