Kitty bolts out of the door!!

Both of my cats are indoor, they are scared of outdoors, yet one of them meows and sctaches at the door to go outside and if anyone opens the door he BOLTS accross the front lawn. He usually gets scared and runs back in....how do I stop this ? I dont want him to get by a car

Is he neutered?

my Eddie is neuterd and a indoor only cat, he used to do the same thing, I hated it until our house burned down and thanks to him wanting to get out, he survived since no one was home. Until this happened, I hated it when he would bolt but now, I guess I am happy that he did, otherwise he would have parrished since he was the only one home when our house went down. I love the silver lining in every story. I know this dosen't help you but just wanted to share my experience.

My Buffy does the same thing, except she's not afraid of the outdoors. That doesn't help much, does it? lol (to get her back, I just bring my dog to go in front of her as I'm behind her, and she'll freeze just long enough for me to catch her. Jake's laid up in his crate now [surgery] so I can't use him at the moment, but Buffy's being so nice about being caught now, for some reason)

I don't know what to tell you ... I have a neutered male who runs outside occasionally too. (He was an indoor/outdoor cat till we got him when he was about five.) Ace's goal, for some reason, is to find a nice patch of dirt to roll in. I can usually manage to catch him before he actually does the rolling, though.

That's not very helpful for you, though, is it?

Ever since Spanky managed to rip out a screen and get outside, he's been doing the same thing - got a taste of the great outdoors and he wants it now. When I go outside and he is near the door, I bend over and clap my hands so as to shoo him away from the door. If I'm outside coming in, I'll give the door a kick to scare him away. Although his great escape was less than 2 weeks ago, he is figuring out that I'm not going to let him out and he is giving up slowly. I suspect in another few weeks he'll no longer try.

Be persistent!

I second Momofmany- Jake was terrible at this and shot out hrough the smallest gap between people's legs to dive under the car on the front drive. And was clearly scared stiff once he got there, I never did work out why he wanted to do it. But over time, about five months, he's gradually lost interest and accepted, and recently someone left the front door open and unguarded and he sat by the door and looked without even trying to go out of it. I think he worked out that every time he managed to get out I wouldn't give up until I'd caught him and taken him back indoors. Persistence does work in the end.

I'm thinking that in future we may have to start using our back door, since to get to it we have to go through a set of French doors (usually closed). That wasy there's like a "safe" zone. Go through a door, check for cats , scoop up "escapees" and put them back in the main part of the house THEN go out the door. Of course this doesn't address the problem of when we're using the front door, but we'll just have to be very cautious.

An argument for microchipping and ID on your cat(s).

Cindy

I don't know if this is an option for you, but my husband put in a second door, about a yard or so back from the front door, so we have a vestibule, and only open one door after making sure the other is shut. It was easy in our house, because the front door opens onto a narrow hallway. A friend with several cats liked it so much that she had a vestibule made out of plasterboard (her front door opened directly into the living room). Her parents, dog owners, did the same thing, but used glass blocks for the side walls to keep it bright.
Another idea is a motion-triggered alarm installed inside the door at "cat level". I've never tried it, but have heard that it works. I've seen battery-operated ones in the form of little animal "statues" in home improvement centers here. They're meant for outside, often to keep cats from using vegetable patches as litter boxes, and stop "wailing" as soon as the cats distance themselves. One pet store chain is now advertising them as "cat door alarms", and I know from another cat site that they do work with most cats.
P.S. Somebody here - I think it was yayi - used a motion detector to keep her cats away from the Christmas tree. If I remember correctly, it played a Christmas carol when it was set off.

Nano used to escape and come back 1-3 hours later, so I decided to investigate exactly what she was up to...

1. She was uncomfortable about using the same litterbox for both brands of business (so to speak). She would urinate indoors but wanted to run outdoors to defecate. I provided two litterboxes and now she has one for each purpose.

2. She was looking to eat grass. She was a rescued cat from the streets and has some residual problems with her digestion, and the grass serves as a laxative or a way to induce vomitting if she has an upset stomach. I provided a gardening tray of wheatgrass and now she just uses that as necessary.

3. She wanted scenery and/or nature. Essentially she just wanted some variety. So I did two things: (1) I bought a window perch and set her up a nice window view so she can look out on the yard behind the building. She will happily stare out the window or sun herself for hours at a time. (2) I started putting her in the carrier and taking her with me on little weekly field trips in a park-like setting. I had used the time to read or meditate, and bringing Nano along doesn't really bother me and it gives her a little adventure.

4. She senses prey and wants to be a predator. Well, she is a very intense about hunting and I haven't figured it out yet except to be cautious about opening the door if I hear any birds chirping nearby.

So basically you need to put on your Sherlock Holmes hat and see why your cat wants to get outdoors. My comments might seem like a lot of work but it was actually very simple to make Nano extremely happy once I had some insight into her motivations.