Cats!!!

Bee friendly

Hi, has anyone got or had experience with sonic cat scarers? My neighbours cat is hiding amongst my pots and then leaping out at my birds as they are on the feeder, as much as I would like to stand guard all day to deter him I can't ,any advice folks?

gardengirl6

In my experience, nothing much works to deter cats.    Can you hang your feeders up high where the cat is unlikely to be able to get the birds? 

I have had some success by planting a couple of curry plants where a local cat liked to do its business and they certainly deterred him. 

I have also found that spiky stuff you nail to the top of fences works as they definitely don't like to walk on it.        

Alina W

Yes, sonic scarers do work - I've used them for years. You do need to positiobn them carefully, though, or they won't "see" the cat until it's too late. Also, think about putting something spikey where the cat likes to hide.

Dovefromabove

But are the sonic scarers likely to scare our hedgehog?  Does anyone know?

weejenny

Something I tried in my front garden was cheap wooden skewers for cooking I broke them in half so they had nice splintered tips and put them in the ground as spikes. I put them through my cat mint which was permanently flattened.I had to use them round my veg in my raised beds too. Cats love open space and hate obstacles I now try and fill up with lots of plants too. Cats are creatures of habit they can move on to some other poor souls garden but never their own!! With perseverance and two wee terriers Im not bothered by the 12 cats within a mile..

Ps I was given a loan of a sonic cat scarer gun I tried it a couple of times from in the house but with double glazing it pointed back into the house! I could never open the window quietly enough either, a waste of time that was for me

Chloesgran

I, too, used to be plagued by cats and tried everything. The sonic cat scarer was fine for a while, but the batteries never lasted very long and a couple of the more persistent cats even got used to the noise and ignored it. The best gel I found was one with added garlic. Can't remember the name but I bought it at B&Q. This worked well, but the smell was atrocious! The neighbours all closed their doors and windows when I put it down and the odour even permeated the outside cupboard ceiling and went into our bathroom above. However, I now have the best (and most expensive) scarer ever. It is the Contech Scarecrow Motion Activated Animal Deterrent £49.99 at Amazon). It connects to an outside tap and shoots a jet of water at anything that moves within its sensor's range. It was a nightmare to set up but now that it is working I think it is brilliant. No cat has been near the garden for three weeks, which in a way disappoints me as it was really amusing to watch them run when they were 'shot at'! This was definitely worth every penny spent on it.

I

gardeningfantic

@chloesgran.. does that not effect the birds etc as well that come in.. would worry me that

i have found putting spikes in teh ground as above works and also the fact i have seagulls nesting on flat roof and they scare anything bigger than themselves off..

weejenny

Do you think this would work for deer. It is on the expensive side but if you put it in plant money only about 7 plants. A friend of mine is having a nightmare with deer, fencing is not an option in her budget

Chloesgran

When setting up the scarer you have to adjust it to the size of the animal you want to scare - small, medium or large, so, with it set on medium,usual garden birds do not activate it.

gardeningfantic

oh..that is good to hear.. thou the seagull keeps the 2 buggers off my garden at mo.. but they still give it a try..

Chloesgran

I seem to recall that in the advert for it deer were mentioned as one of the animals for which it could be used, but I am not 100 per cent certain. Definitely worth a try though.