Advice about training/ keeping indoor cats in general.

Hello,

We got our very first maine coon last Friday called Bungo and he has settled in really well and is fast becoming king of the house. There are few questions I have and wonder if anyone had advice?

Firstly, at what age can is best to train them? For example it would be great to teach him fetch, rollover & giving his paw?

I want him also to be able to wear a harness, when should we start introducing this to him?

I intend to keep him as mainly an indoor cat because we have a main road nearby and I'd be scared he'll get stolen....... HOWEVER I like the idea of playing with him in the garden on a sunny day. Also, during the summer months we would usually have our patio doors & windows open to let air through the house out etc.. and I wouldn't want to have to shut him away in a room every time we do this. Can you tell me your thoughts on this and advise what you do currently? I guess this points relates to the harness training as I was thinking of attaching him to a long rope so he can roam around garden without fear of him running off but not sure how realistic this is.

Many Thanks in advance!

Becky

We had our first girl on a harness & running line when we were out the front of the house & she was the only cat we had at that point,she got used to it pretty quick & she was adult when she arrived so they seem to cotton onto things pretty quick,she would also go for a walk around the estate on a leash,but I never went out in PJ's like another member on the forum did.....another thread...!
I would say get Bungo used to what ever you want from day one & just take things easy with him. We now have an outside pen & the back garden is also enclosed for when we are about but I would never have dared to leave doors or windows opened even during the summer if there was any chance they could have got out,MC's dont seem to have too much common sense when it comes to roads & would also dread them being taken,we had special mesh units made up that when the windows were opened we could hang them on the inside so air could get in but cats not out,daughter who had no garden for hers had one made to go on doors as well.
Good luck & enjoy your babe,look forward to more news & of course as always pictures please....x

Hi there, congratulations on becoming a new slave!
I would have thought you could start harness training as soon as possible, to get him used to the feeling of 'wearing' something, even if he is too small for the harness initially.
At the same time, have you thought about enclosing your garden to make it secure for Bungo? It's great for them if they've got a little bit of outdoor freedom, to climb trees etc.

Thanks guys thats been really helpful already i'll get him a harness as soon as possible then to get him used to the feeling, I just didn't know if he was maybe too young at the moment.

The only doors/ windows downstairs that would be open are the patio ones in the conservatory. they would only be open if we are about, and I can also block him away from those if needs be, If we are out in the garden or around downstairs then I could just hook him up onto a rope if he wants to join us but I wouldn't leave him unsupervised.

Bedroom doors are always shut anyway so he wouldn't be able to jump out of windows upstairs, so that isn't a problem.

I can't really cat proof the garden as its a rented property, although if I ever got my own house then it's definitely something i'd do in the future.

I am always surprised to hear about these door and window issues from our UK members. Don't you guys have any flying insects?? In the US it is virtually unheard of to have windows (that open) without screens, and doors that are intended to be left open will have screening available. We leave our sliding doors and our windows open in spring and fall, and the cats just love sitting in front of them--but they are all screened. So my suggestion is to try to screen windows or doors you want to leave open. :smile:

As for the rope question...we had a MC mix we took in as a stray several years ago. He had HCM so needed medication multiple times per day, plus being outside wandering is simply too dangerous (cars, large dogs, cat fights, ticks, coyotes, etc.), so we kept him tethered outside. People always told us that you couldn't do this with cats, but we had few problems during the more than four years that he was with us (he eventually died from the HCM). He wore a harness, which was attached by nylon "clothes line" to a pulley system on another clothes line strung between pairs of trees. He had one of these setups in the front yard and one in back, and we would alternate him. We never left him outside when we were not home, and we did have to check periodically in case he got his rope wrapped about a tree, but it worked just as well as it would have with a dog. You certainly could have your guy on a line in your garden while you are nearby.

Introducing the harness sometimes takes a bit of effort. Best to just put it on him inside the house with nothing attached and let him get used to the feel of having it on. Next step is to attach a leash or rope and introduce the harness tugging on him. This can cause some cats to freak out (as I learned the hard way), so it is best to do this shut in a room where they cannot take off or get into trouble. I had one freak out and race around the house dragging a lead, and of course the sound of the lead dragging behind him freaked him out even more, so took a while to stop. We were lucky no injuries or house damage resulted (and of course this could have been very bad if it had happened outside). I think it best to have two people involved in first leash use.

The harnesses we have preferred are the "H style" like this one, which is the model that our MC mix used: Coastal Cat Figure "H" Harnesses - Blue - Whole Pets

While some people will claim that various other styles are more secure, they are just simply wrong about that. Our MC mix wore one of these outside, for 12-15 hours per day, virtually every day for four years--20 thousand hours--with almost no problems. There is no harness that you can put on a cat that they cannot potentially back out of because of the flexibility of their front shoulder joints (see Wikipedia). Our guy got out of his two or three times when he climbed a tree and was able to slide out backwards.

On its largest adjustment, the above harness will just fit a 14 lbs MC. We got larger Lupine H harnesses for our current males, who are >>14lbs, but have not used them yet. Our 14 lbs girl Bella does go outside with me most days, and she usually wears one of these harnesses, although I trust her behavior now so she often has no harness. I do recommend brushing them briefly post harness wearing, as you can get some matting from harnesses.

Yes we in the UK do have flying insects. But either they're not that numerous, or they are around for relatively short periods when it's hot in the summer, or we are just not that bothered about them. Certainly it's not in our culture to have screens fixed on doors and windows. That's just the way it is over here. :smile:

Could you elaborate on the washing line and pulley system you used? I am keen to set up our kitten with some access to the garden, and this would seem like a brilliant way to do it without spending loads of money on cat-proofing the garden. What kind of rope did you use? and what material would be best for the leash? Was it one that automatically retracts? What did you attach the lead to the rope with?

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Originally Posted by RoxyKitten

Could you elaborate on the washing line and pulley system you used? I am keen to set up our kitten with some access to the garden, and this would seem like a brilliant way to do it without spending loads of money on cat-proofing the garden. What kind of rope did you use? and what material would be best for the leash? Was it one that automatically retracts? What did you attach the lead to the rope with?

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Here are a few links I found to the kind of thing we did:
Penn Plastics: Everlast® Pulley Products Home Page
Unchain Your Dog.org | Install a Dog Trolley, Dog Run, Dog Cable
Dog Trolley 50' | All Dog Categories | PetSolutions

I bought a pulley like the Everlast one shown, and vinyl covered cord that is sold often as "clothesline." I did not buy any of the prepackaged "dog run" kits because the cables from pulley to animal are too heavy for cats in my opinion. I used two different types of clothesline/cord: (1) metal core and (2) nylon core. The metal core is best for tightly stretching the line that the pulley will roll on. We had trees in appropriate places to tie this line to (re-tie around the trees once a year or so, or the trees will grow and trap the cord). The nylon core line is very light, so it is ideal for connecting to a cat's harness. We had a large clip simply tied onto one end of the light line and then clipped onto the pulley. Like these: Bolt Snap w/ Round Eye on Keystone Mfg. & Supply Co.

The hardest part of this was getting light clips appropriate to clip onto cat's harness attached to the nylon line. Finding small, light clips is not too hard, something like the following: http://catalog.kmsinc.net/item/sprin...001050|3001055

What was hard was figuring out how to securely attach the nylon cord to the small clip, without leaving a big knot or the like. I ended up stripping the outer cover off the nylon cord, tying the nylon strands to the clip, then using shrink wrap (with a heat gun/hairdryer) to enclose and protect the nylon. There probably is some other way, but this was extremely lightweight and would hold up for more than a year of daily use. I will try to get a photo of what this looks like if you want to see.

Karma used to be on 30-50' leads attached to 50-75' runs for the pulley, giving him access to a vast area. Works best if there are not a lot of things for him to get wrapped around, and also best if cat is not a tree climber. Certainly, though, if you check on him periodically and are fairly nearby, this can work quite well. Karma loved being able to go outside on this system.

We're hoping to cat proof the garden this summer but in the meantime we've got the boys some harnesses to get them used to being outside. I think we might try taking them out at the weekend if the weather is nice- I'm quite excited about it. The washing line system sounds really interesting too............

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Originally Posted by NCarver

I am always surprised to hear about these door and window issues from our UK members. Don't you guys have any flying insects?? In the US it is virtually unheard of to have windows (that open) without screens, and doors that are intended to be left open will have screening available. We leave our sliding doors and our windows open in spring and fall, and the cats just love sitting in front of them--but they are all screened. So my suggestion is to try to screen windows or doors you want to leave open. :smile:

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I was going to add onto my post that the screens we had made looked like the ones you see on houses in USA but thought that was being a bit personal against you all,they were brilliant though & while we were using them no nasty flies or wasps invaded our space...

The washing line systems sounds great Ncarver thanks so much for all the info! So much to take in :-) We don't have enough bugs invading our houses to justify putting screens over our doors and windows in the UK.

I'll start off with getting him used to the harness indoors, then when he's used to that i'll have him in the garden attached to a rope. If he likes it outside i'll think about setting up something more sophisticated like you've done!

The harness training certainly sounds interesting i'll have to get my partner to help me with that one! Will be worth it in the end though i'm sure.

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Originally Posted by jckkerrison

I was going to add onto my post that the screens we had made looked like the ones you see on houses in USA but thought that was being a bit personal against you all,they were brilliant though & while we were using them no nasty flies or wasps invaded our space...

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I remembered somebody on here talking about having screens made. You say, "while we were using them," does that mean you quit? I certainly don't want flies or wasps in our house, but the worst things are mosquitoes. Do you not have mosquitoes in the UK? If you do, then how do you sleep at night with them buzzing you? It takes only a few in the entire house to disturb one's sleep.

We went on our holidays last year to America and I can quite understand for the need of nets/screens there. I don't know if the American's amongs us will know what I mean but when we were flying home we had to stay in the airport because there was a infestation of 'Love Bugs' ???? Luckily we don't have that problem in the UK with a lot of flying insects, on the odd occasion that we get a fly in the house they don't last very long with two cats who make it their mission to track and attack ! - I wouldn't want to spoil their fun.

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Originally Posted by Becky

We don't have enough bugs invading our houses to justify putting screens over our doors and windows in the UK.

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I suspect this is more that Americans don't want any bugs in their homes. I grew up in northern climes here, and we still had plenty of bugs to justify screens IMO. I doubt most Americans would think you didn't have enough bugs to justify screens. Screens are hardly costly or difficult to deal with here since windows and doors are designed with them in mind, so there is no reason that anyone should have to have bugs bugging them in their homes. :LOL:

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Originally Posted by Becky

The harness training certainly sounds interesting i'll have to get my partner to help me with that one! Will be worth it in the end though i'm sure.

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Some cats take right to the harness while others require quite a bit of time to get used to it. We had one guy that at first would just lie down and try to bite it off. He pretty much chewed through his first harness and wrecked it. The scariest thing is if they freak out with a lead tugging on them and shoot away from you (pull the lead out of your hand) and race around the house or away from you outside. This is why I suggest having a second person to assist the first time or twp. I wish I had done this.

The outside "dog run" setup worked great for us. One note of caution I haven't mentioned is that you have to make certain their aren't large dogs coming into your yard that might attack the cat, since when they are on the rope, they might not be able to get away. We were fine while we had Karma, but there are a couple of problem dogs now. If we still had Karma, I would be training them to stay out of our yard using pepper spray (or calling animal control).

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Originally Posted by NCarver

I remembered somebody on here talking about having screens made. You say, "while we were using them," does that mean you quit? I certainly don't want flies or wasps in our house, but the worst things are mosquitoes. Do you not have mosquitoes in the UK? If you do, then how do you sleep at night with them buzzing you? It takes only a few in the entire house to disturb one's sleep.

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No NCarver we don't get the mozzies quite like you although can quite understand where you are coming from,nothing more annoying than when you go abroad & because its so hot you open windows & in the little darlings come,on one holiday it was the talk down by the pool next day who had come up with the neatest idea of trying to zap them.
I think it was most probaly me who mentioned having had screens made in another thread,they were for my daughter who at that point lived in a house with no garden so nowhere to have an outside pen for the cats & she found the screens a double bonus for letting air plus keeping cats in but also flies out,we are lucky because as well as having a pen the back garden is catproof so we can open up the patio doors without worrying,we do have a fly screen hanging over them though....!