wanted-tips for moving house.

[balto]

We are going to be moving house in the next few weeks, and we have 3 cats, worried about them trying to return to our old house, we can keep 2 of them in, but it is my cat sandy worried about as he wont stay in, so any tips would be gratefull.

[brandy]

they recommend keeping them in a few weeks until settled even if they want out... that is about the only advice i can give... keep vigelent on the doors ect.. so he dosent sneek out, and make sure he has id on his collar just in case!

[emszxr]

make sure you have cats locked in somewhere when moving your items. once moved a family from wick to inverness. their cat somehow sneaked in back of lorry and was there for about 24 hours. he didnt seem to be bothered, and no accidents.

but yes they say keep them in a couple of weeks and try spoil them a bit more than usual. are you moving far in case they do go back.

[dx100uk]

sadly all cats are diff
however, mine, a rather stuckup little thing of 4yrs cetainly the lord of the house but a very scared cat outside, moved to wick recently for 2 weeks over xmas and had no troubles with him going in/out at all.

even put up with the 650mls [15hrs]journey twice [there and back!]

i was very suprised.

dx

[dragonfly]

If at all possible leave them at your old house until all the moving has finished and until you have set up a couple of rooms - so they have a room with a window that they can go into.

my 19 year old cat has moved house 3 times now. First time I kept her locked in for probably 2 days at most before she escaped, next 2 moves kept her locked in living room with me, sitting her on the windowsill stroking her while she looked out at her new surroundings - did the same with the 2 other cats we had acquired by our last move.

they won't venture out far at first but being naturally curious animals they'll soon want to explore

[over-the-ord]

when i lived at home, not long after we moved our cat disappeared for 2 weeks, thought she died! but it turned out that she went back to our old house on the other side of the town before coming back home! after that she didn't venture far! and lived until well into her 20's

hope your move goes smoothly and your cats settle in there new home!

[Goldie]

We have 4 cats - like yours, 2 go out all the time, and 2 are always in. However when we moved we kept them all in for 2 days.

On the day of the move we put them in their cat baskets and left them in them, in a room without a lot of noise going on. I kept going in an speaking to them and giving them a fuss. When the removals men had gone and the doors where closed we set up the litter tray and their food dishes etc and took the cat baskets nearby and opened the doors of the baskets and let them come out and explore at their lesiure. They were all a bit jumpy, that it to be expected, but soon got into explore mode and got used to the new surroundings.

On the third day we waited till mid morning and let them out. I just left the back door open and let them find their own way to the door, in their own time. We didn't feed them before they went out as we figured if they went out hungry they would come back - it worked, after an hour or so I went to the back door and called them in - giving them a small bit of food - they went back out again and I called them back in again a while later, giving them a small bit of food again. They actually then stayed around themselves. I had heard that a cat will go walk about and exploring on a full stomach, which if in a new area can lead to them getting lost - don't know how true that is but the letting them out hungry worked for us.

Good luck with the move hope you are happy in your new home and hope the cats all settle in well and safe.

Cheers