letting my kitty out

I am the very proud mother of a 10 month out male kitten. He has been neutered. We have kept him indoors since we got him last August. He spends a lot of time lurking at the windows (especially when they are open.) :? We are considering taking him outside just on a harness so he can play. I don't trust my neighborhood to allow him out without constant supervision. What are everyone's opinions on this? Thanks.

 

Works for me! That's what I do with my girl, Moe. She was a stray when I adopted her a few years ago and since I didn't want to let her out alone I harness trained her. It took about 2 weeks to get her completely used to the harness, but now she loves it. I started by clipping the neck part on then praising her and giving her a treat. I would leave it on for about 10 seconds to start with and slowly increase it up to about one minute. After about a week of this, I began clipping the chest piece on too. After about a week of that she was comfortable and we ventured outside. Now she comes running when the harness comes out.

*edited for terrible grammar

 

I have mixed feelings about this one. I take my Oliver out on the harness, only because he was driving us crazy with his crying and scratching at the door (he was 2 years old when we got him). He does love it and he also enjoys his outdoor enclosure. He is used to this though and will cry and drive us crazy on rainy days when he doesn't go out. My other two cats are strictly indoors and always have been, they enjoy the window sills and have never cried to go out. If you do take kitty out then you will have to treat him for fleas.

 

my cats love it too....but it can turn them into door dashers

 

I have mixed feelings about this. I thinkg they would love the fresh air, outdoors, but A lot of cats have the tendency that once they have been exposed to the outside, thats all they want. And they will make make your lives miserable with howling and scratching to get out (like mine does).

honeybear

 

Well, unfortuantely he already has fleas that we have been trying to get rid of. Treating him for fleas won't be any different. I am a little worried about him being a door dasher though. I am considering this to be an occasional thing, not an everyday occurence.

 

I just bought a harness for Tiddy. He is the only one of my 6 that has any interest in going outside. The only problem is that it increases his attempts at trying to escape. I just take him on the top porch, backyard and frontyard.

 

Moe does try to dash out, so I just have to be ready whenever I come home to block her. When she does get out without the harness she stays on the grass right by the door anyway. She also pretty good about not begging excessively to go out. She'll meow for a few minutes and then stop when she realizes that I'm ignoring her.

 

I want to post some pictures on my baby boy can someone please post the webpages to visit to do that?

 

I always upload to my personal site and then link from there, but if you don't have personal webspace here's what the wonderful Chessmind says to do (copied from another post):

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Go to www.photoisland.com

Choose the sign-up free and fill out the membership form. Go to Upload Pictures and use the BROWSE button to browse to where you have the pictures saved on your computer. Choose UPLOAD. On the left side of the screen choose MY ALBUM LIST: Personal (or whatever you named your album) This will display your pictures. click on one. Now on the left choose LINK FOR AUCTION. Copy the URL FOR YOUR PHOTO.

Now come back to Auspet. In your post click on "" again (after your URL link). Good luck.

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If you have any problems you can email some pictures to me and I can upload them for you. Just click the email button at the bottom of this post. Include a subject line in the email so I don't delete it since I tend not to read mail from people I don't know! Good luck.

 

One good site is www.photoisland.com. It's pretty user-friendly and is free. You have to create a photo album and then upload pictures to it. Looking forward to the pictures!

(Sorry, I guess halaroo and I posted at the same time and she beat me to it !)

 

These are pictures shortly after I got him. I plan on taking more recent pictures of him soon.

 

Does anyone know why my pictures didn't work?

 

I have mixed feelings about this as well. I know the fresh air and the outdoors would be great for cats. But all of my cats are strictly indoor kitties. I just don't want to take the chance of something happening to them. Chances are, they could be fine, but I am not gonna see and find out.

Whatever you decide, pleeeeeease use a harness or put him in a safe area where he can't get out and nothing can get to him.

 

SweetpeasMama, make sure there are no spaces between and the web site address (I've done that a couple of times), or at least play around with the spacing there.

 

Ihave waht we call Barn Cats. There are two of them. To tell you the truth, they are both feral cats that were caught then neutered before I adopted them. They are the meanest, cats I've ever seen. Once I got them home. I didn't just "turn them out". I introduced them to the area, Kept them in a large "wire dog kennel", and moved it about the barn and shop. I would ALWAYS feed them in the same area, and they've never left.

The thing about cats is, once they know where home is, and they are spayed, neutered, they usually never leave. Now if they aren't they will go hunting for a mate.

Everyone has their views on how cats should be kept, but truthfully, if its lived its whole life inside, its best to keep a harness, collar on the cat untill its used to its boundaries.
But If they've been outside, ect... I don't see the problem in it. As long as there are safe boundaries, and they are watched.

A cat will never loose its "wild" instinct. Hince why we have feral cats.

I don't see a problem with taking him outside, as long as he's watched.

 

yeah!!!pictures are coming...cant wait. hurry. we havent had enough lately it seems.

 

i have a good story about kitties staying by their home. okay. seven years ago, our family home in illinois, where my mother lives blew away by a tornado. completely demolished, no walls standing. my mother has two cats. punky and missy. missy was 3, punky was 3 mos. old. we found missy the next day. couldnt find punky. so, every day we searched in all that rubble to find him. on, or around the fifth day, i told my mom that i wanted to go to the "house" to look for him. of course their was no "house" per se...but when i went down into the debris i called and called "here kitty kitty". and ALL OF A SUDDEN....i saw something....very quick...movement...then again....i thought "what is that...could it be him?" then....again, i saw it move. then....a little head peeped through the debris that was piled at least 5 feet high. it was punky, sure enough. and i got him to come to me...he looked like he had been indoors the entire time. dont know how he kept himself so clean. but he was fine. and i think all along, he was "home" even though it looked different. the smells were there. and i think it is an instinctual thing too. so, they both came out alive and still live in illinois with my mother who now has the biggest basement of anyone i have ever seen!

 

As for the pictures, I noticed your address ended in "html?". I'm no computer expert but I think it should end in .jpg for a picture. I copied the link to one of my photos and it looks like
http://mediaservice.photoisland.com/auc ... 924143.jpg

Did you select the photo you want and then click on "link for Auction etc" on the left (it's the last item in the column)? A small box should open with the link in it which you can then highlight.

 

Go to the website that you pictures are at. Right click on a picture. Copy the URL for the pic, it should end in .jpg (like Dolly said). paste the url here with the img tags on either side just like you did before.