Cats on Kitchen Counters

[mvp]

[QUOTE=Rudy;7925927]
I don’t simply ‘let’ the cat on the counter…he lets himself while daring me to stop him.

His very life is threatened daily and has been since I got him as a wee kitten 4 years ago. I think he is curious about what I will try each time. He will climb on the counter and mock me…daring me to do something about his little paw prints all over the clean surface.

Then he will let me know, at great length I might add, just how uncivilized it is for a cat to be kept off a counter by his yowling through the apartment with his arrogant tail accentuating his points.

.[/QUOTE]

With all due respect, I can’t believe that a relatively small, football-sized animal keeps winning at a dare. You sure you can’t remind him that you are the Old Testament God of your house?

[cloudy18]

I’m with Rudy. The cat won’t hop on the table or countertops with us right there, but if we are in the living room, he will pop up to the countertop to see what’s up there. Or maybe check out a cabinet interior. If we leave food on the dining room table and walk away, also fair game. This includes salads! He doesn’t eat it, but shoves his face in it. Gross. He has an eating disorder, I swear.

Ziggy is sufficiently neurotic to frighten a few times and you’re good to go. Elmo is perverse and likes abusive relationships. As well as having an eating disorder. I am happy to know there are somewhat trainable cats out there. My DH picked this one out, and he’s forbidden from picking out animals ever again!

[spotted_draft_x_fill]

At my current place none of the cats have been on the counter. They are brazen enough to get up on the table or poke their heads in the cabinets or pantry while we’re around.

At our previous place, when I would make dinner and my dad was busy doing something, he would tell me to leave his food on the stove and he would get when he was finished. Let’s just say if you snooze, you lose. About 75% of the time he made that request Pumpkin would jump up on the counter and steal his dinner.

[AllWeatherGal]

[QUOTE=GoForAGallop;7924900]
Blech no.

Although as I say that, one is crammed next to my head on the pillow, so I really have no rational reason for caring about the countertops when I’m rubbing my face on the same germs anyway. :lol:[/QUOTE]

Yep, this was me!

Of course the athletic ones went where they wanted, but what I didn’t see I didn’t acknowledge

My BF shares his home with 8 cats now, and while he is adamant about them staying off the bird cages*, I am slowly encouraging him not to allow them on the coffee table, dining table, … or counters (when I’m around).

*Grown cats know, young cats are only out and about when supervised. Birds couldn’t care less and have their own reserved “out” times.

[TequilaMockingbird]

My cats are not allowed on the counters, tables or the nice couches. The guest bedroom is completely off limits by keeping the door closed 24/7. Anywhere else is fine. They do as they please when I’m not around but SSScat has helped a lot with that. I put a can in place for a few weeks and then they don’t want to go near that area again for 3-4 months.

I keep the litter boxes in the garage after I put a cat door into the door between the house and garage. All the smell and mess are no longer in the house. It’s made living with 4 cats SO much more bearable.

[Rudy]

[QUOTE=mvp;7926015]
With all due respect, I can’t believe that a relatively small, football-sized animal keeps winning at a dare. You sure you can’t remind him that you are the Old Testament God of your house?[/QUOTE]

Thank you for the laugh. I almost have tears running down my face. I assume you haven’t lived with sphynx who believes negative attention is just as good as positive attention when he is bored. Out of 4 cats, 3 do not go near counters…the one is a willful beast. He will run yowling and hide but within 5 minutes will be back on the counter.There isn’t even anything on the counters that is yummy or fun.

[Mosey_2003]

I’m sorry, but yuck. None of the cats we ever had even tried it, I guess we lucked out. If one had tried and been persistent I probably would have tried scat mats…

[rocky213]

[QUOTE=TequilaMockingbird;7926329]
My cats are not allowed on the counters, tables or the nice couches. [/QUOTE]

This is the same policy in my house too. I think my cat might have hopped up there once or twice when I was not around but she definitely doesn’t do it when I am there. A quick squirt with a handy water bottle or even water from the sink has strongly discouraged her from counter surfing. I am always grossed out from other peoples cats who freely walk on the tables and counters. Now she is older so I think she doesn’t like to jump that high anymore.

When we had a new feline addition to the family from the MSPCA, he was trained pretty quickly as well. Only a few tries and a couple of squirts of water later, he didn’t attempt to counter or table surf.

[sunridge1]

When Pink first came here she would just hunker down and just take the spray bottle. It became harder to discourage her, and hard to train new puppies to stay away from the EXPENSIVE cat food on the floor. I live on a farm some things aren’t worth a battle anymore. There’s not enough hours in the day as it is.

[aurora171989]

our cats do not go up on counters. However one cat, decided she had to get up on the counter to get away from the other cats, then she started hiding and using the bathroom on the kitchen floor, or my parents bed. We gave her her own room and she’s happy now.

Lately I’ve been catching another cat on the counter and told mom about it, hopefully she doesn’t start doing the same thing.

I don’t remember if we ever had to train or teach our cats to stay off the counter though.

[twotrudoc]

No cats on the counters! But, I always clean before use because I just know that Tux sneaks up there when I am not home. He can’t stand to not get his little nose and paws on everything daily.

[Lady_Eboshi]

I do not “allow” it, and they KNOW it. Which is why they wait until I’m out feeding the horses, and I can see them frolicking on the kitchen table in full view of the windows. . .

They’ll jump on the kitchen center island while I’m eating. I’ve tried EVERYTHING, including yelling, throwing hacky sacks, water pistols, heaving a rolled-up newspaper at them . . . all to no effect.

Cats are not trainable because they simply don’t CARE what you want or think!

[Luseride]

Our barn cat came up to the house a couple of times and wandered in. The second time he jumped on the counter, out he went and never allowed to return. I was fine with him coming in the house but Never, Ever, Ever, on the counters or table.

[RS]

So, out of curiosity…and somewhat in reference to the original post…

Hypothetically, if the only two options were to have the cat be an indoor cat and roam the kitchen counters, OR, restrict the cat to outdoor living only, what would you pick? Excluding the option that the cat can be trained to stay off the counters, etc.

Genuinely interested. When starting this thread, I assumed many, many more people were lenient about their indoor cats. You know what they say about assuming…:o

[lilitiger2]

Nothing could convince me to have mine outside. I don’t care what they jump on or where they go (although we have a segregated household). They can watch the birds and turkeys and deer and dogs from the many windows and ack ack ack all they like but they don’t go outside. We have coyotes and wolves and dogs and hawks oh my and other things they coud get into (eat song birds) so they are in. I try to make things as cat friendly as I can!

[twotrudoc]

No outside! (until I can afford a catio anyway)

My little Tux was hit by a car when he was almost a yearling, the reason he is mine is I was the one who could afford the vet bill (his actual owners were my roommies young son and his gf who had no money).

I am fine with cleaning the counters before and after use.

[Mosey_2003]

[QUOTE=RS;7926791]
So, out of curiosity…and somewhat in reference to the original post…

Hypothetically, if the only two options were to have the cat be an indoor cat and roam the kitchen counters, OR, restrict the cat to outdoor living only, what would you pick? Excluding the option that the cat can be trained to stay off the counters, etc.

Genuinely interested. When starting this thread, I assumed many, many more people were lenient about their indoor cats. You know what they say about assuming…:o[/QUOTE]
Depends. If the cat was a barn cat that got an upgrade to the high life he’d go back out. Raised indoors would stay in but I would wage battle about the counters. If no winning was possible kitty would be locked out of the kitchen.

[Sannois]

This thread really cracks me up.
Cat’s are only marginally second in my favorite department,I have had at least one at a time, as many as 5.
Cat’s may know you do not want them to go somewhere, but they are cats, They just wait till you leave.
Gotta love em! I am a clean freak. Litter boxes are scooped once, sometimes twice a day. House smells great. I used to have to feed my male on the counter, because he would never eat, and the fat ones would get it.

[ex-racer_owner]

Our kitchen has the kitchen counters, where we prep food, and then there is the very large island which rarely sees food, other than grocery bags set on top of it. The cats are permitted on the island, though only Thumbellina takes full advantage of it. She had a VERY rough start in life, so when she finally was able to jump that high, I made a fuss over her and now it is a place for attention. Junior wants to be on it sometimes, but he is afraid to jump up by himself and usually cries at my feet until I pick him up and place him on it, but he usually doen’t stay up there long. Oddly, none of my current cats show any interest in the kitchen counters. I have never seen any of them up there and none of them has ever attempted it in front of any of us.

That being said, I do wipe the counters down a lot and if I am planning on cooking or baking for others, I basically clean the whole kitchen beforehand as I would be mortified if a stray cat hair ended up in something for public consumption.

[Kels]

[QUOTE=lilitiger2;7926845]
Nothing could convince me to have mine outside. I don’t care what they jump on or where they go (although we have a segregated household). They can watch the birds and turkeys and deer and dogs from the many windows and ack ack ack all they like but they don’t go outside. We have coyotes and wolves and dogs and hawks oh my and other things they coud get into (eat song birds) so they are in. I try to make things as cat friendly as I can![/QUOTE]

I second this.