How Good A Cat Owner Are You?

What is wrong with the title to this post? If you can’t see anything wrong with it, you are not what I would consider to be in the top rank of cat caretakers. The answer is in the last sentence. The word “owner” means what it says: ownership of your cat companion, which is the law but the law is an ass when it comes to cats. “Caretaking” reflects the actions and behavior of the best cat guardians but what does it mean?

How good a cat owner are you?

Are you able to be honest and objective in self-assessment? If not, I’d stop. I wouldn’t bother trying to check if you’re a good cat caretaker or not.

Excellence in cat caretaking can sometimes come be affected by available funds. In fact it is a combination of funding+knowledge/understanding+commitment. Cat abandonments are often about money.

Budgeting at the beginning, before adopting a cat is probably the behavior of a good cat caretaker (to be); think $10k to £15k over the full life of a cat inclusive of pet insurance. The person who treats the adoption of a cat as she would having a baby  – with that level of concern and forethought – will probably be a very good cat caretaker. It requires honesty though. Cat shelters ask potential adopters questions. Do people ask themselves these questions before adopting a cat? It is wise to.

How much do you know about cat behavior? A good cat caretaker understands cat behavior and respects it. This means not treating a cat as a child. A cat is a cat is a cat, people need to understand that. If a person wants a child substitute she’s unsuitable.

Here is a question: when you believe that your cat is ill, do you wait and watch too long? Do you resist even slightly taking him/her to the vet? Taking a cat one suspects of being ill to the vet promptly can be vital and at least it is necessary. This begs the question whether a cat caretaker has the money to do a good job? There is not much point being very concerned if you can’t translate the concern into purchasing excellent cat food and taking your cat to the veterinarian in a timely manner. Available funds is a factor in how good a cat caretaker a person is.

What about available time? If you’re working in an office, 5 days a week you’ll be prevented from being the best of caretakers simply on the basis of available time, the more so if you are the only one living in the home unless you do things which make your cat’s home as pleasant as possible when you are at work. Cats like company, your company. The like interaction and stimulation.

What can you do? The best ideas come from Marc, a regular visitor. He has created an “enriched environment” (e.g. see the forest) for his cats and he can monitor to a certain extent their activities using Skype, the internet and judiciously placed computers in his home. There are also devices these days to feed your cat remotely, talk them and even watch them. These are not perfect and they cost money – ah, we are back to money again. It seems money plays quite an important part in keeping up cat caretaking standards. You have to have enough not to worry about spending it on your cat when have to.

Pet health insurance can be a good idea. Having pet health insurance is not a sign of a good cat caretaker, however but it does mean the cat caretaker takes their cat to the vet promptly (as long it is covered – watch out for the small print).

Good cat caretaking boils down to:

  • providing a cat-centric environment which is one in which a cat has the opportunity to express natural behavior which is a step from wild cat behavior. Play, climbing, observation, hiding, resting places are all behaviours that come to mind immediately.
  • providing a safe place to live in. This is about making the correct decisions on the indoor/outdoor debate.
  • providing excellent health care. This might mean changing vets if you have to. Not all vets are good. Some are better than others. The best cat guardians find the best veterinarians.
  • providing the best food. The best food should closely match wild cat prey. We can’t buy that sort of food or rarely can. I don’t do it but the best of the best cat food is a raw diet prepared and stored properly. You’ll probably that find your cat doesn’t like it because he is not used to it.

It is really is not that easy being an excellent cat caretaker. It requires commitment. 

When and if you move home, do you buy a place that suits you and your cat? That is a big question. Often you won’t have the money to make that kind of choice but money can facilitate the process of excellent cat care.

What sort of home is the ideal for a domestic cat? The ideal is probably a detached house with a fully enclosed garden that is cat secure. Such a place is not essential however and neither is a lot of money. 

11 thoughts on “How Good A Cat Owner Are You?”

  1. The author of the best comment will receive an Amazon gift of their choice at Christmas! Please comment as they can add to the article and pass on your valuable experience.
  2. Will check out Bodega Bay.
    You are a hoot, Sylvia. You and R are quite a pair.
    Seriously, though, Michael mentioned wanting to move to the country. I think the country is just ideal for cats.
    It’s just hard to find the right setting anymore. And, no to Deirdre. I was named in memory of a very beloved patient (hispanic) that my mother had cared for in her nursing days.

  3. Dasn’t write any more non-cat palaver on a cat website beyond a brief response, Dee. (And your name has got to be an amputated Deirdre.) (Speaking of names, two of the most beautiful I can think of is ‘Rielle’ – the name John
    Edward’s girlfriend gave herself – and the Swedish name ‘Bjorna.’)

    Be that as it may – what are you saying? No Trump Tycoons?? I’d always imagined Florida was a suicidal proposition, weather-wise – another Louisiana, or worse. Glad to hear it isn’t that bad!

    But there’s only one place I’d want to live again, if it were even remotely affordable: Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘Birds’ country: Bodega Bay, my childhood home. If you have a spare minute, pull up ‘bodegaheritagegallery.com – Jerry Dodrill.’ He’s a fab photographer, though I was actually trying to find the name of an artist who painted Bodega Bay and its environs; he was on the Internet last year, but might have popped his clogs. His website has certainly disappeared. (I’ve trained Ruthie to say ‘howdy,’ and she’s introduced me to ‘clog-popping.’ As for the ‘howdy’ incongruity, can’t you envision her in a Stetson and chaps?)

    Anyhow, the coastline was so beautiful with its thundering surf and Yorkshire-like windswept green hills covered with poppies and lupines in spring. And the solitude….perfect silence but for a meadowlark warbling away (think Ralph Vaughan Williams’s ‘The Lark Ascends’), and the chattering wind in the groves of eucalyptus. The school I went to, when I was six, was the one you see in Hitchcock’s film ‘The Birds:’ it was built several years before the Civil War, and smelled of chalk dust and dry rot and smoke from the pot-bellied stove.

    And now – God have mercy – Bodega Bay and Freestone are last-gasp chi-chi: an aggregate of ‘artisan’ pastry, cheese, wine, and hand-dipped candle shops; ‘spas;’ galleries around every bend of the road; world-class restaurants; b & b’s, etc. AS if this weren’t enough, S.F’s plutocrats have built their mansions on the hillsides. Could fall down and weep.

    You have no earthquakes? S.F., my 2nd favorite city in the world, sits on the San Andreas fault. And right now, I live in a prime tsunami zone; the opposing ‘shelves’ are only a few miles offshore, and geologists are finding traces of ‘Noah’s flood’ watermarks at high elevations along the coast. Which explains the centuries-old Native American legends of a monster flood. Oh well…better than sitting in a nursing home, gumming jello and noodles for twenty years, no?

    I know how kind and caring you are of homeless cats,and feel for you – and also for them – in the windstorms, with flying branches. Do the poor souls survive? Perhaps they crawl under cars? So criminal of people to throw their animals out the door to fend for themselves. Sidney Vicious, whom I’m feeding F. F. twice a day, hunches outdoors in the cold and rain all winter long, while his ‘owner’ sits inside, feeding his face and basking in front of his fireplace. I wish there were an afterlife, so I could be there to light the charcoal briquettes. Do these people feel a twinge of guilt? Course not. It’s not part of their mentality. Never was.

    Over & out.

  4. Hi, Sylvia

    I thought about the midwest for someone looking for some country living. There’s still some farm lands there. It’s not for me though. Snow is pretty to look at, but freezing temperatures wouldn’t suit me at all. I don’t even own a coat.

    I like the tropical weather but there’s some caution that has to be taken, especially with kids and animals.

    We have a rare tornado here and no earthquakes at all.
    Our thing is hurricanes and they come in spurts. They can be damaging, for sure, espcially if a couple of small twisters are embedded within. I live more inland now than I used to, so I get less intensity than on the east coast. But, the good part is that we have plenty of notice when they’re coming and can do a lot of preparation to ensure the safety of our pets and ourselves. My biggest worry is the unsheltered cats that I care for. I’ve dodged a lot of flying branches and debris doing checks.

  5. Hi Dee – Florida must be beautiful. But I’d dread the typhoons, hurricanes, twisters – whatever they are. Do not look forward to windstorms, and would think Florida is right in the path of every one. Have surely mentioned this before, but several Australian architects have designed modular homes that are, ostensibly, 100 percent wind-proof. Aren’t you alarmed when the funnels or storm clouds move inland? Aren’t you all but swept off the map a dozen times a year? What gets to be costly, even with our relatively mild winter storms, my handyman takes three hours to nail and glue down one shingle that blows off in the wind. And when you have three or four, the costs tend to mount, given the tempo of his handiwork.

    But yes…it would be heaven to live in a climate where you could have a citrus orchard. I have this two-foot, scraggly Meyer’s lemon ‘tree’ that blooms lavishly during the summer and even sets fruit, which drop off when it’s taken back in, in September.

    Florida, though, must be paradise on earth. But why would you want to live out on the prairies, if you had a mind to move? The temp. drops to 40 below, does it not? Perhaps you’d enjoy Colorado, etc.
    ____________________________
    Thanks again for the great advice re the e-mail problem. I’ve not yet acted on it, however; am used to going up to the library twice a week, and – actually, the curtailment of e-mail means less time on the Internet, which appeals to me. Prefer in-person friendships, though I realize the digital world is essential to people involved in philanthropic or animal rights networks, etc.
    Take care! S.

  6. Well i believe im a good Cat Owner. I always take them to the vet when needed. Esp, when their life depended on it i.e when Cassy got old and started having problems, Also when the cats developed Abscesses and other probs. Money was not issue as all our cats are worth it. I believe i give them a great life, even when i was on my own with just Cassy and Tammy they had both worlds of inside and Outside as well as a comfortable life.

    I am mostly around and they are only on their own for a short period of time at most. The place i live now is prob a better place than i have been in as has a lot of Garden is Very Quiet. They can stay inside where there’s lots of sun and have got cat beds.

    In winter It doesn’t get too cold just about -3 at most, unless it decides to snow. Only thing that worries me sometimes is the road but the cats seem to be afraid of the road. Also im able to keep an eye on them most of the time. I, do think its important when getting a cat/kitten that you think of the long term commitment not just when they are a kitten. Think its important to get them fixed as soon as possible when they are of age. I’ve never let them have their own kittens- as i just think its cruel, plus i really couldn’t cope with it, esp after having to find homes and seeing others struggle to look after them.

    I’ve become a stronger advocate for cats than i used to be. I try as much as possible to give them the best possible food as im able too. Not sure what else to say I’ve lived in a city when i had a cat, where it had a garden and a Quiet street. I guess things are a lot different here in New Zealand, than in other places so i guess its hard to compare. The main important thing, is that cats are happy, content feel loved and know there cat Mummies and Daddies look after them as best as they are able give them the best care and love possible. 🙂

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