What 'present' has your cat brought you? (light hearted)

[Startingagainandagain]

My cat just came into the kitchen while I was having my lunch chirping proudly and proceeded to spit out a huge live fly in front of me....

Of course I congratulated her on her hunting skills and then promptly got rid of the fly in the garden...

What lovely gifts have you received from your cats?

I get mostly mice, sometimes dead, sometimes alive.

I couple of years ago on my birthday, I got a dead mouse with a bit of ivy. It was the closest I got to a bunch of flowers.

😪

A bat
She left it on my night stand
I put my hand out to get a drink and lifted it up

My biggest heart fear is bats
The
Little
PRICK

We’ve had 2 dead rabbits, one live rabbit, numerous birds/mice/shrews both alive and dead and one large and very much alive rat.

If they are traumatised and not running around you can just pick them up or throw a tea towel or something over and kind of scoop them up. If they've run off and hidden I use one of those humane traps baited with peanut butter. Leave it alongside the skirting board and cover it over to make it look like a nice safe place to go.

I always wash my hands after touching any 'gifts' but have never considered disinfecting where they have been in the house.

Four cats going back to about 1998. Not one single present from any of them. One was too busy, one was too much of a princess, one was too stupid, and current boy I'm not sure but I suspect he hunts and eats his kills and doesn't love us enough to bring them home.

Our current pair have a habit of stealing toys from neighbours

First we knew of it was when we found one of those fishing rod toys with a squeaky toy and feather having off it. Heaven knows how they got it though the cat flap

We've had three "grump cat door handle" toys brought in, numerous cat nip mice, strings of mice, balls, toy soft spiders..,,

I've given up trying to return them (our neighbour, which is who they steal most of them from, is ok with that )

We've also had a toy unicorn brought in from over the road where there are so my do you f girls. I did return that one - once I'd worked it out

Cats have also brought in two fortunately dead rats. They've brought in live birds, including one memorable occasion when we came home to find them guarding the Christmas tree, where, on closer inspection, we found a baby magpie hiding

Said cats: butter wouldn't melt in their mouth

You have a dedicated 'mouse pot'? Tell me more😀

Worms are popular here. We used to have a cat who would store/hide worms under the rug in the living room. The latest brings in worms, drinking straws, twigs, and has been seen trying to wrestle a branch through a window.

Our neighbour, who is ok about our pair stealing their own cats' toys, have said that we do need to return any baby stuff that the cats bring in, as the neighbours have recently become grandparents and are baby sitting on occasion

Today my elderly cat brought me a toy mouse miaowing very loudly all the way up the stairs before dropping it at my feet.
The kitten (aged 2) brought me a baby mouse at 3am that I had to chase around the house, catch and put outside.

I couple of years ago on my birthday, I got a dead mouse with a bit of ivy. It was the closest I got to a bunch of flowers.

and

I'm dreading 'bird season'. There's a nest in one of our trees and our boy's been eyeing it up. Last summer he brought one up to my dressing room and I had to chase it flying round. Thank goodness this year so far it's just been raisins from the sky and butterflies.

Magpie in Christmas tree. We did manage to catch it and release it outside

Quite used to seeing a mouse or shrew scuttle across the carpet in the lounge.
the other day the cat brought in a baby rabbit thankfully alive and managed to let it escape, quite impressed as my cat is 22 years old

When I was young and sharing a bedroom with my sister we slept with the door cracked ajar... one evening as we were lying awake in bed our two cats ran in, followed by our mum with a broom, shrieking. The cats scattered under our beds, and she flipped on the light yelling "they've caught a live snake!" All hell broke loose - us stood up on our beds screaming, mum shouting and banging a broom, cats running out SANS SNAKE.... Can't even remember how it ended.

If it makes a difference, we were in the tropics where a snake could easily be a young adder, cobra or (hopefully) harmless ratsnake!

Yes! It’s a plastic pot from a large Xmas pudding, so quite wide at the top and ideal for popping over a mouse (or bat) as long as they’re not too feisty! I then gently slide a large piece of card (the side of a cereal packet is ideal) under the pot, and carry it up to the woods at the back of the house. The cat remains shut in while this is going on, and for a while after, to give the mouse a fighting chance!

Many nice but the most memorable were some sort of newt / lizard that I only noticed as it went up the hoover and also a baby bat.

In the past we had all kinds. Rabbits, moles, mice and birds.

But the worst was this week. I was on a zoom call for work when the current cat hopped up onto my desk with a live pigeon which he then proudly dropped on my keyboard. I shrieked, pigeon flapping around my study, cat leaping trying to get it back.

God only knows what my team thought.

We all do the 'mouse check' before putting on shoes in this house.

She passed now bless her soul but :

Mouse
chicken nugget
Some really nice ham... convinced it was pinched out a house as she had gone out and within 2 mins she was trotting back. She looked so pleased with herself

Thank goodness this year so far it's just been raisins from the sky

Is that a thing where you live? I’ve been racking my brains for the most likely typo, or maybe I’m missing something!

Our old cat was a mighty hunter. Loads of birds including a pigeon that was nearly as big as him, rats, mice, frogs, live adult rabbits, but the best one was a female cat who brought in a whole fish. It was actually a mackerel! I concluded that she stole it from a nearby house. Then she ate it.

My old girl didn’t have any hunting instincts at all, she would run away from robins! but she did come home one evening tangled in someone’s bra. I did sheepishly put a message on our old roads WhatsApp group, but no one ever claimed it!

'@Soigneur
I'm not sure how stories of allowing your domestic pets to kill native wildlife (some of it endangered) is 'light hearted'.'

You don't know much about cats do you?

They are just following their natural instincts and they are not meant to be kept indoors, so some level of hunting is expected.

Rats and mice are not nice things to have in your garden, let me assure you...

If that makes you happier the fly my cat caught survived and flew away when I put her back out and so did the seagull my cat went for...in fact the cat got the worse of it.

I also have two cute foxes using my garden and I believe they kill more of the native wildlife than my cat ever will...

On another note I was surprised to read that some people's cats also catch snakes! I honestly thought they would be scared of getting near them :).

@Startingagainandagain i understand perfectly well about cats, and that they are a non-native predator existing in unnaturally high population densities (unlike foxes which are part of the ecosystem). Field mice, woodmice, voles, shrews and songbirds are not house pests and many species (a chaffinch was mentioned upthread), are already under severe pressure.

i control my dogs and would never let them kill wild animals, cat owners in countries where they are expected to take responsibility for their pets manage to do the same. But in the U.K. it seems that cat owners are uniquely absolved of all responsibility for their pets. And then raise merry hell when a farmer or gamekeeper shoots them.