Wooden mulch, bird baths, cats
Newbie wrote:
To make a long story short...
snipped to make a long story even shorter
Exhibit 1: My wife has created about a 60 feet long strip of wooden
mulch along the fence because grass doesn't grow easily here. Cats love
to walk on the mulch, even jump on it from the fence. (As mentioned, it
is Cedar Nuggets from Home Depot.)
If you want to make your cats' lives better and safer (and give
yourselves less to worry about in the bargain) keep them indoors.
Now, I tried walking barefoot on it for a few feet and realized it
wasn't like normal ground. You have thousands of wood chips, some with
sharp edges, all at random angle. I felt a lot of sharp points and
edges. Walking gently is one thing, but if a cat ran or, worse, jumped
from a fence, she could land on a sharp chip the wrong way and get
hurt?
Cats are clever. They wont persist at something that hurts. Very wise,
unlike many of us higher animals, obviously. Either don't use the mulch
or keep the cats indoors. If neither of those are viable options, stop
worrying. As you said earlier, "they love to walk on the mulch, even
jump on it from the fence."
Exhibit 2: We have an 18" heavy iron bird bath. It looks pretty but my
fear is it easy to trip. Especially when it is sitting on an uneven
ground like the mulch or even grass. Cats are naturally curious, this
is just the roght height for them to try playing or climbing, and
having it fall on them.
I'm concerned about the safety of the birds in such close proximity to
the cats.
If the birdbath is so unstable you're concerned about the cats being
injured by it:
1. don't put it up -- find another way to leave water out for the birds, or
2. keep the cats indoors
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