Everyone told me not to put up a tree with cats, but we have 3 and they couldn't care less about it. The first year we had our biggest/most destructive cat, we put it some place where we could tie it to a door, just in case, but he was fine.
The worst they do is pull the ornaments off of the very bottom and play with them, so we just put the nicer ones up high and they've always been fine.
Post by UMaineTeach on Oct 21, 2014 20:43:30 GMT -5
Our cat hasn't climbed a Christmas tree yet (4 years). We did test her by just setting up the tree undecorated for a week, to see if she would climb it, then put the delicate ornaments on.
Not necessarily, we got Sadie last November and this was my biggest fear. She didn't touch the tree OR any of our other Xmas decorations around the house.
My cats haven't bothered the tree. Last year was the first Xmas with the spunky asshole kitten (who has since clawed through our couch), and he didn't climb or knock it over.
I'd let the tree sit for a day without decorating it, just to gage his reactions, lol. You should be safe with the nice ornaments at the top, where he can't bat at them.
When we got Salem, he would try and climb it. I started squirting at him with a spray bottle when he got near it. It took a couple weeks but eventually he would walk around it an look at it sideways. (He thought the tree was spraying him lol)
Our cat has knocked it down once. Now she just likes to bat at the ones on the bottom, so I very rarely put anything on the first like foot of the tree. My MIL had an artificial tree that had fiber optics (i know right?) and they got 2 kittens about 2 months before Christmas last year and they totally DESTROYED that tree. By the time Christmas came, the lights didnt even light up or anything and her tree had no ornaments on it, just a little bit of garland.
My cat didn't give a fuck about our Christmas tree. Then again he was a big fat orange fluff that never jumped up on tables or counters (just the bed or couch) so he might not be an example of a typical cat.
We have 1 cat that climbed it once and then realized it wasn't going to lead him to a magical Narnia-like land outdoors, so he got bored and now ignores it. The other two just like to hang out underneath and drink out of the reservoir.
Put the tree up with just a few cheap low hanging ornaments a day ahead and see how he reacts, and then decorate accordingly.
My cat doesn't climb our tree very often, if ever, but she loves to lay underneath it.
Ever since I was little my parents tied the top of there Christmas tree to a hook in the ceiling. They did this because the dog I had growing up climbed the tree.
DH thought it was very weird but the first year we lived together the tree fell over because of the cat. (I think this is why she doesn't climb it anymore.) The tree is now tied to the ceiling every year.
Post by polarbearfans on Oct 22, 2014 9:58:43 GMT -5
My cats tried to sit on top of a little 2 foot fake tree, and had fun flinging the ornaments across the room. That was the two good cats. Now that we also have a very bad cat in the mix, we have decided after 8 years to try a tree again, but it will be in the sunroom lol
We don't trust our cats at all with a tree. You may want to try leaving an I decorated tree up for a few days and see how Dexter does, and then slowly decorate.
I know my cats, and a tree is not happening unsupervised. The one cat walks the curtain rods, he climbs to the top of his scratcher and wraps all his legs around scratching 4 feet at once, and chews everything. He is so bad. The other boy will throw EVERYTHING he can find, especially when he wants a snack. My princess loves to play with anything that looks like a plant and would destroy even a fake tree lol
Lol, our first Christmas with our cat, we had to lock the tree in the spare bathroom every night.
She did a little better every year after that, we just had to make sure it was too heavy to topple and put the tree on a table she had a hard time getting on.
Post by Velvetshady on Oct 22, 2014 10:07:47 GMT -5
None of our four have attempted tree climbing (minus one YouTube-worthy occasion involving a bird loose in the house), but three do love sleeping under the tree and do decide they wanna play with the "toys" conveniently hanging above them.
The first year we get a new cat, we leave the undecorated tree up for ~ a week to test interest. We got some cheap plastic balls to hang near the bottom and mix in other unbreakable ones. We didn't put any breakable ones on at all the first couple years after we got the fourth cat, but used some near the top last year since they haven't shown interest in climbing.