I have two lovely (nearly six month old kittens). They were in a home for 14 weeks and with CP for 5/6 weeks. They've been neutured and microchipped. CP suggested we keep them in for a month, but I just wondered what the census of opinion was.
I can block the gaps up under the fence, but suspect they're strong enough to climb over once they've got their confidence.
If you live in a safe area then you could let them out when they are a year old.
The keeping in for a month from CP is in regards to all cats so that they know where home is. But you have babies who won't be savvy enough to keep themselves safe until they are over a year old. Or consider catproofing your garden to keep them safe.
Personally I wouldn't let them out at all it isn't a very safe place out in the big wide world ,would it be possible to cat proof your garden so that they are allowed some outside freedom but are kept safe.
Have a look at the sticky compiled by members who have built runs/cat proofed gardens to see if it is something you m ight consider doing............https://www.petforums.co.uk/threads/cat-runs-cat-proofed-gardens.211361/
If you decide that you are going to allow them to "free roam" then I would wait until next spring when the daylight is longer and the weather a lot warmer but more importantly your babies are a good bit older and more able to look after themselves and always make sure that they are in before it is dark.
A great deal depends on where you live.
I'm in the wilds of the countryside in the UK (farm) so my cats wander at will and come home at mealtimes and at night and savour the delights of civilisation whilst enjoying the fun and adventure of the great outdoors. In 58 years of marriage (with cats) I have only ever had one who died before the age of 20.
I'd have allowed them out as soon as I'd had them neutered and innoculated, and certainly after a month, but thats me - living where I do. At 6 months they need to be learning basic outdoor skills, unless as buffie suggests - you intend to keep them as indoor cats, or build a proofed garden.
I'd have allowed them out as soon as I'd had them neutered and innoculated, and certainly after a month, but thats me - living where I do. At 6 months they need to be learning basic outdoor skills, unless as buffie suggests - you intend to keep them as indoor cats, or build a proofed garden.
Sorry to disagree (well not really sorry ) but at 6 months old they don't have the physical or mental strength to keep themselves safe regardless of where you live.
Mine were always out 24/7 at 6 or 7 months and have all lived over 12. They stay around all day and usually if they aren’t I call and the come running back to the yard. But I am on a farm with land so they go wandering that way, also the road is quite.
Lol, you and I come from two different schools of thought don't we buffie?
I think we have to agree to disagree, but it doesn't stop us feeling concerned about these two 6 week old kittens.
If they are to be indoor cats, then any access to the great outdoors would be best prohibited and they should be taught skills to keep themselves happy and occupied in the safety of a house. However, if they do manage to escape outside they will have absolutely no skills to deal with what they find out there. Be it city or countryside they will be lost and helpless.
If they are to go outside then they really have got to learn to cope with what's life's going to hit them with in their particular environment - so we need to let them explore for a few sessions under our supervision because they NEED to learn to cope. Luckily there are fewer dangers here in the UK than in many other countries - traffic (to my mind) is the most dangerous, but at least we don't have snakes or many other predators.
After all we chuck our own offspring into the wild world at 18 or younger and hope we've taught them enough to deal with it.
Come to think - that last remark has nothing to do with anything. so lottiecat we've thrown it back at you - sorry.
@Lottiecat - before you consider allowing your kittens to go outdoors I advise you to carry out a risk assessment in your own neighbourhood taking into account the distance you are from roads, railways and other potential hazards.
Bear in mind that 'quiet roads' are not always 'safe roads'. It depends on the speed of each car. Cats are poor at assessing the speed at which an approaching car is travelling. They are renowned for making poor judgements and trying to cross the road at the last minute. If the cat is hit by a vehicle travelling at less than 30 mph there is a chance the cat will survive though often with severe injuries. If the cat is hit at 35 - 40 mph (or more) they are unlikely to survive.
A road with little traffic can make cats complacent about their safety. They may treat the road as somewhere to sit, or to lie down and have a snooze.
Even if you live near a farm, with no public roads nearby, a cat is not always safe. Years ago, I lived in a very rural area with 2 farms nearby, no roads, and one of my cats disappeared one summer. I never found him.
I had always thought we would ultimately let Joey (now 8 months) out.
But in the last 3 months alone living here we have seen so many lost cat notices go up on the local Facebook group and recently a photo of a cat sadly passed away after being hit.
There was a local cat called Sid who would go on massive adventures and his owners would proudly post about what he got up to (gps tracker). He passed away last week around 14 months old after being hit by a car.
Our street is ‘quiet’ and we have a lovely field nearby. The neighboring cats don’t actually venture far. But cars DO speed down. There are foxes. There’s even some unscrupulous teenagers. I see all these things as dangers now.
I love my boy to bits. He is happy living with us, I know he is. I know he would like to play outside too but I couldn’t bear it if something happened to him.
We will have a serious think about how to cat proof our garden without it being too much of an eyesore. We are planning to change it and I’d like to incorporate something cat-proofy. It would be nice to sit out with Joey. But only when I feel like it’s safe for him...
My dads cats have a different environment. Their quiet road really is hard to drive down at more than 10-15mph, and most cats play out in the back gardens that all back onto each other. So Cameron and Cavendish do have free reign during the day but again they don’t go far. They don’t really want to, after living on the streets they know that home is the good life !!
Just like @SuboJvR i imagined Ren would go out when he would be old enough but as he grew up, I was too scared to let him. So he only went in the garden supervised. When he goes everyday, he really wants his time outside (he knows he is not allowed to escape and I only have to call him when he is climbing the fence for him to stop). When he is only inside because the weather is miserable, he doesn't even ask anymore. So I think he is ok inside (if I leave the front door open the time I throw the bin away, he just sits and watches, he doesn't try to run away at all).
I think the only way I'd have it is if I was cat proofing a garden but I don't own a house and probably never will (maybe a flat someday if I'm lucky).
My parents have a big garden with no busy roads nearby. The cats never go even on the small road leading to our house. They still both got poisoned and the boy lost his leg in what we think was a trap.
My old cats, one never left the patio so nothing happened to her but we found sausages in our garden... and my male had all sorts of injuries, he ended up paralysed because someone hit him with a stick, on the spine.
That's with a massive garden surrounded by other gardens. I have seen enough...
Thanks for your comments. We had planned to keep them in longer, but as CP suggested a month my husband is on about that. I wasn't sure, so that's why I thought I'd sound everyone out.
We kept our last two in three months. They'll be let out for a short while each afternoon and one or both of us will be with them - I'm leaving all the autumn gardening jobs so I can be out with them. We're in a long cul-de-sac off a no through road, so although there is traffic it's impossible to go fast, although, I do appreciate there are risk factors.
When we adopted Oscar in March, I had always assumed he would go outside. However, I found this forum though and started to think about him being an indoor cat. The rescue (small independent one) recommended the usual month inside before being let out. Husband and I had many many discussions about him being allowed out - ended with him saying that if he couldn't go out, we would take him back to the rescue. That wasn't him being mean, it's just the cat he had as a child always went on, so he assumed Oscar would too. Then it started to get really warm, so we decided we would let him out - which was 8 weeks after adopting him. We are lucky in that we have a big garden so he can toddle around there, he's also 11 years old so even though he's pretty sprightly, he's happy wandering about and then chilling. He jumped over the back fence once (and we found him sitting on the front drive of the house he jumped over to). He's gone over the fence to next door probably six times (they have two kittens there now, so I think he's less interested!), never goes the other way as there are two cats and two dogs living there. We have put netting across the two "hot spots" where he's left the garden - it's also deterred a neighbourhood cat that's quite, should I say, feisty. We chased it out of the garden one day after we'd put the netting and it couldn't get out, so it's not been seen in our garden since. We obviously don't want to hurt the other cat but when we were away this year, it came and had a go at Oscar, so I'm happy it got scared enough not to really come back. We live on a cul-de-sac (9 houses) and 4 of those houses have no car (funny little seaside "estate" full of older folk!), but I still don't want him out the front. He does love to be out in the garden with us, he has his own stools and umbrella to sit under with us. We are lucky in that he's not particularly shown much interest at wanting to leave the garden - whether that's his age, or something else I have no idea. Husband and I have had many cat-proofing the garden discussions too but currently we seem okay as we are, with the netting on the hot spots and I haven't entirely given up on more cat proofing I do like it though - he has outdoor time (not today though, it's raining and he loathes being wet!) but I have less concern about him hopping over the fence. When I was out planting violas the other day, he was toddling about with me, I'm sure he thinks I'm nuts, chatting away to him. I don't totally leave him to it if he goes out without us, I'm always up and down and making sure I know where he is. He's not great with his cat flap (he used it to come in on his own the other day when we think he got scared by the wind!), so at least I know he can come in through it now if he needs to. The flap is always locked when we are out - and he is obviously indoors when we are out. It's also opened at 7am after his brekkie and locked before the sun sets, he doesn't go out at night.
I'm sure when I started typing this, there was a point but I don't know what that is now - I've had some Oscar interruptions since i started
@SuboJvR was Sid the cat that crossed the dual carriageway? How sad Poor little chap
Yes that was Sid! And there have been a couple of other cats in our estate missing/some bodies found. It has terrified me!
I would love it if Joey would be like Oscar, only pootling around a bit and enjoying a Little outdoorsy time. Maybe once he's a bit older he will.
It's hard with a kitten, I know he wants to experience everything because the couple of trials we have done that's exactly what he did lol. As he settles into adulthood more I may rethink things.
Our old cat Cleo was very much like Oscar - I NEVER saw her out the front properly. Even if she got a bit excited and ran out the front door she then ran immediately round the back. She was so funny, we could be bringing shopping in, she would come out, think OMG WHAT AM I DOING, then she would be at the back door asking to come in
Well we have done that for a year and a half and never had any issue.
I guess it depends on the cat but I know Ren is slow when he tries to escape and he has never been further than the neighbour's fence. I also had a cat who, in 12 years, never ever left the patio, she was always on a windowsill.
I think cat owners know their cats best and feel what is safe or not for their cats. I know Ren would leave if I left him for two hours on his own but I am absolutely not worried when I supervise (and I am a massive worrier).
It's also worth noting that there is no road after my garden. It's only a footpath and a play area, a cricket pitch... so even in the event he'd manage to jump the fence (never happened so far), he would only be on a patch of grass
Thanks for your replies everyone. I feel it's right to keep them another few months, but my husband keeps saying about letting them out this coming weekend. It's just doesn't feel right so I'll have to argue my case.
Alongside trying to make this decision, one of them has got past me three times in the last couple of days. Yesterday he got out the front and wouldn't let me catch him. The positive was that he kept trying to run back to the front door, which unfortunately I'd closed to keep his brother in. He's a very quick little cat and has worked out if he's at the back door, I'll go through the gate and in through the front.
Lol. Don't worry too much, good game though - running round the garden playing catch!
Just a thought - have you tried a lead? You can get them for cats, but if you can beg or borrow a lightweight lead for a small dog it might be worth a try on such a tiny chap. Mine were too old by the time I tried it, and they just crouched on the ground digging their claws in for life or death. Complete failure (wish I'd taken a picture).
I could have taken them for a drag (but they don't smoke)
Just to add - if you do try them lead training them, only use it attached to a proper cat harness, (not attached to a collar) for the safety of the kittens.
Best type of harness can be bought from Mynwood Cat Jackets or Happy Housecats.
I had always thought we would ultimately let Joey (now 8 months) out.
But in the last 3 months alone living here we have seen so many lost cat notices go up on the local Facebook group and recently a photo of a cat sadly passed away after being hit.
There was a local cat called Sid who would go on massive adventures and his owners would proudly post about what he got up to (gps tracker). He passed away last week around 14 months old after being hit by a car.
Our street is 'quiet' and we have a lovely field nearby. The neighboring cats don't actually venture far. But cars DO speed down. There are foxes. There's even some unscrupulous teenagers. I see all these things as dangers now.
I love my boy to bits. He is happy living with us, I know he is. I know he would like to play outside too but I couldn't bear it if something happened to him.
We will have a serious think about how to cat proof our garden without it being too much of an eyesore. We are planning to change it and I'd like to incorporate something cat-proofy. It would be nice to sit out with Joey. But only when I feel like it's safe for him...
My dads cats have a different environment. Their quiet road really is hard to drive down at more than 10-15mph, and most cats play out in the back gardens that all back onto each other. So Cameron and Cavendish do have free reign during the day but again they don't go far. They don't really want to, after living on the streets they know that home is the good life !!
It might also be worthwhile training them in basic recall.
Arthur knows that when he hears me shake the Dreamies packet, he gets a Dreamie so comes running in from outside . He is also harness and lead trained and if you do go down that route, make sure that the kittens are used to wearing the harness inside (going about their daily activities) first before you let them out.
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