Chicken safe cat deterrents??

[Chick and duck mom]

My cat goes into the chicken pen when the chickens are out. I have 2 outdoor cats and 1 neighbor cat. My cats are afraid of the chickens. I accidentally left one in the pen when the chickens came in., she was at the back cowering. Luckily I saw her and rescued her. I do have roosters, but the cats are afraid of the hens. So I think the hens must have attacked her. They're way bigger than my cats.

 

[riolla12]

Are there any chicken safe cat deterrents that are helpful to spray around yards? Our neighbors let their cats run around freely and I personally find that really unsavory along with I dont want them spreading disease to my chickens, I know that they will snoop around and piss in our yard and its just gross/neglectful on the owners part..

They dont help with mice either in our yard, though we took care of it ourselves with traps and seeking out any nests; they provide no benefit for us and only cause harm

One of the neighbors guilty of this arent the most stable and fed rat poison to mice at one point, if I didnt stop my girls from eating the dead mice my girls would have died; said neighbors also asked us if we had disease issues too as 2 of their chickens dropped dead.. they also had no general thoughts of their animals safety saying how "Oh yeah the hawks hang out in the trees above all the time" and not doing anything to prevent attacks and saying how they would just get more(and how they would get a rooster and more then our towns legal limit for hens, which would then make it harder with regulations for responsible chicken keepers)

Just in general I dont want to confront them as they will have really nasty fights with each other outdoors and im generally more blunt then I mean to be, I do not want to start a fight but their cats coming in our yard is not ok.

With deterrents for cats I dont even know where to begin with chicken safe options as generally we have not needed predator/pest repellants since our only predators are hawks and a fox that crosses by to get to the river(luckily has no interest in our girls) Would love links/advice!!





Also as far as cat stuff I dont want a debate or anything, I have my views on cats and you may have yours. I do not want to argue over it and will not change my mind. I am more then happy to have a civil conversation but im really just looking for help with this specific problem at this current moment.

none to suggest but just saying that my cats ignore my chickens. they are more interested with the birds. they might look at the chickens bu
t ignore them.

 

[krkelly]

Are there any chicken safe cat deterrents that are helpful to spray around yards? Our neighbors let their cats run around freely and I personally find that really unsavory along with I dont want them spreading disease to my chickens, I know that they will snoop around and piss in our yard and its just gross/neglectful on the owners part..

They dont help with mice either in our yard, though we took care of it ourselves with traps and seeking out any nests; they provide no benefit for us and only cause harm

One of the neighbors guilty of this arent the most stable and fed rat poison to mice at one point, if I didnt stop my girls from eating the dead mice my girls would have died; said neighbors also asked us if we had disease issues too as 2 of their chickens dropped dead.. they also had no general thoughts of their animals safety saying how "Oh yeah the hawks hang out in the trees above all the time" and not doing anything to prevent attacks and saying how they would just get more(and how they would get a rooster and more then our towns legal limit for hens, which would then make it harder with regulations for responsible chicken keepers)

Just in general I dont want to confront them as they will have really nasty fights with each other outdoors and im generally more blunt then I mean to be, I do not want to start a fight but their cats coming in our yard is not ok.

With deterrents for cats I dont even know where to begin with chicken safe options as generally we have not needed predator/pest repellants since our only predators are hawks and a fox that crosses by to get to the river(luckily has no interest in our girls) Would love links/advice!!





Also as far as cat stuff I dont want a debate or anything, I have my views on cats and you may have yours. I do not want to argue over it and will not change my mind. I am more then happy to have a civil conversation but im really just looking for help with this specific problem at this current moment.

Feral cats are a terrible problem in my area. I have lost more young chickens to feral cats than to any other predator. I use a catch-alive trap at night, baited with a little jack mackerel or scraps. When I trap a cat, I cap it in the head with a pellet gun, and put it in a trash bag for the garbage man. I collected 29 of them so far and now I only see a few of them in the course of a week. Between me and the coyotes that moved into town to feast on cats, we are finally making a dent in the problem. Hopefully, the coyotes will not be a problem after they clean up the cat mess. Presently my chicken losses have subsided greatly.
I find that trapping cats throughout the WINTER is most effective and greatly reduces the number of skunks caught. I have caught about a dozen skunks in the past 5 years and I have not been sprayed by them. When I catch a skunk I cover the trap with a poncho and take the skunk a few miles away to release it. So far, so good.

 

[Wolfie2]

Regrding the TSC live traps. I've had 2. The first one The smaller one in TSC's inventory, Coon was a tight fit in it, worked good for several years. One morning I checked on it and it was all torn up inside. Step trigger was pulled off and twisted, all the bars for the trigger mechanism were bent and the door lock messed up. I straightened it up, put it back together, set and baited it. Pretty soon it was torn up again. Went to TSC and bought the next bigger size, almost big enough for a small coyote. Next morning I had the BIGGEST old boar coon in it. If that's what tore the smaller trap up I don't see how it fit inside the smaller trap. He tried to do as much damage to the bigger trap as possible but it was still perfectly usable. Caught several critters in it since! I recommend it, well worth the money.

 

[MetroMutt]

Thank you for the advice everyone!

To deal with the problem I am now spraying the cats with the hose lightly anytime they come into my yard if im able to, Unfortunately no other solutions work with my current situation.

I should hopefully be able to leave my current area and move somewhere with distance between neighbors within a few years and will hopefully not have any cat problems there. If If I do I will make sure they are feral before dispatching and any that are not completely feral I will trap and send to a shelter.

 

[Acre4Me]

Thank you for the advice everyone!

To deal with the problem I am now spraying the cats with the hose lightly anytime they come into my yard if im able to, Unfortunately no other solutions work with my current situation.

I should hopefully be able to leave my current area and move somewhere with distance between neighbors within a few years and will hopefully not have any cat problems there. If If I do I will make sure they are feral before dispatching and any that are not completely feral I will trap and send to a shelter.

Glad you found something that works a bit. Some cities/towns will us a TNR approach to stray: Trap, Neuter, Release. Some individuals will do the same out if their personal pocket. The cat gets released back where it was trapped. The reason for this is bc a neutered/spayed cat does not create more cats. But that cat will defend its territory from other cats, keeping new cats away.

We had a stray cat problem in a rental duplex we lived in for awhile. The previous tenants were feeding the cats, so the cats had chosen a spot near the front of the duplex to spray urine, and poop, and they sprayed urine along the foundation. YUCK! The odor would permeate into the basement - YUCK! So, we looked up various info online. All we wanted was to deter the cats, encourage them to leave the vicinity of our rental. We removed all the poop we could find. We used straight vinegar in gallon jugs and poured it along the foundation-directly onto the foundation blocks. We did this a couple of times. Apparently vinegar deters them, but bleach attracts cats, so vinegar was what we used. We then additionally placed moth balls under some bushes near the foundation where we thought the cats were hanging out. Moth balls are harmful if they ingested them (so would also likely be harmful to chickens), but we only put them there as a deterrent, and the moth balls were never moved or bothered, so we know nothing tried to eat them. Our priority was to deter the cats, and these things all came together to keep them away from our foundation and home. We continued to see the same stray cats around the entire time we lived there, so none of them died, they just chose a different spot to claim as their own, and not our foundation or bushes.

 

[GingerRose]

Does your area have a restriction on Peafowl?
My adult male and his ladies keep anything smaller than a bobcat away, day and night. We don't live in a city or a neighborhood, no restrictions for us.

 

[PicoFarm]

You could look into motion activated water sprayers. Lots of them on places like Amazon depending on your situation and finances. Cat generally hate getting wet. I picked one at random to show you what they look like.

TERRO Havahart 5277 Motion-Activated Animal Repellent and Sprinkler,​

Oh I love this.

 

[PicoFarm]

A 410 works wonders too.
in all seriousness though. What about lion pee? I hear that BIG cat pee, which can be gotten from zoos and even on line, the smaller cats smell it and avoid it, it's like a territory marking thing or something. Have never tried it but heard a few people say it works on a few types of pests / predators.

Aaron

Another chicken person in my area said try human male urine. If you have a human male in your life, it's perhaps more convenient.

But I guess the Amazon delivery guys have seen everything by now.

 

[PicoFarm]

It's that way in many areas and yes, it is annoying.
A dog gets loose and everyone is screaming and crying.
Cats get booted out the door at the end of the day, and nobody cares.
BOTH are illegal to be running free.
If you have a pet KEEP IT ON YOUR PROPERTY !
If you insist that kitty kitty needs to run free, then build a pet run on YOUR property for the cat to use. I do not want your pet spraying my car and house, nor harassing my poultry.

If you have a neighbor who does have cats they let run loose, you will need pictures of the animal on your property, at which point, you can file a complaint with code enforcement and they should warn / ticket the person.

I approach it as, out of sight, out of mind, if your cat running around is not causing issues for me, then I have no issues with it., but, if the animal is causing problems for me, then the issue gets treated like any other nuisance predator that is attacking my flock. Alligators need to eat too.

Aaron

Trespass/attack is a tough deal, especially when the root cause is an irresponsible human.

My neighbor's dogs regularly dug under the fence, trespassed, and attacked (or attempted) my flock. Our Rooster for his part was good at diverting attention, but took some tough licks. There were face-to-face conversations, text strings, discussions about replacing the fence, surveillance videos, chats with sheriff deputy, certified mail, and notice that trespassing dogs could be shot. She'd pile stumps into the holes and the dogs would dig a new one. After almost 2 years, she put up cattle panel, and they still dug under. Some people just don't care.

She previously had an untrained German Shepherd who went on a biting spree, tagging multiple neighbors in the same day. I'm surprised someone else didn't shoot him. She euthanized him and replaced him almost immediately with another untrained, unrestrained dog.

After the last attempted attack, I started looking for a Livestock Guardian Dog and began fencing in a run.