Leaving Junior alone for 36 hours

This holiday will be the first time I've left Junior (9 mo) alone over night. I'll be leaving Wednesday morning and returning Thursday evening. Other than making sure the litter box is clean and there is plenty of food and water, is there anything else I should do before I leave? I do plan on restricting him to just half of the house. I'm sure this is a common question but I'm still adjusting to being owned by a cat.

Mez

PS - I should say that my main concern is food. I normally feed him 2 pouches of wet food and just a little bit of dry food each day. I'm not sure how he'll do with just dry food available.

That's a long time to be left alone imho. What if he spills the water & has none, eats all his food the 1st day or has an accident with his litter box.
You'd have to crawl on your hands & knees to make sure there was nothing around that he could get into.
Is there someone who could come in a couple of times & check on him.
I've never left Blossom alone longer than about 10 hours. Then I'm lucky that my sons can look after her if we go away.

I think he would be fine. Do you have some sort of feeder to use so that he doesn't eat all his food on day 1? Just leave lots of toys to keep him occupied and make sure there isn't anything he can get into that would hurt him.

He'll probably be okay. You could freeze a portion of wet food, by the time it thaws he could have that Wednesday night.

The problem of having someone stop by is Junior is only social with me. He runs and hides from everyone else.

His water and food bowls are both stainless steel bowls which are wider at the base then at the top so tipping the bowls over is virtually impossible. Also, Junior has been a grazer from day one so I don't anticipate him eating all the food at one time. I do like the idea of freezing some wet food for him to eat after I leave. Thanks for that suggestion, missymotus.

As for the litterbox, in the 2 months I've had Junior he has not had a single accident. But I've never left the box unscooped for more than 10-12 hours either.

Mez

Then he's probably fine. My wife and I had to leave Juniper for about the same time the first weekend we got him, since we had plans before getting him, and while we had someone come over, he wasn't social at all towards them.

Still, that person made sure he had food, scooped the box, and tried to play with him for a little bit.

About a month later, we ended up doing the same thing (hey, fall is camping season!) and we had a different set of friends come by. He was much more playful, but still had lots of food and water. By the time I had come home on Sunday, he had somehow knocked over his food, but he still had a fair amount of it in the bowl (and he's not averse to eating food next to the bowl, apparently!).

36 hours isn't all that long for a single cat. He's probably going to be lonely, so having someone stop by and check on him wouldn't be a bad idea, but I don't think it's necessary. One of the advantages of cats is that most are OK to keep themselves safe or at least occupied for a short weekend trip.

The first weekend we had Jack we left him alone for almost 36 hours (had plans made before hand) and he did great--used the box without fail. He was in our downstairs bathroom as he was only about 10 weeks old.

And yesterday I went to stay with my parents (hubby outta town) and I left him for 24 hours and he did great.

We will be leaving him again this week for 48 hours because of Thanksgiving.

I make sure to play him tired before I leave--he's young (13 weeks) so he naps a lot.

I leave the radio on when we are gone so he can hear the voices.

I will add that none of my neighbors know we have him--we don't wanna pay the deposit... Oh yeah and my neighbors are a little on the scuzzy side...wouldn't let them in the house for any reason really...

Leslie

If he's only 13 weeks why don't you take him with you? It would be great socialization for him.

I'd love to take him with us--however my parents have a dog (who hates cats) and my extended family will be there as well and they do not care for cats.


Leslie

Do you have chance to go out and buy an automatic feeder? We normally have neighbours call on our kittens twice a day when we go away, but on one occasion they were all away (at the same place as us!), so we purchased an automatic feeder for each cat (at vast expense!) so we could continue with their wet food consumption as normal.

The advantage of these is that they keep it chilled (you put ice in the top) and the feeding is timed - to be honest I'd be worried about leaving frozen wet food down, in case the cat decides to eat it while it's still very cold.

If you don't have chance to get an automatic feeder or ask a neighbour to visit, I'm sure you won't be gone long enough to cause him much concern, as long as you leave plenty of water and dry food out for him.

Bruce&Sheila

I got back a few hours ago and my house is still in one piece! Junior was very glad to see me but was even happier when I gave him a bowl of wet food .I'd left a partial serving down along with the frozen serving when I'd left and I'm sure they were both gone yesterday. After that he played and played before lying down to rest per his usual routine.

Mez

Glad it all went well