Live with cats? Here’s how to cat-proof your home

22 Jan, 2021

Live with cats? Here’s how to cat-proof your home

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If you are a real cat lover and find you keep adding cats to your pet family, you may need to cat-proof your home. As a pet owner you want to care for your pets, and as a home owner you also need to protect your property. Here are some top tips for how to cat proof your pet’s living environment, keeping your home safe when you live with cats and when you leave then with catsitters to care for them in your absence.

Love cats? Then you need to cat-proof your home

cat-proof
Cats are adorable and yet they can cause damage to your home. You need to cat-proof your living environment

Do you love cats as much as we do? Whether you have a penchant for orange cats or a special breed of cat, read on to learn how to protect your home.

Indeed, nothing can be compared to a cat’s love, soft purring in the morning, and a warm, fluffy paw gently rubbing you on a Sunday evening. If you own a kitty, you’re lucky – although, sometimes, being lucky means having a few minor scratches on the body. Well, it happens. The cost of living with an independent creature, right? It’s all worth it!

While a few body marks caused by your cat won’t make much of a difference or diminish the amount of your love and devotion to the pet, this might not be the case when you see the cat damage done to your house.

Think shredded sofas devastated by claws, rugs and carpets ruined from urine or vomit, or malfunctioning technical devices suffering from missing buttons or bitten electrical cords.

If you fail to cat-proof your house, besides risking your expensive household objects, you risk allowing a dangerous living environment for your pet, as many items in your home are toxic to cats.

If you live with a cat and hold their health and happiness close to the heart, check out our tips to successfully cat-proof your home.

Cat-proof electric cords

Blind or electric cords, cables, and phone chargers are inevitably cats’ favourite toys. Unfortunately, the cords often break, leaving your devices non-functioning and your cat – electrocuted or strangled. To make sure your home is cat-proof, try to cover up the cables, for example, by pushing them under a rug.

An even safer way is to buy proper furniture for your electronic devices, such as a TV wall unit designed to cover the cords. A secure TV unit doesn’t mean you have to give up on a good interior design – for instance, Sena Furniture offers modern TV units that are both safe and classy. Both you and your cat will love it.

Plants and Flowers

Your kitten chewing on a new plant will surely be annoying and devastating – both to the plant and to the appearance of your house. However, did you know it might also be dangerous to the cat?

Before you buy any new plant for your house, make sure it’s not toxic to your cat. In this case it might be more manage your indoor plants carefully rather than cat-proof your plants.

cat-proof
Choose your indoor plants and their pots carefully

Watch out especially for lilies, sago palms, and cyclamen, which are highly poisonous to cats. Always remember to contact the veterinarian regarding all the other new flowers that you buy. You can also hang your flowers up by the ceiling if you want to be sure the cats won’t be able to reach them. That’s one sure way to cat-proof you living environment.

Cat-proof windows and balconies

Cats love sitting in front of the window or on the balcony, observing the birds, getting excited over other cats, and annoyed at dogs. Unfortunately, so many distractions might lead to a terrible accident.

Every year thousands of cats – even very athletic ones – fall from heights, break their limbs, and suffer from internal injuries.

Don’t test the theory regarding nine lives. If you have a big window or balcony, better limit your cat’s access to the area. It would be best if you didn’t encourage your pet to go there looking for cat food or litter boxes – better store such items in a safe place in your flat.

However, if your kitten’s favorite location is the balcony, you can also install a safety net there. Protecting your feline from accidentally falling by using cat proof fencing on your balcony.

Can you cat-proof curtains and Sofas?

Curtains and sofas are what kitties usually love the most. Not without reason, too: climbing is what comes naturally to them. The way to cat proof your home, besides avoiding installing long curtains and putting a sofa cover on your furniture, you should buy cat toys.

This will help to satisfy this inherent need of feline climbing and scratching, for instance consider buying a scratching post or a cat climbing tree. Buying a cat climbing tree will help to cat proof your home and it will help to make your cat healthy, safe, and very happy.

are all orange cats male
Meet Buddy – an orange cat, male and feisty

Keep chemicals safely put away

When working to cat proof your home, remember about finding a good place to store all your chemicals: household cleaners, garage items, medications, personal care products, etc. Very often, a colorful substance might be tempting to the cat, who, thinking it’s cat food, will get poisoned, experience kidney damage, or even die.

You should store all chemicals – starting from moisturizers to drain cleaners and bleach – in a high cabinet or use a child-proof lock on the low cabinets. When it comes to house automotive chemicals, such as motor oil or antifreeze stored in the garage, put them into a locker container with limited access.

The same goes for fuels, paints, pesticides, and so on. Don’t risk your cat’s health and safety – better safe than sorry. It is a vital lesson in how to cat proof your house.

What to do when you want to cat proof a home in summary

Be sure to put all chemicals and cleaning fluids away after cleaning to help you cat-proof your home.

The list of advice when are want to cat proof your home can be rather extensive. Whether you’re an experienced cat owner or have just adopted a new cat, possibly some of those methods you’ve already known, or maybe you created some tips yourself, too.

When you cat proof a property, the general rule is to make sure to treat your animals as human babies. When you think something wouldn’t be safe for a baby, it surely would also be dangerous to a cat.If you have

Moreover, always make sure to scan your room for possible dangers, and consider what needs – or behaviors – your pet tries to satisfy by playing with it. This way, you might develop creative ideas on products that will successfully take your kitten’s attention from the dangerous pieces. Good luck.

REFERENCES ABOUT KEEPING CATS, CATSITTING AND HOW TO CAT-PROOF A HOME

At Housesitmatch.com we like to share authoritative articles on related topics to the one you have found online. Please read on to find a curated group of articles about keeping cats and cat sitting.

How to pet proof a home

Housesit Match on Cat-sitting

Preparing a home for a house or pet sitter

What is House Sitting?

 

 


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LamiaW

LamiaW

Founder and Director of HouseSitMatch - I'm a hands-on Admin on the site. Please ask any questions and as soon as I can I'll happily answer and assist where I can.

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