Anyone crate a new kitten while at work/out of home?

[Schune]

I’m likely going to be getting my 3yo neutered male a buddy come the fall, and I think the age range I’m going to target is 8 weeks to 3 months.

I do work FT 30 minutes from my apartment by highway, so coming home on lunches to check, etc. are not feasible. I have two bedrooms so I can separate the new addition until things are going smoothly, but I was curious if anyone has crated a kitten while they are not around to supervise it. I’m talking XL crate for small litterbox, bed, food, toys, etc.

I am not declawing this one, so if I get a kitten that is too tiny at first to try the claw covers, I want to protect my furniture until I can feel I have reasonably controlled the kitten’s clawing urges.

Thanks!

[rubygirl1968]

I’ve kept them in a bathroom when they were too little to be unsupervised with my big cats, but not a crate. They have sooooo much energy I believe it would be like a caging a tasmanian devil and expecting them to behave when they get out. lol

The kittens were so easy to train to scratching posts - my adults were harder than they were. Well, some of the adults, not all. (I fostered lots of kittens and cats for a rescue group. )

Get some scratching posts, different kinds, cardboard ones and a good sturdy sisal covered one and your kitten should catch on remarkably quick.

Imho, I would go with an older kitten so you would have a ready made playmate for your guy. The adults can play too rough for a tiny little baby.

[chestnutmarebeware]

I’ve set up a large crate for two different feral (tiny) kittens, so they were confined for the first week or so. They were both fine with it. If it’s an open-style crate, I’d provide a cardboard box on its side as a “den”, so kitty can get away if it wants to.

I’m sure your boy will be thrilled with a playmate, once he gets over the initial “insult”! :lol:

[SuckerForHorses]

Yes, my nana crates her male cat at night so they can get a peaceful sleep! He is a TERROR and will literally attack their faces at night while they sleep, adn otherwise destroy the house - we’re talking hanging from plants, clearing off hutches, doing hot-laps around the house and climbing the curtains.

At night time, she just says “let’s go to bed” and he follows her to the crate to go to sleep! :lol: No litter box, just a blanket to sleep on, just like a dog. He uses the litterbox before bedtime, she has seen him do it. She is up by 5 AM and he gets let out for the day.

[HannahsMom7]

my daughter laughs that my cat Hannah was the only kitten she knew that was crated!

Hannah was a curtain-climber when I got her at like 6 weeks. She would RUN everywhere and was boss of my older boy(neutered) cat.

In order to keep this tiny kitten safe, I first would put her into a tall box, then a crate that she could not get out of. I did this every time I could not actively watch her!

I don’t think I have ever met a more active kitten!
eventually she got too big to fit under the frig and the stove so I let her have more freedom!

[HannahsMom7]

I am not sure how to add a link to a photo.

see, she is still making trouble! LOLhttp://www.flickr.com/photos/39035668@N02/9160210408/

[Schune]

[QUOTE=chestnutmarebeware;7053334]
I’m sure your boy will be thrilled with a playmate, once he gets over the initial “insult”! :lol:[/QUOTE]

I really think getting him an outgoing companion will help his own confidence. He’s on Prozac and may stay on it for a while longer, but he’s by nature skeerdy-cat. Once he knows you, though, you can’t ditch him :lol:

He was fostered from a baby in a household of many cats, so he has good social skills. My sister’s cat is a certified ***hole and he’ll roughhouse with him, and my mom’s cat HATES all living creatures but will tolerate Allen because he’s much more respectful.

It’s so funny because Allen wants nothing more than to groom and cuddle with Merlin, who won’t tolerate it for more than a second before flipping out.

It also doesn’t help that my sister just got Goose a little calico female as a friend and keeps sending me pictures and videos. The cat fever is hitting me hard!

[Schune]

@rubygirl1968;7053323

I’ve kept them in a bathroom when they were too little to be unsupervised with my big cats, but not a crate. They have sooooo much energy I believe it would be like a caging a tasmanian devil and expecting them to behave when they get out. lol

I have a guest bathroom with a door that connects to the 2nd bedroom and another door to the main apartment. I was thinking about temporarily closing the new addition in the bathroom/bedroom, but Allen spends his days lounging on the daybed, so I’m not sure how he would tolerate being suspended from there.

[paulaedwina]

I absolutely have. Bringing a new cat into the household with Yoshi takes alot of planning and training. He has to be convinced this is our cat and therefore should not be eaten (as opposed to outside cats where all bets are off). So this means crating the cat at night when I can’t supervise Yoshi (there’s a whole process of Yoshi on leash, cat being crated in the living room, Yoshi dragging a training tab, etc). I have a giant great dane sized wire crate that I set up with cat dishes, bed, toys, and litter box.

It was no problem.

Paula

[StGermain]

I crated my last kitten because the vet wanted him to be 4 months old (as I recall) before he did an FeLV/FIV test. He said the mother’s immunities (she was a stray fed by a co-worker) could impact the test results, and he wanted Jack the kitten to be a couple of months post-nursing. I made it a month with letting him out to play a couple times a day. He was pretty good in there, though - it didn’t seem to bother him.

StG

[Beckham03]

The last cat I brought home was young and was used to living in a vet clinic, so was used to being “crated”. He was/is very very naughty, so he stayed crated during the day, etc and didn’t really care. We still occasionally have to crate him. He steals food and sometimes makes cooking impossible, so he gets some time out. LOL.

[Nicker]

I will crate foster kitties when I can’t watch them. Usually a large dog crate with a small litterbox(disposable cardboard ones we use in the shelters), blanket and food/water bowls attached to the door is good for one or two kittens. When I’m home they have run of the house, usually crated for no more then 4 hours at a time. I try to come home on my lunch break and let them out. Occasionally that’s not possible and they’re in the crate for 8 hours. If I have more then one or two then I confine them to my home office, which they then destroy and I spend more time cleaning the office then the rest of my house.

[Beethoven]

My foster cat isn’t crated, so is confined to a bedroom if I am not home or while I am sleeping at night. He was feral before I got him, so I had him locked in the room because of my dog and to just give him a smaller space to adjust too. I then just decided to keep him in there while I wasn’t around do he couldn’t tear up the couch. There isn’t any furniture for him to really tear up in his room. At this point, he could be out all the time, but he is a) used to his routine and likes being put up at night b) I have a motion detector that he will set off if he is in the living room, so it works that he is fine being confined to his room.

I know people who do crate their cats at night so they can sleep.

I think a big crate is a fine idea!

[LauraKY]

I’ve crated all my barn cats if they’re sick, after speuter, etc. Just get a large crate and one of those hammock thingies. Mine all love those.

[Wraper2]

All of my cats have been crated at one time or another. I have a large (Boxer sized) crate set up on a table in my room. I added a shelf with a ‘hide hut’ on it. Litter box on the bottom as well as food and water. My Bengal cat chooses to sleep in it every night. I don’t close the door on her now days, but she LOVES her crate!

[Bacardi1]

When we trapped “Ming”, our feral Siamese kitten, at the dump, we kept him in a large dog crate (Lab/Doberman size) with a small litter box & his food/water dishes.

Didn’t want him disappearing into the house before he was friendly/acclimated. He was fine with it, & it made getting him used to us, the dogs, & the other cats SO easy, since he could safely meet everyone through the crate door.

[Schune]

Thanks everybody.

I might not even make it to the fall. I was very bad yesterday and went to the local humane society. Just to look, of course

[onelanerode]

Mine is 4 years old and is still confined to a bedroom with a giant cat tree at night and when we are not home. She is a wicked little girl unless she’s asleep, which is not nearly as often as I’d like. :lol:

Lucky for her we both work from home most of the time, so there is usually someone home, and she gets the run of the house then unless she’s making bad decisions (knocking over the cable modem after jumping up onto an off-limits cabinet earned her a time-out this morning).

The one day I left her out when I went to work I came home to a lamp on the floor, bulb shattered; all the pillows on the couch strewn across the living room; and a 2-foot by 3-foot framed picture on the floor—it had been hung about four feet off the floor, with nothing underneath it. I am still not sure what acrobatics transpired for that to come off the wall. :eek:

So for everyone’s safety, Wicked is confined to a room in which she can’t really damage anything except the carpet, which is replaceable.