PF cat thread

[NorthernHeat]

Cat newbie with a question.

We have always had dogs growing up, but now we have "adopted" a cat on our ranch. I say adopted, but its more of the cat showed up at our doorstep one night and now wont leave.

Cat is friendly, but because it is a completely wild cat, its nails are VERY sharp and even when its playing with us (like laying on its back and we are petting its stomach) it slowly paws its paws out and scratches the crap out of us.

Is there anything I can get to keep at the house near where the cat stays to help dull down these nails a little bit, as an alternative to actually trying to trim nails... which we are not trying to do.

Some sort of scratching post or something?

[EMC]

Cat newbie with a question.

We have always had dogs growing up, but now we have "adopted" a cat on our ranch. I say adopted, but its more of the cat showed up at our doorstep one night and now wont leave.

Cat is friendly, but because it is a completely wild cat, its nails are VERY sharp and even when its playing with us (like laying on its back and we are petting its stomach) it slowly paws its paws out and scratches the crap out of us.

Is there anything I can get to keep at the house near where the cat stays to help dull down these nails a little bit, as an alternative to actually trying to trim nails... which we are not trying to do.

Some sort of scratching post or something?

Comes with the territory. Every cat is different in what they like or are willing to scratch. If it happened by random circumstance that it loved to scratch sandpaper on a board you would be in business, but none of the typical scratching post materials are likely to dull your cats claws too much.

[hufnagel]

you could always try to trim it's nails a bit, but if it's a wild cat you're best to leave it alone so it has full use of its defenses.
alternatively you could try to convince it to scratch a chunk of wood, to help keep them in shape.

[TheRoland]

Cat newbie with a question.

We have always had dogs growing up, but now we have "adopted" a cat on our ranch. I say adopted, but its more of the cat showed up at our doorstep one night and now wont leave.

Cat is friendly, but because it is a completely wild cat, its nails are VERY sharp and even when its playing with us (like laying on its back and we are petting its stomach) it slowly paws its paws out and scratches the crap out of us.

Is there anything I can get to keep at the house near where the cat stays to help dull down these nails a little bit, as an alternative to actually trying to trim nails... which we are not trying to do.

Some sort of scratching post or something?

Three things:

1. You could try putting out a scratching post. Some cats like them, some cats don't.
2. This varies by region somewhat, but a cat in a rural area that's friendly is/was probably someone's cat at some point. Feral cats will happily take food and even spend time with you, but will almost never let you interact with them closely. As someone who lives semi-rural, I'd be thinking someone dumped them, and at least be cautious that their survival skills may not be at the apex of feline potential.
3. Sticking their belly up for you to pet is the cat inviting you to be clawed to death. Scratching the shit out of you is the objective. See a wide variety of memes on the topic, for example, here.

Welcome to cats. There's a reason they own the internet.

[Drang]

There's a new stray that's trying to establish my yard as his territory and is crapping all over the place and not burying it, like a dog. I had to scoop the lawn with a shovel before mowing today. For the first time, I understand how non-cat people can think they are disgusting, filthy animals.

It's called "maddening", and is an aggressive form of territory marking.

[willie]

Using a sling shot to project small potatoes is the method I used to discourage a certain cat who was eyeballing my pair of roadrunners. I nailed him good a couple times without harming his health. He went elsewhere.

[OlongJohnson]

It's called "maddening", and is an aggressive form of territory marking.

Did some googling. It's actually "middening."

[LittleLebowski]

We are getting rid of our younger cat. We have tried and tried to give her a good chance over the past year (adopted her as a kitten) and she just gets more and more wild plus she's ruining our carpets. I can't let a cat ruin my house, I spent my weekend running a goddamn rented carpet cleaner. We have two litterboxes as well. I'm finding her a home as a barn cat. I'd really like to buy a Burmese cat as they're nearly guaranteed to have a good personality, but I don't want to pay more than $200 or so. This just sucks with the kids crying and whatnot.

[Dog Guy]

LL, you might also consider a Bombay, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombay_cat . No idea what they cost if you shop for one. Ours was an accidental rescue and was as nice a cat as you could ever ask for. Very sociable with people, got along well with the dogs. Didn't set my allergies off to any notable extent. If you spend a lot of time away from home and the cat will be home solo, Bombay might not be a great choice because of their strong sociability.

[Wondering Beard]

Three things:.
3. Sticking their belly up for you to pet is the cat inviting you to be clawed to death. Scratching the shit out of you is the objective. See a wide variety of memes on the topic, for example, here.

They do love to grab and stick their claws in and chew on you a bit, but it's primarily affectionate and they control very well how deep to dig in. A high pitched yelp indicating that you are in pain generally gets them back off some since they want to play and not hurt. With my wife, she grabs with barely any claw out but with me, since I let her go in deep when she was a little kitten, I get small temporary scars which don't bother me at all. She also does it when she sees I'm about to leave for a long trip to indicate she doesn't want me to go.