Do you know how far your cat travels?

[teamsaint]

serious qustion.I have tried looking on cats forums, but they are..well..full of cat people ..you can imagine . But each to their own !!
Any which way, today, I dropped my son at a railway station 5 miles away, little village out in the country (lucky them having such a good service, once an hour to Southampton , Salisbury etc).
As we parked up, a small black cat with a pink collar, just like ours, was setting off along the up line in the direction of Salisbury. Bear in mind this is a tiny village. How many small black cats with pink collars can there be?

Do they go that far? and if so, at what average speed? I have asked her about her wanderings, but no clear response.
All help gratefully received. I can't face any more cat forums, but I need to know !
Thanks.
Edit, she came home at 4 pm.Phew.

[Roehre]

Before she was run over we know that our cat travelled for at least nearly three miles.
She managed to sneak into a cage of a Kennel/Cattery, nick available food and return home again, until she was "caught" and the owner brought her back to us. In a crow's fly that's 2.8 miles.

[teamsaint]

Before she was run over we know that my cat travelled for at least nearly three miles.
She managed to sneak into a cage of a Kennel/Cattery, nick available food and return home again, until she was "caught" and the owner brought her back to us. In a crow's fly that's 2.8 miles.

sorry to hear about the running over Roehre, but it sounds like she lived life to the full !Couldn't keep a cat indoors against their will,although I feel bad about the bird thing... fewer round our house than before the cats arrived, though trying to do all the feeding etc, obviously !

[gurnemanz]

My neighbour's cat travels just far enough to crap in my garden.

[doversoul1]

teamsaint
I am sorry to be so dim, but what is your problem? I take it that you went home after you dropped your son, and your cat was at home. So what are you worried about?

Cats can go a very long way but as all cat people know, there is absolutely no ‘average’ about cats. Some go miles, some stay put. And I expect there are enough small black cats with pink collars. As it is, you may have seen only one other small black cat with a pink collar.

How old is your cat by the way? Do you not know her ways yet? Are you worried that your cat has developed a habit of wandering off and might get lost or something horrible may happen? By the way, you don’t expect a cat to tell you what you want to know.

P.S. If you have a cat, forget about feeding birds. You can’t have both, and birds are perfectly all right without your help.

Roehre
Very sorry to hear about your cat.

[teamsaint]

teamsaint
I am sorry to be so dim, but what is your problem? I take it that you went home after you dropped your son, and your cat was at home. So what are you worried about?

Cats can go a very long way but as all cat people know, there is absolutely no ‘average’ about cats. Some go miles, some stay put. And I expect there are enough small black cats with pink collars. As it is, you may have seen only one other small black cat with a pink collar.

How old is your cat by the way? Do you not know her ways yet? Are you worried that your cat has developed a habit of wandering off and might get lost or something horrible may happen? By the way, you don’t expect a cat to tell you what you want to know.

P.S. If you have a cat, forget about feeding birds. You can’t have both, and birds are perfectly all right without your help.

Roehre
Very sorry to hear about your cat.

DS...you sound very clued up...almost like you had visited some cat forums !

Anyway, she came home 7 hours after the station sighting.( sorryif I didn't make that clear).If she comes home then great, but i am very curious at least.
She is young, just over a year, and pretty adventurous. I can't stop her wandering, but you know how it is....and 5 miles does seem a long way. Maybe it was indeed another small black cat with a pink collar...but my son though it was her also.
I am glad that the birds are alright without my help...there is some cat guilt dished out in some bird loving quarters !
Also, you are right, now I think about it NONE of our cats have chatted about their wanderings. Something I have to live with.
Anyway, cheers for the advice .

[doversoul1]

Glad to hear that your cat is not missing. I suppose one ‘average’ thing you can say about cats is that un-neutered male cats tend to go a long way but other than that, cats don’t usually go that far for no reasons. Your cat probably has a few hiding places around the garden. And after all, cats do look much the same if the colour is similar.

[jayne lee wilson]

DS - "If you have a cat, forget about feeding birds" WTF?!
My garden has many visitors of both... they don't pay each other much mind, the birds feed, the cats look on longingly, then pass by. Cats catching birds in big shrubby gardens - rare event. Our old tabby once leapt high to bring down a pigeon as it took off - the bird was sick, did it a favour. Most neighbourhood cats spend more time arguing with each other than hunting. Outside, they become little lions.

I have a garden with 9 bird-feeding dispensers in it, all very busy with finches, tits, robins, blackbirds, nuthatches... they don't need our help?! In early autumn perhaps, when there is a greater abundance of wild food. But rain can ruin it.

With the recent climatic extremes it's often the case that young birds can go hungry during a cold, wet spring and the adults search for food desperately - they need what we give them, coming very close, & they know the cat who just watches, close by. Winter, snow or hard frosty ground - next to no food at all. Late summer sees a semi-independent creche of young tits flocking round the crushed nuts, suet and seeds

Attitudes of some farmers has driven many larger birds into suburban areas on the countryside fringe - we have many more Jackdaws, Wood Pigeons, Pheasants and Magpies than a few years ago. If it freezes and the tide's in the gulls drop in for lunch... large birds' only predators - sparrowhawks.

Our cats never travel too far - say a street or two away. Present Norwegian Cross gets great fun out of chasing the young foxes I try to feed, brings in many mice who live in the house till I catch them and put them back out, so she doesn't need to go far for entertainment. But I've rescued a stray or two who came many miles, including a blind 17-year old grey who survived who-knows-where for 3 weeks after wandering off from her home across the park.

What's needed are radio collars, preferably with tiny cameras attached...

[MrGongGong]

My neighbour's cat travels just far enough to crap in my garden.

since getting one of these

http://www.pesthelp.co.uk/img/products/image848.jpg

none of them have crapped in ours

[Serial_Apologist]

since getting one of these

http://www.pesthelp.co.uk/img/products/image848.jpg

none of them have crapped in ours

Blimey, what's the spike for???

Handwritten notice on several trees around here:

"Lost

Pet African grey parrot

Very tame

Phone this number"

[Flosshilde]

Blimey, what's the spike for???

Impaling the cat, of course

Handwritten notice on several trees around here:

"Lost

Pet African grey parrot

Very tame

Phone this number"

It's amazing how many African Grey parrots go mising - there always seems to be a notice up about one missing.


I've no idea how far any of my cats have travelled (I could say from London to Glasgow, but that was in a car ). We did meet a cat once when we were out for a walk, & it followed us for several miles (we didn't have a dog then).

[kernelbogey]

Oh good, a cat thread.

My nine-year old neutered male cat, now in his fourth home, has had to be retrieved from locations about 1-2 miles away on various occasions. He has my phone no on a tag on his collar, since he has been a wanderer for ever and has a habit of attaching himself to new locations. In his first 0-4 years, when I lived in a small city, he would go to the nearby leisure centre, hijack the receptionist's chair and sleep there all day, to their apparent delight but their manager's frustration.

Since moving five years ago to this small town/large village, I have had calls from various estate agents, banks, shops and homes 'We've got your cat here and he doesn't seem to want to leave....'; so now his other tag says 'Please don't feed me' on one side and 'I can find my own way home' on the other (I know, I know).

His sister never goes out the front door onto the street and seems to be happy with my garden and a few of the neighbours' gardens as her territory (she's a fierce hunter).

My former, delightful, Irish vet once memorably said, 'You have to remember that, out of our sight, our dear pussy cats become urban terrorists'.

[BBMmk2]

Our car I know travels far as he runs across a busy road next to us, where there is parkland/woods and so I expect he does travel far. I've heard cats that travel around 8 miles!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

My ... cat, now in his fourth home, has had to be retrieved from locations about 1-2 miles away on various occasions. ... Since moving five years ago to this small town/large village, I have had calls from various estate agents, banks, shops and homes 'We've got your cat here and he doesn't seem to want to leave....'

Has this, I wonder, anything to do with the fact that he is a

neutered male

?

(I mean, would you? )

[Pabmusic]

I found this, by a writer who laments the dearth of published studies into the distances cats roam. He still has an extensive bibliography:

http://lostpetresearch.com/2011/01/how-far-do-cats-travel/