Going through the garbage

I have no idea if this is a behavior or nutrition topic...

Cairo is just over a year old now. He's starting to rumage through our garbage. We've even put the garbage in the cupboard and placed a chair in front of it. He pushes the chair and still gets inside the cupboard. Sometimes he licks containers and things in the cupboard and sometimes it seems like he just looks.

What's up with this? We feed him plenty plus he gets leftovers from our supper and a slice of sandwich meat when I am making my husbands lunches. He can't possibly be hungry still... so why is he doing this?

Cairo can smell what's in the garbage and wants to check it out. It is not hunger but normal behavior.
Put your garbage in a container with a lid preferably one that can snap shut. To further reduce the smell of food, rinse those used food cans/trays before throwing them out.

Cats have a pretty good sense of smell...and are even attracted to "ODD" things....we can no longer put used Qtips in our bathroom wastebasket....Tedy can smell one a mile away and will empty the wastebasket everytime!

Ah! So he's just being annoying then. LOL

Oh boy. Mr Underfoot is 11 years old and will still dig in the garbage if he gets the chance, and he's really good at opening things and getting lids off. I think it's the lure of the forbidden - he's always opening up the cupboards too. Repellents didn't work at all for him, and he manages to get just about any typical garbage container open.

The only solution I've found is simply to keep food where he can't get to it. We keep any food garbage in a container in the garage. Another alternative is to put the garbage container in a cupboard with a child-proof cupboard latch.

Here's my solution:



- screwed on to a wide base
- has a brick inside
- top cover is bungeed
- lid has a locking latch

I had to take extreme measures after going through five different kinds of trash cans, all of which Tommy figured out how to get in to.

Oh! That's good! We bought a nice garbage can some time back which we haven't been able to use. Maybe we can rig it up somehow too. Before we even had put anything in it we found Cairo sitting inside the garbage can with the lid on!!

And all this reminds me, this is why we love our cats. You never know what they will do or where you will find them.

Well done Tim.

Originally Posted by coaster

Here's my solution:

- screwed on to a wide base
- has a brick inside
- top cover is bungeed
- lid has a locking latch

I had to take extreme measures after going through five different kinds of trash cans, all of which Tommy figured out how to get in to.

Click to expand...

Originally Posted by SunflowerGirl

Before we even had put anything in it we found Cairo sitting inside the garbage can with the lid on!!

Click to expand...

Originally Posted by SunflowerGirl

Oh! That's good! We bought a nice garbage can some time back which we haven't been able to use. Maybe we can rig it up somehow too. Before we even had put anything in it we found Cairo sitting inside the garbage can with the lid on!!

Click to expand...

Maybe you should just give up.

Umm, maybe he was a garbage man in a previous life?

Gordito is the same way.. he rips the bags open, and then the dog notices and spews it all over the place and then they share their findings.. withtraining I stopped Apollo from pulling the garbage out.. but no luck with the cat yet!
And the cats are free-fed, so its not like he's starving orantyhing.. he just wants people food.

If Cairo spent any time out on the streets, he likely saw his mom get food this way. It could be just an ingrained trait inside of him- street cats are like that. I have one female that you have to lock down the garbage cans and tie up every bag of trash. She will still rip open a bag of trash if given half the chance.

Well, I would say that's the problem. Giving a cat human food isn't the best thing to do. You get a reaction of them either ONLY wanting that food from then on, constantly begging for your dinner (which I find incredibly rude), or doing as your guy is...digging through the trash. Not only that, but our food is full of so many things that are just plain not good for their system (even lunchmeat).

I would stop giving him human food, and see if that helps. It will take a few months before you would see any results, though, and even then, he might always try because he's been given permission to have it, and he won't understand why the change of heart. Ya know?

I'm sorry if my advice seems harsh. It's just that I've seen what human food can do to a cat, both physically and behaviorally, and it's never good.

I hope this helps!