Do Your Cats Go Outdoors?

Originally Posted by SammiesMom

Interestingly enough, I read a statistic last year when I first got Sammie that said outdoor cats' average lifespan (remember, folks, this is statistical stuff...your experience may differ) was a mere 5 years!

OTOH, a strictly indoor kitty can live 15 years and beyond. That sealed the deal for me.

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I grew up in a house with indoor-outdoor kitties, and that statistic sounds completely right to me. I back up my parents decision, we had a lot of cats, and I think that they all lived happy lives, however long or short they were, and they got good care and good food, and a lot of them were strays before we took them in. But for all that many of our cats definitely lived well into their teens, for every of them there were 4 or 5 cats that didn't make it past 1 year because they got nabbed by a predator or hit by a car. It's a tough world out there and natural selection will pick out the kitties that aren't the strongest or smartest pretty quickly. For our family, it wasn't about having one dedicated very special pet, it was about taking care of as many kitties for as long as they were around, so we let them live as they wanted to, in or out. ( The number of times I've heard that phrase as someone held a door open for a cat in our house! "In or out, cat.")

But I agree, 100% -- if you're keeping your cat as a pet, and you want it to live a long, healthy, and safe life, guaranteed, unless you live in a rural area without much in the way of predators (in which case, where do you live so I can move there with my cats!), keep it inside.

Obviously, all my kitties are indoor cats. My hubby is lucky enough to live in such a place -- an enclosed trailer park with little traffic, and no animals other than pets, so his kitty goes in and out during the spring, summer and fall, and just stays in during the winter. My cats are also all rescues, so I would be terrified of them getting confused or scared and running off if they were outside, poor things.

mine dont go outside. patchy was adopted with a 'strictly indoor' clause but id keep her in anyway.

i have 9 cats. i put a cat safe fence on top of the wooden fence in the backyard. but i still only let them out in the backyard only in the daytime and only when i'm out there with them too. never alone and never after dark. in the 15 years that we've had cats here we never lost one or had one get hurt.

Mine have outdoor access, but only one of the fosters goes out (we had no choice with him, if you dont let him, he will try and escape everytime the door is open, he managed 5 weeks inside). I do live in a safe area though, I have lived here for 6 years, and only heard of one cat being in an RTA (she is fine now). Dont need to worry about any of the neighbours cats bullying htem, as my foster is the neighbourhood bully, so he does have selected outdoor access (ie if i get up and there is a cat about, he doesn't go out till they have gone!!)

Both my boys are indoor kitties. I signed a contract with the breeder agreeing that they would never go outdoors and never be declawed ~ a deal's a deal .

Danny only goes out on his leash. I don't want him getting hurt or killing the small animals around here.

My four live inside. In Georgia there are too many natural predators, even in the middle of the city where I live. Don't even get me started on traffic but suffice to say it's miserable. Before moving to this house, though, we lived in an area where I felt safe letting my cats out some during the day but they were predominantly indoor then too. Now, we take sniffing/rolling/nibbling trips to the fenced in backyard. If a predator could even make it past my fence they'd meet my crazy dog and an even crazier me!

Originally Posted by goonie

i have 9 cats. i put a cat safe fence on top of the wooden fence in the backyard. but i still only let them out in the backyard only in the daytime and only when i'm out there with them too. never alone and never after dark. in the 15 years that we've had cats here we never lost one or had one get hurt.

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Well I'm glad that you have cat safe fence. I say that because last month while watching tv I was suddenly interrupted by this terrible screeching sound outside. I thought it was two cats fighting at first but the noise wasn't like anything I'd heard before so I went to investigate. When I went out to backyard I was rather shocked at whet I saw.

Hanging upside down form the wooden fence was one of the female stays that lives around the neighborhood. Somehow she had gotten her back leg caught between a small gap in the boards. Poor thing was scratching the fence like crazy and swinging wildly trying free herself. A very unsettlingly sight to say the least. I had to wrap her up in towel just to get her to calm down (and keep myself from getting clawed to death) and then it took me almost 10 minutes to get her leg out. I was actually getting a bit panicked because nothing I was doing seem to be working and there was no one around to help me but fortunately a moment later she was free. I don't think I'd ever seen a cat run so fast in my life. Saw her a couple days later though and she appeared to be ok.

As for my Gizmo I keep him indoors. I'm a worrier and I'd be so paranoid that somehow he'd get away from me.

Yes, my cats go outdoors.

They have a cat flap, and in the warm weather doors and windows are wide open, to help air movement in the house, and they come and go as they please. They don't actually spend a lot of time outdoors, except when it's very warm, and for the most part they stay fairly close to the house.

I understand the hazards that are cited as reasons to keep cats indoors, and in fact in thirty years of having cats in my life, I have had two go missing, one as a youngster, the other at the age of 8. On the other hand, I have had five other cats in my life, all of whom have been healthy, have not been beaten up by neighbourhood critters, and avoid vehicles -- and those who are no longer with me have lived into their teens or later and died of causes unrelated to the outdoors access. Cindy and Fawn are about to be 7 in a little over a month. So, the statistics aren't really supported in my family or my expreience, for that matter.

I believe the decision to allow outdoor access or not, and to what extent, has to be based solely on the specific situation -- location, specific hazards, living quarters, humans' habits, the cats themselves. If the equation does not support letting them out, then they should be kept in and their lives enriched with cat furniture, toys and interaction, to whatever extent is necessary for their wellbeing. If the equation does support allowing them the outdoors, then they should have the choice.

As you can tell, I've had occasion to re-think that, and I have twice come to the conclusion that the disappearance of a kitty, while agonizing and a tragedy, does not warrant restricting other cats if the ground rules of the situation have not changed. It's no different than when a child disappears -- you don't lockup all the other children -- it's a tragedy, to be sure, but it is one incident.

I know the vast majority of people on this board disagree with this view, and I absolutely respect everyone's right to make up their own mind, based on their own situation.

Oh, and BTW, the 8-year-old who disappeared is Suzy. She has been gone 8 months as of today. Cats have been gone longer and returned, and I haven't felt her "leave", so I'm hopeful, still.

All 6 of my cats are indoor only cats. I do have an abyssinian who begs to go for rides in the truck. He gets his little harness put on him, and jumps on our shoulders to go to the truck. When his ride is over he jumps from the drivers side of the truck to husbands shoulders to go back inside. His paws never hit the pavement. The little man loves his rides! He sits in the center console and navigates.

We do have a stray who adopted my neighbor and us 3 years ago, we tried to make him a indoor only house cat but he wants to live the life of a well fed Hobo. He gets medical attention, has been neutered, fed well(he weighs 17 pounds). He wants no part of the indoors.

5 here, and all but one go outside. I live in a "rural" area so we still have the coons, bats, hawks and so forth. My big black one loves to hunt snakes and bring them IN the house. They have their own doors, front and back, right next to our doors. Each night at about 9pm, everyone is brought in and the doors are locked.

As for outside to inside cats living long lives?? My husband's baby Satin is over 13 yrs old. He comes and goes as he pleases. He is the alpha male of the group and "head" of the cat household to say. He gets his shots, taken to the vet for the illnesses he catches. My other 3 who goes out are about Figget at 4 and Dakota(our special one) and Daisy at around 3 yrs of age now. If any of them were to go early, I have to say Dakota because of the seizures he has had in the past.

<--from Fl also

Fluffee

Cocoa is around 1 year old and she is an indoor/outdoor cat, but we have a Petsafe electronic cat fence. The wire goes around my backyard chainlink fence. Cocoa stays in an enclosure on the back patio at night (unless its cold, then the dogs come in the garage and Cocoa sleeps in my bathroom, usually in the clothes basket), we put her collar on in the morning and she's free to explore the backyard. And she usually comes to the patio door around 8PM, ready to come inside and either lie on the bed or sleep in my mom's lap. The cat fence is the best thing I could every imagine for her. She's a tortoiseshell and she's much calmer since she's allowed to go outside. And it only took about three days to train her on it. She won't go anywhere near the chainlink fence the wire is attached to. We have dogs in the back yard as well and they all get along great, so I don't worry about predators coming into the yard and being a problem.

Shelter won't let me adopt a cat b/c I told them I plan to let it outside. Doesn't cat becomes neurotic if kept indoor all the time? I know I would go insane if that's done to me.

i keep my cats indoor at all times. i live on a really busy highway. im afraid if i let them out they'd get hit (i mean i got hit by a truck a couple months ago on this road & im lucky to be alive). im afraid of people finding them & keeping them, im afraid of ppl hurting them, or getting hurt by a dog or other animal. there are too many dangers out there & i love them too much to let them get hurt or killed. my bfs cousin lived with us for a while, & he brought his cat. he got locked up for a fine or something. while Smokey lived with us, he started going outside (when at first he was scared to go out) bc the back door was always left open in the summer time for the dog to go in and out when he wanted to(no one in this house cared, besides me, if he went out). Eventually, one night, my bf went outside to move his truck into the driveway, & Smokey was out there too, & he darted out into the street & got hit by a passing car. he came in screaming "Smokey just got hit by a car!!!!" we all ran outside, my bf went out into the street & got him, layed him on the porch, & he died a few minutes later. im just glad he didnt suffer. but i dont want that to happen to my babies, so no outside for them. I am getting my bf & his friend to build an enclosure out in the backyard when it starts getting warmer out. bc Monster doesnt like the leash.

I have actually been thinking of putting my 6 month old male kitten on a leash and take him for a walk outside I see he has some interest in it and he was found outdoors. Still I don't want him to try to get out when I am not home and I don't want to start a trend where he sits at the door and meows for hours to get out what do you think? I just want him to experience a great life and I don't want to deprive him of anything.

7 cats here and none go outside, and none are neurotic or insane. I live in a suburban neighborhood and I just feel that its safe. But, I could love in the country with no road or neighbors for miles and I still would keep them inside. We had outdoor cats as a kid growing up and they all died of being hit by a car, attacked by raccoons, etc. That was enough for me. And a few would like to go outside, but I have the opposable thumbs, so they don't really have a choice in the matter.
My rescue will adopt cats out who will be let outside, but I am allowed to veto any adoption for my own personal foster kittens and cats, and none of mine are allowed to be adopted to an indoor/outdoor home.

People who thinks they care about animal welfare are just projecting what they want onto the animals.

Originally Posted by yiplong

People who thinks they care about animal welfare are just projecting what they want onto the animals.

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?? I'm not sure what's meant by this...

No. It is very dangerous out there, aside from the unfriendly dogs, amount of cars, dangerous wildlife, people who hate cats and kill or harm them, dangerous chemicals and plants, fleas and ticks, heartworm threats, getting in fights with other cats, getting viruses and diseases, she is a Sphynx and lacks hair and would get sunburned.