The attraction of eating house plants.......

I work at a garden center, we have a nursery as well as an indoor plant store. I constantly hear from customers having concerns with there cat eating their house plants. Maia is an angel when it comes to this, well almost. Her interest in the plants is the possible shells or rocks around the base, she will play with them and paw them out! So I occasionally find a shell or rock in the curtains or on the floor ! I think this is because she has been around them all her life, I ask her to respect them as I give her respect, they have there space, she has hers. Try putting a plant on her window perch, that is asking for trouble!
Any of you have plant eating kitties?

The only house plants I have are cat grass

My plant eating kitties are the reason why I don't bring anything home from the greenhouse

I have several beautiful plants, tropical, tender perennials, cactus, succulent, hanging and shelved, she respects them all! And my past kitties the same, I think because it was a common in their environment and I instilled they respect them. Of course she gets soooo much attention from me, sometimes she probably wishes I would leave her alone! She definitely knows that disturbing the plants is not the type of attention she wants!
I couldn't imagine a home without plants, the air is so much cleaner and a bit of nature indoors is so refreshing! Then again, I do live in NYC!

My sweetie is really good around the plants - she only eats hers (a big pot of cat grass). I was fully prepared to get rid of the plants when we got her, but she doesn't touch them.

As for her brother...I don't think he even knows they exist. Typical guy.

Originally Posted by Ms. Freya

My sweetie is really good around the plants - she only eats hers (a big pot of cat grass). I was fully prepared to get rid of the plants when we got her, but she doesn't touch them.

As for her brother...I don't think he even knows they exist. Typical guy.

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That last line caused a laugh attack! How true in the house plant sense. Though you would be pleasantly surprised in the business, how many extremist plant caring men are out there!

Of course they respect my plants.


I've never seen them actually eating the plants. Just batting sections of them around the room. I had always blamed Shareena for breaking off pieces and throwing them on the floor for Miss Patchwillow, because Shareena was the one I saw sitting in the pot. Then I caught Miss Patchwillow in the act, with Shareena egging her on.

Originally Posted by GoldyCat

Of course they respect my plants.


I've never seen them actually eating the plants. Just batting sections of them around the room. I had always blamed Shareena for breaking off pieces and throwing them on the floor for Miss Patchwillow, because Shareena was the one I saw sitting in the pot. Then I caught Miss Patchwillow in the act, with Shareena egging her on.

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One of my major advantages is Maia is a single kitty as I her best friend! Her only encouragement towards the plants is from me, and that is pampering and respecting them! In return we get fresh air in our NYC apartment!

My cat likes my house plants, but does not eat them. She lays next to them in jungle cat fashon, lol. The only plants I had that the cats (had 2 at the time) went nuts for was, uh, um, well, lets just say I was growing tomatoes, in my closet. (this was many years ago)

Tilly doesn't care about the houseplants she just leaves them alone.

Moo on the other hand. thinks they are his own personal Salad Bar and will EAT ANYTHING he can find...when he was at my mom;s house he ate one of her plants and had a seizure!

SO I took him to the vet and he said that is because alot of plants are deadly to cats! Luckily moo was fine. (he never stays at my mom's anymore when I go away..I have her come to me)

BUT he either eats them or has a personal vendetta against them...he will pee on the plant if the base is big enough or (in the case of my lucky bamboo) he will tug on the plant until they are uprooted and then he will push the pot to the floor and watch it shatter then sit in the remains and purr loudly until I come to see what happened.

Because of this..I only get plants that are ok for cats or hanging baskets so he can reach them...and I did get one of those awesome AEROGardens but i put it ontop of a bookcase and he gave up reaching it after a few days.

But his FAVORITE plant to eat...is Roses. HE WILL DO ANYTHING to eat a ROSE!! and After having Rose ice Cream I can FINALLY understand why!

Originally Posted by vampcow

Because of this..I only get plants that are ok for cats or hanging baskets so he can reach them...and I did get one of those awesome AEROGardens but i put it ontop of a bookcase and he gave up reaching it after a few days.

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This would never work with my cats. They LOVE the top of bookcases, especially those that are at least six feet tall.

Originally Posted by Trillcat

My cat likes my house plants, but does not eat them. She lays next to them in jungle cat fashon, lol. The only plants I had that the cats (had 2 at the time) went nuts for was, uh, um, well, lets just say I was growing tomatoes, in my closet. (this was many years ago)

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Maia also loves to sit amongst the plants, In the "jungle"! Yeah, there are those "tomatoes " that attract kitties to munch on, gotta watch for that!

Oh no no no plants for us. My cats will eat anything and everything (to my ultimate distress in wrapping xmas pressents, elliott ate ribbon that year and had shiny metallic poop). He is such a little scavenger that he got into my no kitty room, ate a plant he was NOT supposed to and proceeded to cost me 400 + in vet bills to have him hospitalized, cost for poisin control, etc.

Needless to say we have learned our lesson so no plants for us.