On Tue, 03 Feb 2004 10:45:54 -0800, Lozzie wrote:

My neighbours cats seem determined to use my garden as their toilet. Is
there anyway I can keep them off? I don't want to use any of the machine
type deterents you can buy as they seem expensive and I've been told they
don't work very well.
Thank you

Anything stinky enough or noisy enough to annoy cats would annoy you more.
If your garden is dryish & the soil loose & sandy, cats are going to love
it, period. You could get a big cat of your own whose territoriality might
keep the number of visiting cats down to a minimum, & one tends NOT to
hate one's own cat's turds quite so much. Some areas might be mulchible
with cedar bark (small crushed type which better resembles top soil
instead of chunks of wood strewn about, & mixes best into the soil as an
organic component) because it is so splintery cats don't like to dig in
it. Anything that makes the surface of the soil less like a catbox of Tidy
Cat discourages them. They can't dig in areas with solid groundcovers or
with unloosened soil, & you can even punish them with stickery
groundcovers. If you prune a lot of roses or blackberries or the like, you
can cut up the stems into torny sticks to mulch with in cat-favorite
spots, or even just use regular tree twigs & small limbs as a decorative
mulch laid attractively around any plants you don't want cats digging in;
if there's not room for them to dig, they'll dig elsewhere, & bent little
snaky limbs can be attractive while making it uncomfy for fastidious
beasts to squat down. Cats also tend not to like to dig in well watered
gardens, but go for the dry areas under eaves. Sometimes regular watering
nearer the most cat-active times (dusk) is enough to discourage them.

I find there are not TOO many cats & with just a little bit of a blase
feeling about their endeavors, a little poo can be regarded as potential
fertilizer & no big deal really. Now & then the cats do something that
makes me peevish, like one scratched off the entire surface of a cyclamen
about to burst into bloom, scraped off every leaf & everything, then
pooped right on top of the tuber. Now that clump is not going to do
anything until next winter gawdamn it. But usually all their scratching
about means is that I have to bury their tootsy rolls better than they do.

-paghat the ratgirl

--
"Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher.
"Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature.
-from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers"
See the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com/