# Neighborhood cat trying to break into my home....literally.



## FelineMommy (Jul 6, 2010)

We have to cats (a spayed female and a neutered male), both 11 years old. There is also a cat in our neighborhood (who I have to assume by his behavior is not neutered) who, quite literally, tries to break into our house through the window screens. We think we know which house he lives in, and he only seems to be out and wandering free at night. Or at least that's the only time he bothers us.

We literally cannot leave our windows open past about 9:00 p.m. or whenever it gets dark.....that's when he sneaks up to the windows and climbs the screens and tries to get it.....thus FREAKING out our indoor kitties and causing chaos. Not to mention damage to our window screens. He does this at any window he can get to (first floor, second floor, etc). Pretty much no window is safe, and we kind of feel like prisoners in our own home.

He also used to spray our front door, but I was able to stop that by leaving a bag of moth balls (opened) next to the door. The smell turned him away.

Any ideas on what we can do (other than getting a dog or lining the entire exterior of our house with moth balls) to keep him away from our house in general so we can open our windows at night?

Thank you!


----------



## Heidi n Q (Nov 22, 2006)

How about motion-activated lawn sprinklers? He'll douse himself with water whenever he ventures close.


----------



## MEOWx4 (Apr 22, 2009)

This is funny only because I have a friend with a similar story. She has 2 indoor cats, male and female, and there is a black cat that likes to sit at their sliding door and terrorize her cats around 4am, he throws himself at the sliding door which causes her cats to freak and go crazy, in return waking her up at the butt crack of dawn.

Maybe you can try squirting the cat with a spray bottle through the screen when you see him do it? I'm not sure what else could help.

Oh I have to add she also had a confrontational chat with said cat one early morning in which she said "how dare you sir!!"


----------



## Alpaca (Dec 21, 2009)

Sorry to laugh, but I found that 'how dare you sir' comment, pretty funny. I assume the cat didn't stop after that comment?

But seriously, that is not a good experience! I'm not sure what I would do given the same situation. Getting a dog might not be the solution as you're not sure if the cat is even frightened of dogs in the first place.

You might need to resort to a bag of mothballs at each window when you open it. Since a cat's sense of smell is pretty strong, you might not need to place it outside. Could you try applying sticky tape to the outside window sills? It might be a short term thing just so the outdoor cat figures out this is not a nice house to visit. After it goes off, then you can remove the tape.


----------



## FelineMommy (Jul 6, 2010)

Alpaca, I like your ideas. We will probably try putting moth balls outside the window we want to have open (we don't want to put them inside because we don't want to discourage my own kitties from sitting in the windows). I like the earlier post-er's idea of automatic sprinklers, too, but that's a bit expensive. Lol. As would be a dog (I was just being facetious with that thought). Moth balls and/or tape it will be for now, unless someone has other thoughts? Thank you, all!!


----------

