A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2006 Help My Cats are eating my pothos and spider plants

Very upset with my cats as they have found a likeing to eating my houseplants (the ones that they can reach) they tend to chew on my pothos if not placed in a high place. currently am using a mix of water and caynne pepper?
any other ideas out there?

and as for my spider plants I have to keep them hanging as they will eat it up like cotton candy.
thanks for any ideas.
mrs. b

i really don't have any ideas, my cats like to nibble on the ends of my draceanas. i just do like you are doing, put them out of reach

Thank you Jiffymouse for your post. I have to spray this stuff once a week and try not to display to much attention to the plants as this attracts my cat's attention and before you know it the cats are there eating away.
Mrs.b

mrs. b, you might want to check out this site. It has pothos listed as being poisonous to cats! Might need to rethink the plants you have if you can't keep them from eating them.

Dianna

hey the way my cats used to chew up my pothos, i wonder how poisonous? that never stopped them.
Mrs. b

Out of reach of a cat? Not likely!

Wonder if a little cyanne pepper sprinkled about would discourage them.

Nothing is out of the reach for a house cat. You would be amazed with what they get into when you sleep. The house is their DOMAIN when you sleep. Cats are extremely active at night... or atleast mine are.

I have built a small electric fence around my house plants.... (JOKING).

Honestly, I guess I am lucky... I have one full time indoor cat and three other cats that are free to come in or out as they please.... none of them bother any of my house plants. Although.... the three indoor/outdoor cats do try to get at some plants that are outside.... but for some reason my plants that are inside no one disturbs them.

yes my cats do think they own the house and I suppose in a sense they do. I also you caynne pepper as well. Just last nite another potho (one that I did not spray) was attacked.

Bad kitty!!

Mrs. B

Maybe at night (if that is the time when they eat the plants) you can section off the cats. Keep them in a bedroom or a garage. If you have birds... maybe you can put the plant on top of the bird cage (JOKING).

Any way you can raise the plant and hang it?

No as the space that I have for hanging is already being used for plants too!!
well, the plants they do chew on are not my prized ones just yet and this is not a constant problem, just a once a month thing with them. It's when I get lazy with the pepper spray is when I see a backslide with the cats. With spiders I just have to hang all of them, nothing works to save them from the cats. To them, spider plants are like cotton candy.
Real Yummy!!

Don't know if this will help, I have never tried this, but this recipe is in a book I have of homemade sprays for bugs, fungus, disease and even cat and dog repellents!!


30 ml Cayenne pepper
45 ml of strong powdered mustard
75 ml of flour
2L of water

Spray on plant


Here's the dog repellent fot those having the same problem but of a canine variety


1 clove of crushed garlic
1 chopped onion
1L of hot water
5 ml of Tabasco
12 ml of cayenne pepper

For this one it says to mix everything together and let sit for 12 hours. Filter and water this in areas of the garden or lawn where the dog has a habit to dig holes, for example.

Thank you so much for those recipes. I know they were around but never could find them. Now here they are.

You're welcome. Good luck!

Hi everyone, I am new here! I have 7 cats who love to make a salad out of my plants if I let them. One thing that I do is that I bought some cat oat seeds(sometimes called cat grass). It grows quick and my cats love it. It seems to have made them not pay as much attention to my plants. I am not naive enough to think this is the ultimate solution, but it does help.

3 words:

bitter apple spray

you can get it at any pet store - it's used to defer biting but works equally as well when sprayed on the plants and it won't harm the plants or the animal.

My cat used to do that also. The reason they are after the plants is simple. They are after grass, or cholorophyll. Cats that go outside usually chomp on green grass, and have no need for houseplants. I always grew oat or barley or wheat grass for kitty. Takes about a week. When I would give her a new pot of grass, she was in heaven. If the grass fizzled out, and the new one was not quite ready, I would go outside & get some grass from the yard to put on a pie tin for her. Grass was never sprayed with poisons. To raise your grass, you need a 4 in. or so flower pot. Fill with soil. Sprinkle seeds on quite thick. Then top off with a little more soil. Keep damp. Raise someplace where kitty cannot get into it. Usually takes a little over a week to get the right height, a few inches. For seeds, get them at the grocery, in the places that have food in the bins. It is barley, oat groats, wheat groats, or the whole food, not the flat rolled type. This should keep your kitty happy. They are just after what the body is needing, not being malicious.
Darlene

Thanks Darlene for that information. I tend to forget the cats have physical needs like we do.
mrs. b

Hi, I searching through some older posts and this one caught my eye..My kitty Marco loves to eat my Spider babies..Bad bad kitty..I think I will get him some cat grass and look into the bitter apple spray! Thanks everyone!

This is an older topic but I have a couple suggestions. I was having a problem with my cat getting up on the stove and urinating. I asked at a Yahoo group for any ideas, here are what I think are the best ones.
Smear some shortening on a peice of parchment paper, wax paper might work. Then sprinkle with red and black pepper and put it where they go that you don't want them. The get a double whammy: gooey paws and a god dose of pepper whan they clean their paws.
I also was told to just put aluminum foil down cause they don't like the noise (I don't know if this would be very effective).
There is this spray that you can get at Petco called Feliway, that you spray around where you don't want them to go. In Maine it is $25 for a 75ml bottle. It worked for my cat to stop urinating on the stove, but I don't know if it would be effective for you though, especially since it is quite costly.
I never tried the parchment paper with shortening and the peppers, but I think this would probably be the most effective for you. The woman that gave me this idea said she'd hang the papers on the refridgerator with magnets when she wasn't using them, so she wouldn't have to keep making more.
Good luck and let me know how it goes.

My dogs used to lick it off the shelves before chewing. I guess it's good to have a variety of deterrents, everybody doesn't like something.

"It" being bitter apple from a way previous post in this topic. I didn't know how these long threads worked. Sorry.

The cats are after greens to help food digest. A cat that goes outside will eat grass, inside cats have no choice. I always grew oats, barley, wheat or anything like that for the cats. Get that in the food bins at the grocery store. Get a 4 in. square pot, fill with soil, put a handful of the "groats" as they are called on top. Sprinkle with a small amount of soil, and keep watered, but not soping wet. In a week or so, you should have a super nice crop of kitty grass. Only thing is: they are so happy to have it, it is gobbled up super fast. When I gave kitty a new batch, you would think I was giving her the best food possible. So I always grew one batch right after the other, always have one batch going. They do not need full sun to grow, just light.
You can buy these in the pet stores, but they cost over $5.00, and about 5 cents to do it yourself.
Darlene

Try using a spray bottle and blasting the cat with water every time it goes near the plant. (not just when its eating it) That taught my cat to stay away quite quickly.

I agree with several of the postings, cats have an instinct to eat grass and the like - it's fiber, cleans out their guts, etc.

Grow the oats that you get in the bin from the grocery store, but be warned: cats LOVE the greens. You may find yourself sewing seeds to grow every 3 days to keep up.

But it's better for them to eat than the spider plants, etc.

Just my $0.02

my cat tries to eat mine too. only the grass-like ones though. i have a pony-tail palm that he used to like until i put it where he couldn't reach. try growing some wheatgrass and putting within easy reach of the cats. its really easy. just go to the healthfood store and get some whole, raw, wheat. soak it in water in a dark room or cupboard for 12 hours, drain and rinse, then soak it another 12 hours in new clean water, then sprinkle it on some damp soil in a pot and place in bright light. it will sprout and grow in days, grows very fast, and cats love it. it may destract them from your houseplants if they have something in easier reach that is OK for them to chew on.