How to stop my cat bringing in dead animals

[Seventyandlovingit]

My cat is gorgeous (see cat tax attached). However, he is also a real hunter and since we moved to a house closer to the edge of town, he is having a field day - and night! So far, he has brought in a rat, and a mole, and various other delicacies. The bigger prey he just leaves lying around for me to appreciate (i.e. chuck in the bin) but he eats the smaller stuff, then regurgitates it about an hour later - it's not pleasant! I've tried keeping him in at night, which he is used to, but he has now taken to yowling for ages to be let out. If I do let him out and change the cat flap so he can't get back in, he yowls outside it at 5.00 in the morning (like he has been doing off and on for the past hour!). I do understand that he's only doing what cats do, but that doesn't mean I have to like it! Has anyone got any tips for stopping this behaviour?

There is such a thing as a cat flap that detects if they have something in their mouth and doesn’t let them in!

If you do play sequence games with your cat for 15 minutes a day it lessons their hunting drive by up to 25%. My cat hasn't brought anything in the house for 2 years since I started this and he used to bring a mouse at least once a week.

https://www.preventivevet.com/cats/prey-sequence-cat-play-sessions#:~:text=When%20cats%20hunt%2C%20they%20follow,in%20more%20detail%20further%20below.

We did 2 things (simultaneously, do it could just be one working).
Night time curfew, which youve already tried. And a bell. This has (obviously) stopped all nightvtine hunting, but we also get very little during the day too. Many don't like bells and the required collar on cats tho

Gorgeous panther you have there!

Knowing what a tough time our wildlife is going through, I'd be doing absolutely everything in my power to keep him in.

It's far busier on the roads, too, so he could be hit by a car and then you'll never know what happened to him 😭

My mum has just started keeping her cat inside as another cat beat the crap out of her ( admittedly trouble causing 🙄) little sod, and it's taken two lots of antibiotics for him to recover.

Build a catio. Keep him/wildlife safe.

Yes, the ‘no prey’ or ‘only cat’ cat flaps use AI to detect prey and lock the flap till the cat drops it.

I know somebody who’s just got one of those. It cost a bomb, apparently, but seems to be working - although it only solves the problem of the cat not bringing its prey into the house. There’s still the issue of protecting the wildlife from the cat.

We adopted a third cat last year who turned out to be a bird hunter. A collar and bell has pretty much stopped it. We’ve not had a bird brought in in months.

I do like them to hunt a bit though as we have chickens so they keep down any rodents who might be about.

Does your cat bring in live ‘catch’? I have two cats. One was beside me on the sofa. There must have been some noise which grabbed his attention, because he raced off quickly to see what his sister had. I had the back door open for them to come in and out as they wished.

Girlcat had brought a blinkin’ field mouse inside, and it was hiding under a set of shelves. In a house with two cats, I had to trap the blasted mouse myself. I brought it outside, and it ran off into the grass. Girl cat was there for another while, looking at where it had been.

I now don’t leave the door open. We didn’t get a cat flap for this very reason. The little bugg&rs would have the place full of live vermin. Boy cat brought in a little mouse once, dropped it and then jumped on the sofa for a snooze. Again, it was muggins who had to find it. Mind you his sister did help that time.

They are put to bed in a downstairs room. Out of earshot. They’re fine, they have litter, beds, water and a few kibbles. They are tended to first thing in the morning,

I screamed this morning when I picked a leaf up only to find out it was a dead baby mole ….. we’ve 2 just 1 yr old brothers, one’s a coward one’s a hunter ! I keep looking at the fancy cat flap but we’ve not got a plug socket nearby 😭😭😭😭

They’ve both got collars and bells, it’s just slowed him down !

Put a bell on him.

Mine respond surprisingly well to 'training'. They bring things in as a gift for me, so each time they do, I pick the random rodent up by it's tail and the cat will follow me out of the back door to the garden, where I drop it in a specific spot. The cat is happy that this is the particular place where I want my 'gift' (which he/she will then play with and/or eat). It only takes 2 or 3 times of doing this for the cat to get the message, and that's where they leave the prey - which is preferable to indoors.

Sometimes they forget and need to re-learn the rules, but it generally works.

I figured it's better for them to bring rodents and snakes into the garden than the bedroom...