Cat flaps in front doors?

[drunkenmaster]

When they are young, its mostly, at the moment, earthworms

We have a fairly damn big 9 lbs not at all fat male and a much smaller female. He despite being huge is a big wuss and she at the moment keeps bringing earthworms into the house. Alive, squirming, probably not even hurt, she puts them down somewhere meows a bit for attention. He comes running and they both just sit near it watching with the occasional prod when it stops moving

I would say get the smallest, most secure catflap you can, might want to buy several if you start off with a young cat as kittens at a guess you wouldn't put a collar on so a lockable expensive one to start with wouldn't be best. Put it as low down and as far to the opposite side to the lock as possible. Change what you do inside the door if you put one in. Keep anything several feet away from the door. Have a wooden panel or something you can slide over the catflap and lock in place for overnight or if you are away and for when you don't want the cats out. Mine must have only been tiny and 4-5 months old, still pretty small and could force the catflap open

Hmm, trying to remember, we had a cat that lived to 18, i remember when i was very young she brought a bird home, but it was alive and only slightly hurt wing. got stuck in our kitchen flying about, eventually caught it and took it the vets. Our cats seem to not hurt anything, but have to bring it in to show us.

 

[RobH]

Our cats seem to not hurt anything, but have to bring it in to show us.

Yeah it's the same with our cats until they get bored and start chasing it around. Our cat has bought a huge frog in before, completely unharmed which was suprising.

 

[Tefal]

Sure - he's asking about houses without a backdoor. My point was that he only needs to be worried about the security risk if he believes it would be safer in the backdoor - I don't think it makes any difference. A hole in a door is a hole in a door.

yeah but it wont be seen and as such won't temp some drunken chav to do something to it.

 

[badbob]

Cats just seem to play with frogs, not eat them..perhaps instinct they know could be poisonous? Our two cats picked up frogs, plonked them down. As they bounce away cat picks them up again

 

[Fyebot]

When they are young, its mostly, at the moment, earthworms

Our kittens have been doing that too, but it escalated today, they brought in and deposited on the floor a whole live snake/slowworm (didn't get close enough to check, heh)

Cats just seem to play with frogs, not eat them..perhaps instinct they know could be poisonous? Our two cats picked up frogs, plonked them down. As they bounce away cat picks them up again

We had a cat when we lived backing on to the botanical gardens ponds in sheffield, I felt too guilty for the frogs to let it keep them so I spent a lot of time rescuing frogs and taking them back out over the wall.

I've been doing it with the worms they bring in too though, so our front flower bed is probably seething with rescued worms.

 

[drunkenmaster]

Our cats are kind of dumb, pick up a worm with your hand, they follow your hand and see where you put it and right back it came . Pick up worm with tissue, raise hand, they are still looking at the floor no clue its in your hand, go put worm somewhere, safe till they find a different one.

Reminded me, ages ago there was a mangled frog, a leg and part of body left, on the lawn they were looking at. No idea if they ate it, to be fair its far more likely it was killed by a fox as there are loads around the area.

Funniest thing ever with cats/kittens and catflaps is when its locked for some reason and they don't know, happened a few times. like sometimes when they broke out they'd force it past the bit that blocks it opening out, but it won't open in. Several times i've gone to see them, assumed door was open as they were out, knock on door they run to get in, BANG, straight into a catflap that won't open

Also accidentally kicked the female cat through the catflap once. THey seem to respond to the sound of the catflap rather than the door mostly. So tend to give it a few kicks to make noise to get them to come in. When its dark can't always see them coming, kicking catflap and 3rd kick of so if felt like i hit something pretty solid Nothing bad, only a tap really but cat basically just running into closed door again. Actually, those are funny, but funniest was when she(again, she's WAY faster than him so generally running into stuff is funnier with her) ran right down the hall, i could see sitting on sofa, she ran straight at full speed to catflap but for no apparent reason missed it, about 3 inches to the left and fell down looking dazed for a bit, then went out running break neck speed again.