Moving with a very old outdoorsy cat

[iwannafeelwhatloveis]

Any tips on moving house with an elderly 18 year old outdoor cat?

I know i need to keep her in but she’s very much the outdoorsy type and is hardly around. She has a cat flap and comes and goes as she pleases.

I am hoping she will remember how to use a litter tray again as if she gets out she’ll shoot from the garden and be lost as we are going quite some distance.

Any tips please? I’m really stressing over how she’ll be and she’s a lovely old thing (apart from the yowling).

My mother always used to say, butter the paws of à cat when you move them, they will be too busy to notice what’s going on. The key is to keep her busy, new catnip toys and new interesting slow feeder machine, and also some Beaphar calming cat treats to keep her calm.
and a familiar smelling place to use as a refuge. If you’ve a box or basket with a blank ie or jumper that smells of you, that she can get familiar with now, and also have in the new place.
she will miss her old territory and probably yowl more. Our 16 year old has started random yowling, I think he walks into a room and wonders where everywhere is! ( asleep, usually, as it’s the middle of the night!)

You could be right about keeping her distracted. When we moved with our cat, the familiar smells seemed to make the biggest difference. We brought her favorite blanket, left it unwashed for a while, and set up a quiet corner with it straight away in the new house. She spent most of the first day hiding there and gradually started exploring on her own.
The butter-on-the-paws trick made me smile — I've never tried it, but I can imagine a cat being completely offended by the sensation and forgetting everything else for a few minutes! 😄
The yowling is relatable too. Our older cat started doing something similar as she got older, especially at night. We'd find her standing in the hallway looking confused, then she'd settle as soon as she heard one of us talking. I think routine and familiar scents are probably the biggest comforts for them when so much else changes.