pesky next door cat...

Hi Everyone, I'm new here - we moved into our flat last summer and it has a lovely garden that we are just beginning to look at taming...

My trouble is next door's cat.

First - I love cats, I grew up with at least four at a time and am finding it really weird not to have one at the moment (we have a one year old boy who is taking up most of our time at the moment!)

However, as I grew up with cats I've never had the problem of them pooing all over the garden - they've always done it in someone else's and stopped other cats doing it in ours!!

Our garden is vaguely communal - it is open all around our block of six flats, but with 1/2ft walls to segment the garden spaces. Next door's cat seems to think that any bit of earth I dig over for flowers/sowing a nice new lawn is a lovely toilet just for him.

Any ideas what I can do to stop him?!! I've tried ground black pepper, and 'get off' green jelly granule things, but it's not working. We are thinking of going to the local zoo and getting a bag of lion poo...

Any better ideas?!

Cheers guys

 

Well if you previously had four cats that that 'left deposits in someone else's' rather than yours and now you have someone else's cat leaving deposits in your garden you can't really complain.

You'll maybe manage to reduce contamination by lifting every heap you find and applying the stuff you mentioned. Lion poo might help too, as would chasing the creatures with a pump-up water pistol. However you can rest assured that so long as there is a cat in the vicinity and you provide some nice soft earth it will be used as a kitty loo.
Covering tilled soil with plastic (cheap) or wire netting will keep the pests off and once you get plants in there will be less space for them to settle for a .... in comfort. You could also try thorny cuttings from holly, berberris or roses scattered on the ground.

 

I find the thorny cuttings a good aversion for cats to settle in private. but i know chicken wire laid over the soil also works. The lion poo pellets didn't make much difference to one of my custs, But i know alot of folks believe in it so i wont pooh pooh it :D :D

 

Thorny cuttings is a great idea - I've just pulled a load of old tomato plant stalks out of the grow bag they were in last year (I know, lazy lazy - we try, but it is hard to keep on top of everything!) I'll put them over the sunflower bed and see what happens.

I was only joking about the lion poo - I didn't realise you could actually buy it!! :D

Thanks so much for your help

 

Strange... but we don't see many cats around here..only our own of course :confused:

Cute 'aint she? :D

 

I think she ate them all, she looks stuffed ! :D

 

I can just imagine all the neighbourhood cats clawing at their doors begging to be let back in :D
Don't suppose you could pursuade Mrs Pal to knit a few and flog them to GC members. :rolleyes:

 

Not sure how she'll knit the teeth, Dave..... (and I know - she's the cat's mother.....) :rolleyes:

Yes, the lion poo is sold under the name of Silent Roar, which some of the GCs sell, Polly!

 

I have heard that citrus helps- bits of lemon and orange peelings in the right places. Also stuck loads of prunings from last autumn in the veg patch and so far no more kitty litter.

 

pollyc, you answered the question yourself. If you have a cat (preferably a neutered tom) it will go elsewhere to do it`s business but it will keep other cats out of the garden. David.

 

get a pack of moth balls and crunch them up spread them around that is supposed to work

 

I have been putting those small green garden canes and snapping them in half and putting them into my borders and beds and it seems to have worked!! If cats can't sit they can't S**t!! So they say!! :D

 

Thanks so much to everyone for your help - at the moment I am putting the spiky prunings from my other neighbours rosebush all over the exposed earth and it seems to be doing the trick!
Hopefully it will work until we get our own cat, which won't be long now! just waiting for the baby to get a bit bigger...
Thanks again