What is it like?

kfleck

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What is it like to live with so many cats? I've noticed that many of you have LOTS of cats. And I thought that two cats might be too many!

Two cats in the house gets crazy at times. They wrestle each other, knock things off the shelves, get into any food that gets left out, nag to get into the bathroom while it is occupied, sleep on our heads, run around the house at night, etc. Do you get any sleep with that many cats in the house? Are you able to eat anything (especially yogurt or cheese) without getting malled to death by cats wanting a bite? Don't you get tired of all the cat hair in the house? Do you have to change the litter box every day? We change ours twice a week with two cats. Just curious what it is like.. stories please. I've never know anyone to own more than three cats before.
 

hissy

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My numbers change all the time. The most we ever had was 23. My cats have the option of indoor/outdoor and it is the kittens that keep us mostly awake at night. The Trips trampoline off of us while we are sleeping.

Right now we have 9- and they have their designated sleeping spots either on our bed or around the house. Meals are quiet, the cats know not to jump on the table and I feed them all before we sit down to eat so we are not disturbed.

I guess because we rescue ferals, we are used to having them around, either in the house, or in the barn or outside on our land. The cat hair is a big issue, our vaccuum routinely gets clogged with hair, but we just take it out to our shop in back and blow air through it to unclog it. I wouldn't know what to do without so many wonderful felines to share my life- it has been an adventure!
 

ttmom

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I don't think I'd be disciplined enough to have more than a couple of cats. Although being surrounded by furry little bodies at night does seem attractive.
 

mom of 10 cats

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I never would have believed I'd have 18 cats, if you'd told me years before. But I can't imagine not sharing my life with my furkids. It's not all fun and games: we had an eye infection run through here earlier in the month, putting eye ointment in 36 eyes was a task!
We scoop the boxes (all 19 of them) twice a day (at minimum) and change the litter weekly. We add litter all the time, as well. Dinnertime is a three ring circus, but when enough is enough, they do listen and let us eat.
I love falling asleep to the sound of cats purring, and waking to them all snuggled around me. It is hilarious to watch them all play together, and cute as heck to watch them groom one another and fall asleep in a catpile.
 

mzjazz2u

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I have 5 cats and don't notice much more of a difference then when I had 1. I still vacuum every day to keep up on the hair and I still scoop out litter boxes daily. The only difference to me is we go through a little more food!
And of course, we get 5 times the love!
 

rfox

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I love having two, and even briefly thought about getting a third, but that is for later
. They play so good, they havent gotten into any kind of trouble together...yet. I clean the boxes daily and have no problems with furs around the house. But it is good to have the sticky roller handy.
 

momofmany

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Our numbers also fluxuate and we have 14 right now. Personally, I find them so entertaining that the added work of scooping litter and picking up after them doesn't bother me. You get into a regular routine of sweeping the floors (we have very little carpet in the house) and straightening the throw rugs. We aren't phased by a cat hair in every meal.

Mine are great at meals - the only one that really pesters us right now is the baby Oscar, and he will learn very soon that begging doesn't get him anywhere. I do allow them to beg for Pepperidge Farm goldfish crackers, but only give them to them once they are trained to take them from my lips (don't gross out on that one please).

Bedtime is sleep time, not play time in our house. When they are young and start the inevitable play-in-bed games, we simply give them a time out, explain to them very patiently that beds are for sleeping, and in a few months they get it. It helps that we can sleep thru just about anything, and yes, we have waken up in the morning with fresh scratch marks that we didn't notice in the middle of the night.

All in all, we've been very lucky to have started this group with a strong, well behaved alpha cat. While he has crossed about 6 years ago, his good behaviors have been ingrained in his successors, which they continue to pass down to the youngsters. We have never lost a piece of furniture to the cats, and have never had any serious fights in the house.

I wouldn't live any other way.
 

superkitty

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Originally posted by kfleck
What is it like to live with so many cats? I've noticed that many of you have LOTS of cats. And I thought that two cats might be too many!

I've never know anyone to own more than three cats before.
Seeing that we only have 4, it's insignificant compared to some of our other members. But apparently we fall into your 'many cats' category! That's ok, my hubby also thought 4 was too many. Until I got Pixie. Now she's Daddy's little girl.


I don't see a big impact having 4 over when I just had 1. I always scooped the litter 4-5 times daily, wash 1x weekly, and that didn't change. I constantly vacuum, Swiffer, and de-lint.

I buy food in bulk so I don't see the disappearing food as fast, I guess. No-one bothers us while we're eating, since no-one was given people food, and begging simply stopped after being ignored. They sometimes smell something interesting so we let them smell it, but that's the end of it.

My adults are very good at sleeping at night, and not playing in the bedroom, and we're training Pixie now. Also it's very entertaining when they tear around the house in a chase train - we always chuckle listening to the buffalo stampede.

Downsides are health-related: deworming everyone when we suspect one has worms, or they all get the sniffles if one has a cold, vet bills, stuff like that. But that's such a small price to pay. We couldn't imagine life without them.
 

purrfectcatlove

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M.A. : The Trips trampoline off of us while we are sleeping.
that is to funny .
But mine do the same and yes I sleep through the night
. I scoop twice a day and clean the boxes every 5 days . Vacuum daily and dusting weekly . We have dinner on the taple , but have to loock some up in a room sometimes .I enjoy having all my cats around and would not wanted that any other way . I have 19 insite cats and 5 outsite cats and 3 dogs . Like Mom of 10 Cats I never thought I would have that many cats in my life . But I love each and every one of them and are hurt if one is sick , it is like a child is sick to me and worrie about the cat .
 

princess purr

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Our cats have two rooms that are "theirs" they get free run of the house unless we are cooking/eating or if I need to clean. When we cook they are eating in there room with the door shut (don't feel sorry for them, they have two eight foot kitty condos and more toys then you can shack a stick at). most of my guys are under a year old so they are CRAZY. We sleep with the door shut because sebastian bites noses, and marble and some of the others attack toes! When we leave the bedroom in the morning it is a process of tripping over cats! When we get home they are all sitting there waiting for us and we say hi to each and give them a pat on the head.
When we go to the vet we are "that couple with alot of cats" they receptions knows my voice

When they are sick it is a pain, right now we are doing ear mite drops so that is 3-4 drops in 24 ears! Nail clipping I do every three weeks. They are starting to learn, expect lola she is BAD!
I would have NEVER EVER thought we would have this many cats! But we love them all to peices and they all get the best of care. There needs come first.
The only place they are not alound in the house is my office, they try to steal the toys!
 

princess purr

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Originally posted by Momofmany
I do allow them to beg for Pepperidge Farm goldfish crackers, but only give them to them once they are trained to take them from my lips (don't gross out on that one please).
And I thought I was the only one who had cats that thought they were cat treats
just because they are fish shaped my guys think they HAVE to have some!
 

hissy

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I will say kfleck with two cats you might give it more thought to scoop your litter pan(s) more than twice a week, and scrub them out at least once a week-
 

purr

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I am planning on getting another cat next year and my roommate says that it's not fair to Cupid if I do b/c he'll have to share the love. Well, for one thing, it's not fair to Cupid (IMO) to make him live his life w/o another cat's company. I mean, I wouldn't want to only interact with a cat for the rest of my life.
Also, I think it'd be easy to give two cats love equally. They are small enough to both sit in my lap at the same time. However, if they both like to sit with my hand around them like Cupid does, my online time will be considerably less (though that's not such a BAD thing; it might be a good idea anyway.
).
 

mom of 10 cats

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I know I will never think of cats as solitary creatures after seeing the way these guys interact, especially the littermates. It is so funny watching them, they provide constant entertainment. And there is a big "AWWW" factor when they curl up together holding one another to sleep.
 

oava

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I agree about the cat box, I have 2 cats and two litter boxes. They seem to like that, we also clean it once a day. A clean cat box makes a happy cat.
 
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kfleck

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We have two cats and two litter boxes. We use the clay litter, not the scoop litter. So the entire box gets dumped and scrubbed out every 5 to seven days. And yes, I agree that it probably should be cleaned out more often than that. My husband is in charge of the litter boxes. The cats usually let us know when it is time for fresh litter.

When we rescued four kittens a couple months ago we kept them for about six weeks and got a small taste of what it might be like to have six cats in the house. I used scoop litter for the kittens and scooped it three to four times a day. They were little pooping machines! And they were bad and hard to keep track of once they learned how to climb the steps. They were constantly climbing up our pant legs and biting and wrestling anything that moved. I got my second cat when she was a year old and I was happy to have skipped the kitten stage. She is still a bit crazy though. She has lots of energy and loves to lay on my pillow and wrap her body around my head to sleep. When Simba was a kitten he chewed on everything worse than a puppy would. He wrecked two pairs of my shoes by chewing on them and many pairs of shoe laces. We had to hide any type of string or he would chew it and try to eat it. They do keep us amused and are very good with the kids. I would never get my cats declawed. I believe that they need some protection against the kids ;o) Our cats only scratch their scratching posts and never used to beg for food except my husband thinks that he needs to share bits of hamburger and chicken with them all the time. He offers them scraps when they aren't even begging for it and it makes me so mad! Perhaps if I didn't have to kids, a hamster and fish, I might have more than two cats also?
 

momofmany

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I'd like to add that the only real concern that I have for having too many babies is that I can't give all of them the attention and love that they need. It helps that we try to bring them into the house in pairs, and the pairs bond with each other during their initial quarantine period (before they have full set of health testing & screening).

But since we are such cat fanatics, we spend most of our spare time playing with them, and our house is set up for their entertainment. We great each one in turn as we walk in the house, and scratch them or pick them up each time they wander by us. Even while on the computer, we will have one or more snuggled in our laps or on our arms (right now it's Muddy and Oscar). While sitting, there is at least 4 or 5 snuggled in around each of us. And bed time has the majority of them tucked everywhere on and around us.

Our favorite joke with them is: "so many cats, so few hands".
 
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