AI cat doors which bar entrance when cat has prey in mouth

[SusanOldknow]

After a recent period where my cat brought home some rats (some live), I have been looking at any options to stop this. My cat is an active young male aged around 4 so we might expect many more years of "gifts" being brought in.

I found there are some new AI-based options on the market - they are pricey but I'm definitely interested. Has anyone used these or is anyone thinking of doing so ? Really welcome anyone's thoughts
Examples I've been looking at are:
https://zeromouse.ai/
https://www.onlycat.com/

Also, cat tax provided:

I’m interested too. I fret every time I come home in case there is going to be blood/feathers/bones everywhere. These cat flaps seem to be about £400 at the moment and need to be plugged in - hoping the tech improves and comes down in price!

I’m in despair about my cat. I either lock the cat flap at night and she hates being kept in. Or lock her out and she screams to get in at dawn. To be fair. She screams outside every when the cat claims open because she wants breakfast at 5 am. I would keep your cat in at night and lock the cat flap.

I should have said - We have also tried an approach of keeping our cat locked in at night. This seems to cause a lot of stress for him, he is absolutely desperate to get out in the morning (from about 4 a.m. there is lots of attention-seeking behaviour), and also fairly desperate to get out in the evening, scratching at windows and so on.

One of the factors in working out what best to do, is that our cat has got feline cystitis, which is an ongoing problem where all the vet advice is that stress will worsen it or increase the tendency for recurrent attacks of cystitis. Allowing our cat to go in and out freely has seemed to reduce his stress a lot (but increased our worry about things being brought in, alive or dead...)

I'm currently most interested in the ZeroMouse option which can work with existing cat flaps and is about £200. I've also contacted the OnlyCats people with a query so we'll see. Both these do require a power source so that the device is essentially plugged in the whole time.

Today's been a busy day - Since I first posted this morning, my cat came in around lunchtime, holding another rat in his mouth ! (He must have found a nest somewhere). I managed to dispose of this one by throwing the cat out of the door (still clutching the rat) but this has spurred me on to go ahead and buy an AI catflap. I've bought the ZeroMouse one, if anyone is interested I'll add an update in a few days' time once it's arrived and I've got it set up.

@SusanOldknow please do update on the AI cat flap. I am looking at an OnlyCat and they have brilliant reviews but are very expensive.

I did laugh at your method for getting rid of the latest rat catch!

@SusanOldknow How have you got on with the Zeromouse? My fuzzball has been bringing in live rats on a daily basis and I've just about had enough of it!

So far it is working really well, will post more later plus pic

Installation was very quick. You will need a power socket ( or extension lead) by the cat door. The app generates pics of the cat like the attached, and you can feed back so the AI learns what is normal (No Prey) and what is Prey being brought in

However in the last 4 days since installing there haven't been any attempts by the cat as yet to bring in prey...

My ILs have an OnlyCat and swear it’s the best thing they’ve ever bought for their prolific mouser. It’s more expensive but they wanted something fully integrated rather than an add-on to their existing flap so they could manage everything through one app. The customer service has apparently been absolutely faultless when they’ve had questions, and they really enjoy the support group on FB where users share videos, help each other with policies and settings, and the OnlyCat team are active with responding to comments and giving development updates about what is coming next. ILs are constantly showing us “contraband detected” videos now and it’s quite funny seeing some of the bizarre things the cats try to bring in. They showed us one of a cat with a hot dog which tickled me they’re bloody clever devices!

Hot dog is a new one! Though our cat did try to bring in some pork crackling .
Pic of how it looks

@SusanOldknow Thanks for the update. Great to know that your little rascal has stopped bringing in gifts!

I think I will have to get either the Zeromouse or OnlyCat asap. At first it seemed like a lot of money, but I think my sanity is worth more.

Tbh I now feel quite relieved and I enjoy seeing the pics where he comes in!