Fly or drive cat x-country (and questions)

[babygirlpriest]

We're relocating from DC to DFW and trying to figure out how to move our cat.

DH and the dog are driving out ahead of me. I'm staying another month or two for work/selling the house. DH taking the cat isn't really an option as he'll be staying a few days with bro who has allergies. 

My preference is to fly with the cat to DFW shortly after DH gets settled in. First, I think it would be easier for showing/selling the house but more importantly, I think flying would be easier for the cat and, since the cat and dog are buds, I think it might be easier on them to be together. The other option is to keep the cat with me till the house sells and I drive to TX (meaning 2 days in the car for the cat).

Questions: Which will be less traumatic for the cat? Does it just depend on the cat? Is one airline better than another? Direct flights are roughly 3 hours, I'm assuming I should only look at direct flights (not too hard to get)? Anything else I need to know? Does he need to be approved to travel from our vet?

Tips/suggestions welcome. Frankly we're pretty new to cat ownership (rescued him a few months ago pretty battered and bloody from a parking lot and the sucker just wormed his way into our hearts). 

[gottadobe]

I only have experience with Delta (I'm in DFW) - didn't have problems either time.
Yes, you will need a certificate from your vet for the pet to fly.
If you look on Delta's website, I believe they have all the information there.

Pet Requirements

If you can afford it, I would probably send the cat to DH while you are showing the house. I think a 2 day road trip would be more stressful than a 3 hour flight.

You don't say when you are relocating, but there are temperature restrictions, so summertime is probably not an option.

[G22]

I've never flown my pets so I can't help there. But we are a military family and have done several cross country moves with 2 dogs and 2 cats by car. (OH to CA, CA to MT) Both were 3-4 days trips.

We have a medium soft sided dog crate we put both kitties, a small litter boxes and some blankets for the trip. Our one cat gets anxious, so he gets some meds the vet gave us before each trip. But overall they travel very well. I also use Feliway spray on the blankets in their crate to make them feel a little less anxious.

Truthfully, it probably depends on the cat. But my cats travel fine by car, but would be a mess if I flew them somewhere. Just based off personal experience, its easier and cheaper to take them by car, and I think its less stressful on them.

Its been a few years since we have moved, so I may be forgetting something we did. If you have any questions about driving with them feel free to ask me!

[msmerymac]

We moved from California to Pennsylvania and my friend and I flew out with my 2 cats. I stayed to work an extra week and finish cleaning out the house in CA, and my husband and his BIL drove across the country with our stuff in a moving truck. I got there a day after they did.

We had a cat with medical issues at the time (oral medication and subcutaneous fluid administration) and I thought the stress of 5 days in a car, plus temperature fluctuations, plus never being able to leave them alone in the car while we went to eat dinner, plus finding pet friendly hotels, would have been more stressful.

I did ask my vet about traveling with them and got copies of their medical records, but no one asked for them. I flew Virgin America, a direct flight, and each cat was $100 extra. You have to use correctly sized carriers (the dimensions should be on the website - usually it's the smallest carriers companies make and they should be soft-sided).

I left my house by 6am, picked up my friend, returned my rental car (my husband and the moving truck towed my car to PA), got to the airport, got checked in, got on the plane for 5 hours, got to Philly and then got "home" 45 minutes later. When all was said and done, the trip, door to door, was about 9 hours.

My non-medically-indicated cat peed, threw up, and got stressed out, but that would have happened regardless! The other one was totally fine and happy, although his face was pretty shocked when the plane took off.

I put a towel at the bottom of each carrier and topped it with a puppy pad. I also put a harness on each and brought leashes just in case I needed to take either out while in the airport for any reason. When we went through security they had us go to a side room to take out the cats so they could inspect the carriers. I also brought collapsible bowls and filled a nalgene bottle with water at the airport so my kidney-disease cat could have water on the plane, but he wasn't very interested. We did not medicate either cat.

Good luck! Let me know if you have any questions and I'll see if I can remember any info.