Recycling Loose Cat Hair

You can do useful things with cat hair that is lying around the house; floating against skirting boards, on the bed, on sofas and chairs, you name the place, it is likely be there. You’ve probably eaten quite a bit of it over the years. Cat hair that has been shed by a cat tends to get everywhere. Cat hair shedding can be minimized by regularly grooming your cat. We know that. The Furminator is the tool of choice. Groomit is another one. Incidentally, there are no non-shedding cat breeds.

If the Furminator is good for collecting loose hair from a cat, a Bizzy brush is good for collecting it from beds and furniture. This is a velvet brush and the grain of the velvet picks up cat hair extremely effective. Once on the brush the hair can be removed by pushing the brush against a carpet with the grain of the velvet. The hair balls up on the carpet and can be picked up. Now that I know of some uses for loose cat hair, these balls of hair will put to use.

Incidentally, the Furminator, itself can be used to collect loose cat hair from upholstery, so says Caroline a regular contributor. Thanks Caroline for these ideas.

Crafted Cat Hair Products

For interested people, beautiful cat hair products can be crafted. The book below is the definitive work on this:

For the Birds

Crafting products from loose cat hair doesn’t really appeal to me but this does: balled up, collected cat hair can be used by birds. I like this idea. It is creating a partnership between predator and prey and the human is acting as the intermediary. Wonderful concept. The idea is to place balls of cat fur next to the bird feeder. Birds building nests should collect it to line the nest to provide insulation, comfort and warmth. When do birds build nests? It varies a lot; from February through to September with March and April being the more active months. When I try this, next year (2014) I intend to put some cat fur out with the bird feed around March and throughout the summer and see what happens.

The Ultimate Natural Free Homemade Cat Toy!

You probably know this one. I wrote about it years ago but it is very clever so I’ll repeat it! This is an “invention” of Zach Scott in America. He has made a video. Using the Furminator or some other effective cat grooming tool you simply ball up the hair into a cigar shaped wad (it binds together very effectively and naturally) and that is the toy. Done and dusted in about five minutes. Cats seem to be interested in the smell and shape of their own hair. My cat will sniff it and eat it! Until I stop him.

Other Uses

There are other uses for this natural resource. Wads of cat hair have been used as booms to pick up oil from oil spills. I am sure there other uses which are yet to be devised. I suppose it could be used as padding for cushions and such like. Perhaps not. Do you have any ideas for recycling cat hair?

Conclusion

A nice aspect of recycling loose cat hair is that a lot of people see cat hair as a nuisance, something to get rid of as soon as possible. If it can be used and put to use  – particularly to help nesting birds, for example – it turns a negative into more of a positive. I like that.

Photo: Sean and Lauren on Flickr