News You Can Bruise for 2005 April 18

Permalink [Comments] (13) Mon Apr 18 2005 17:05 Anticatnip:

There are stray cats that wander the neighborhood, and they like to sleep on the patio and in the garden. Sumana dislikes these cats; they creep her out. Is there an anticatnip I could plant that would let me externalize the cost of stray cats by getting them to sleep on other peoples' patios?
Comments:

Posted by Factitious at Mon Apr 18 2005 20:13

You could put catnip on all other patios.

Posted by Leonard at Mon Apr 18 2005 20:17

Or just throw catnip seeds surreptitiously over the fence and hope they germinate.

Posted by Voice of Experience at Mon Apr 18 2005 20:36

They will just eat the catnip and come back and sleep on the patio. Best to trap them and take them to the SPCA. Maybe the SPCA has a trap you can borrow.

Posted by John at Mon Apr 18 2005 20:43

I think Sumana should adopt one.

Posted by Seth Schoen at Mon Apr 18 2005 22:39

Maybe you can trap them in a /bin.

Posted by Clint Ecker at Mon Apr 18 2005 23:14

I don't know if this is true for all cats, but mine REALLY hate the smell of Earl Grey tea when its dry. They literally run away after taking a sniff of it!!

Posted by Brendan at Tue Apr 19 2005 01:19

Develop stereoisomers of catnip in your basement laboratory? Or maybe just hold some catnip up to a mirror, then reach through and grab it!

Posted by Brendan at Tue Apr 19 2005 01:21

No! Wait! Have your catnip grow a goatee!

Posted by Lionfire at Tue Apr 19 2005 01:47

Most cats hate citronella (mine certainly do). You should be able to buy it in a spray form somewhere. It's also good for deterring mosquitos.

If you want a more permanent solution, plant some citronella near where you don't want the cats.

Posted by Nik at Tue Apr 19 2005 05:04

I've been told that lemon (possibly lime) rind left around will have a similar effect to citronella. Perhaps obviously.

I'm having similar trouble myself (cats using my flowerbed as a toilet. Ech), but in the end gave in and bought a pre-prepared spray from the moderately vast array at B&Q, the huge chain DIY supplier in the UK. No sign of invading felines in the couple of days since beginning to apply it around the property border and all over the flowerbed (it shouldn't need daily application, but it's been raining almost constantly).

One of the other things proudly claimed to be '100% pepper'. Presumably chilli-derived. So you could try that.

Posted by mike at Tue Apr 19 2005 09:03

A friend of mine was worried that her cat was going to run away after she moved, because it seemed to hate coming back into her new house. Turns out there were a bunch of mothballs in the basement - once she got rid of those the cat was happy. Something chile pepper based probably would smell better to humans though.

Posted by Josh Myer at Thu Apr 21 2005 01:52

Everyone has missed the obvious solution: get a dog.

Posted by Nik at Fri Apr 22 2005 05:56

Damn. Stupid pre-prepared spray == not effective. Not only has it crapped in my flowerbed, it's dug up a flower. That's just rubbing my nose in it.

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