I remember dreading the day I found the perfect couch to go in
our apartment. Binx was never particular with what he liked
scratching on and I realized that if I bought this couch, that
it would end up looking like a shredded pin cushion in a matter
of hours not days!
Just moving into a new apartment (or having been there a long
time) introducing your kitty to his new surroundings can be
quite tough and you want to keep him inside for about a week to
three weeks until you are satisfied that he is happy to know
where home is and he is settled himself before deciding to let
him outside. While he is inside for those one to three weeks, if
you are unfortunate enough not to be able to stay home and watch
your kitty 24/7, you will likely to come home and find the couch
has been attacked or worse, I used to come home and find the
base of my bed had been attacked!
Now declawing is definitely out of the option, the only other
choice left was to look at is Cat Furniture for your kitty. For
starters a cat scratcher especially if you have an indoor kitty!
Now I was very wary how Binx would take to this new carpeted
object sitting in the lounge, and it was quite lucky I had
bought him a Cat Nip plant!
Your kitty will probably go nutty over Cat Nip, but not all cats
react the same way to it. If your kitty is not taking any notice
of his new scratching pole, and is still using your couch, break
a couple of leaves off the Cat Nip plant and proceed to rub it
all over the carpeted pole. It took a few days of sniffing for
Binx to actually get any interest in the pole, but once your
kitty gets the idea or if need be, show kitty how it should be
used first, and praise him each time he uses it properly!
Make sure the pole is secured down properly because it might
topple onto kitty while he's using it, and it will just scare
him off using the pole for good! I had ours wedged underneath
the TV Cabinet and now the Coffee table and removed the bell
attached to the top of the pole as it seemed to scare Binx every
time it jingled behind him! And guess what - He has not touched
our new couch, ONCE!
