Cat Stealing.....EVERYTHING!!

What are you doing to cat proof your house?

Many years ago, I had a food thief living with me. One day, she jumped on top of the fridge trying to get at a loaf of bread that I thought was safe up there. The bread was resting on a cloth placement. When she landed on top, the placemat slipped, which caused her to fall and hit her mouth on the counter top on the way to the ground. After I paid the vet bill to have her jaw put back together (she dislocated it on the way down), I started a concerted effort to keep all food locked in cabinets, storage bins, etc. The bread found a home inside the microwave. Eventually, she stopped trying to get food, as it was never available to her.

A cat will grow out of this condition, but you need to be ever diligent on keeping food away from him. A spray bottle never works, as it doesn't teach the behavior you expect of him.

Spray bottles can work IMO, but they are very very difficult to use properly.

If a cat sees that the water from the spray bottle is coming from you, they simply associate you with spraying them. That means that they may completely miss the fact that they should be associating it with the action they just performed, or even if they do make the connection (most don't) may simply check to see if you're close by.

A far more effective tool is a product called the SSSCAT which uses a motion sensor to release a puff of air. This can be set on countertops you want to stop a cat from cruising.

But as was said, first and foremost you simply have to kitty proof the house, and that means that all food needs to be in the fridge or in the pantry. No exceptions. When cooking or eating, my kitties are allowed to watch, but if they get too close (especially when working w/ sandwich meat for example), I make a "TSSST!" sound, and they scamper off. After a while, I haven't had to do that as they know what respectable distance they have to keep to enjoy the show of me preparing or enjoying a meal. It also helps to consistently only feed them in one or two spots in the home, so they know food not in those spots is not for them. So never never never give a scrap at the table or anything. You can also try smaller more frequent meals for kitty. My two get fed at 5AM, 2PM, and 11PM as an example. Something similar make work for you.

And no worries, back when I joined this forum, Wesley was a handful and I posted about him even stealing an ENTIRE leg of lemon garlic chicken I had just put on the table and turned my back on only for a second.

As mentioned by others, the first priority would be to cat proof the house. In particularly food items Ducman mentioned Ssssccat which I have used in the past with success. Around the Christmas tree... don't ask I use the water bottle but it's difficult to spray them when I'm not close to them and they associate me with the squirting. This is probably something your meezer will grow out of. My Ramsey was a thief but it was not food related. He loved to steal any jewelry item, kleenex, you name it, I left on my nightstand. I just started locking everything up and eventually he stopped the thievery.

I watched (at a friend's house) a whole cooked ham nearly slide off the buffet table once. Her cat Toby had his hooks in it and was determined to drag it off and presumably eat it. Toby was a holy terror with food until he turned about 2.