A Thought on Cats

I love them.  I have two that still reside at my parent's house due to the constant chaos that tends to ensue in my apartment, and I love them.

However, they use a litter box.  Not my brand-new vegetable garden.

For the past week, ever since I planted my peas and onions and tomatoes and peppers (early, yes, but I've been able to protect them from the unseasonable cold we've had thus far), I've come home to at least one of my pea plants completely buried in dirt.  I'm sitting at work now and all I can think about is having to uncover my plants when I get home.  It took me almost a whole week to figure out what was going on.  I could constantly smell poo but figured that it was either the composted cow manure I worked into my garden or one of my neighbors wasn't cleaning up after their dog (wouldn't be suprising, they don't even clean the garbage out of their front yards so why would they clean up dog dookie?).

A couple of days ago I took my dachshund puppy, Frankie, outside after work.  I had some random composting to do, and figured she could do her "business" while I was puttering around the back yard.  As usual, I went to do something in the garden and she hopped in and sat down right between the basil and the dill.  No biggie.  At least she's stopped sitting on the peas (poor peas.  Come on, animals, give peas a chance!).  I turned around to work in my compost bin (I'll have pictures up at some point as this was my first project prior to starting this blog) and heard her chomping on something.

You have to understand, when I put the garden in and was working the composted cow manure into the soil, Frankie was finding little "cow cookies" and was eating them left and right.  :gag, vomit, gross gross gross:.

Frankie was not eating cow cookies.  Frankie was snacking on what appeared to be a fresh cat... present. 

My first thought:  EW!

My second thought:  Cats have been using my garden as a restroom!  EW!

My third thought:  You dirty, fuzzy, opportunistic scallywags.

OK, I didn't use scallywags, or any other old-timey word that would take the place of a good old F-bomb.  But I'm trying to keep it clean here folks - you know, clean?  Green?  Ahhhh, moving on.

So between working today, I did some research.  I can go to PetSmart and purchase a bottle of pet repellent.  A lovely chemical substance that you put around your gardens and flowerbeds to keep animals out.

My first thought:  EW!

My second thought:  There has to be an option with something I have lying around the house.

I have four options to use, all of which I was able to locate through eHow.com today.  The first and probably most simple method I found was to put a motion operated sprinkler near the garden so that when my little intruders try to potty in my veggies they'll get a healthy dose of cold water to the fur.  This would be great, except I don't have one of these lying around the house (although I'm seriously considering investing in a Super Soaker for when I'm home.  Insert evil maniacal laughter here).

Option #2 - sprinkle crushed red pepper flakes on the soil and water them in so they don't blow away.  Repeat every 2-3 days until the plants are big enough that they won't be damaged.

Option #3 - sprinkle powdered ginger around the perimeter and on the soil of the garden/flower bed.  Apparently, cats despise the smell of ginger and won't enter any areas that have been "contaminated" with it.  (Why do they despise ginger?  I'll have to do some digging on that one, especially if this one works.)

Option #4 - mix 2 cups of water with 1-2 tablespoons of flour, 1 1/2 tsp ground cayenne pepper, 2 tsp powdered mustard and 1/2 tsp regular black pepper (ground) in a spray bottle.  Spray on the soil around the plants as well as any other areas that the cats may be attracted to (in my case, my stockade fence alongside the garden).  Again, not sure how this one would work but it might be worth a shot.

When I get home from work tonight I'm sure I'll find a suprise in my vegetable garden.  I really wouldn't have a problem with it, except that everything you read online says to NOT use dog and cat waste as fertilizer as they consume meat-based diets.  Therefore, I'm constantly digging poopies out of my garden and therefore I mind immensely.  I will definitely be using one of the above methods tonight (depends on what I have in my cupboards), and will be sure to post the results.

Enjoy your afternoon!