Indoor or Outdoor

| June 21, 2006 | Leave your comment

The age-old question: do you keep your cats indoors (safe from the outside world) or do you set them free as they are basically meant to be? This topic has haunted me for as long as I can remember.

I hate keeping cats indoors because it’s so obvious how much they need the outdoors. I watch my cats chasing toys around the house like they are actual animals. You can tell many are natural hunters and would thrive out in the wild.

That being said you are endangering your furkids by letting them loose outside of your home. First off they can get ticks and all kinds of other things. Other animals or even humans can also injure them. The most common I’d say is getting hit by a car, it happens all too often.

I’ve lost 2 of my furkids to being hit by cars and my little baby Keyser I had to find on the side of the road. The thought of something like that happening to Aurora or Pilot just terrifies me beyond belief.

I was okay with keeping them indoors at our current apartment because it just wasn’t realistic otherwise. We are on the second floor and we are on main street, I wasn’t going to put them in danger like that and I really try hard to bring them as much excitement everyday as I can.

Now that we are moving to a house in a very rural area the topic is lingering in my head again. It’s not just the fact I’m considering letting them out at all but the concept they may sneak out all on their own. Mind you Aurora used to hang (yes hang) from the door begging to get out when she was a baby. I know my furkids and it becomes like Mission Impossible.

So I’ve decided I’m just going to roll with the punches and see what happens. I may get a harness like someone suggested or something. I know I certainly won’t just :willynilly: let my indoor furkids of 3 years just go outside.  What are your thoughts?

Indoor or Outdoor was posted on June 21, 2006 at 7:09 am in Furbabies and. It was last modified on June 21, 2006 at 7:09 am. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your site.

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  • http://mercurial-me.blogspot.com lani

    i keep them indoors because i don’t want them dragging crap inside. i do let them play on the balcony, though, which they really appreciate. fortunately, i live on the first floor and i have a really big balcony.

  • http://fragilemusings.net Robin

    lani – We have a good size balcony but they could so easily run off if they were on it. Unless I suppose…we got one of those gates you get for children :dunno:

  • http://www.heathersblog.com Heather B

    All the cats we ever had as kids were indoor/outdoor cats… Thankfully they never brought stuff inside the house, but they did leave things out on the driveway to display their fine work lol.

  • http://www.wokeupthismorning.co.uk Chris

    I know absolutely nothing about cats, but if you have a garden or something for them to run about in, is there a way you could set up a kind of area for them to run around in?

    When my friend used to bring round her hamster, we would set up a little play area surrounded by books so that she couldn’t escape. Something like that could work?

    But like I say, what do I know about cats? I suppose they jump around and would get out too easily.

  • http://vixen.wordpress.com/ vixen

    You can go to PetCo or PetSmart and get an outdoor enclosure for cats. It gives them plenty of room to run around in, and you can put purches in them so that they can jump up on them and look around. Not sure on the cost, but it’s better than letting them go free in a wooded area, where any number of things could happen to them.

  • http://fragilemusings.net Robin

    You all are so helpful! Thank you :cheesy:

  • crystal

    I’ve never had indoor cats. I think it’s because all of the cats I’ve had were kittens from the barns my father works at, and the one time we actually tried to keep one inside the house it damned near killed itself pushing out a window.

  • http://fragilemusings.net Robin

    Determined little shits aren’t they?

  • http://www.professionalredhead.com Lysie

    My furbaby stays inside. He gets scared outdoors. :lmao:

    I do take him out on the screened in porch and he digs that.

  • http://hterry.com Blueyes

    I kept mine inside because I see alot of cats running around outdoors that look ill and/or dead on the side of the road. I did take her out on a collar and leash so she could sun herself and play in the grass but thats it. She’s gotten out twice by accident and after those episodes she refused to go near a door for months. When I get another cat, she also will be an indoors kitty. My mother lives out in the country on 5 acres of land and she keeps her cats inside.

  • http://geminibitch.wordpress.com/ Gemini

    In the interest of this argument… here is a great article on this issue.. :cheesy:

    http://www.family-pet.com/Articles/indooroutdoor.htm

    Just so you know I am totally for indoor there is too much out there that could hurt my babies… :heartbeat:

    Just seeing that little tip of Gibson’s ear missing that some other cat or person is enough to break my heart to think about. :sob:

  • http://www.roadlessunraveled.com Robin

    I will have to read that later. I think the idea scares me too much but I may find ways to let them enjoy outside without letting them loose…if I can. Aurora is a sneaky bitch sometimes :bitchslap: