Which is to say, my cat is eating a houseplant, not that I have a cat-eating houseplant!
My cat has very few vices, and the only one that's really driving me up the wall is his tendency to chew on my houseplants. I don't get any plant at home that is toxic to cats, and for the most part the leaves just come right out the other end (he's thrown up only once after chewing on it). I've done a lot of googling and most of what I see is either he's eating it out of boredom or he's eating it due to some kind of vitamin deficiency.
I've tried moving plants out of his reach, but with the way my house is laid out there's very few places I can put a plant where he can't reach it but it will still get the light it needs. I've tried providing him with cat grass, which he loves, but he still chews on the plants even when the cat grass is more accessible. I also tried some live catnip but after he ate more than half of it in one sitting I realized that wasn't going to be a long-term solution! I've tried bitter-tasting sprays, which he seemed to think I put on there as some kind of seasoning just for him (I caught him licking it off the leaves!).
I've also tried solving a possible boredom problem by leaving his toys out (I keep them in a basket that's accessible to him, but I've noticed he's more likely to play on his own with what's already out than pull things out, unless he wants something specific or wants me to play with him) and getting a bird feeder so he has something stimulating to watch (he LOVES the bird feeder), and he spends less time eating the plants than he did before but he still does it! The only thing that actually stops him is when the counter the plant is on is too cluttered for him to get to it, but that's not really a solution I like on a regular basis!
Does anyone have any tips on how to keep a very determined cat from eating houseplants, or should I just give up on having any kind of indoor greenery? Besides the general unattractiveness of a chewed-on plant glistening with cat spit, I'm also worried he's going to choke on it the way he scarfs it down sometimes.
My cat has very few vices, and the only one that's really driving me up the wall is his tendency to chew on my houseplants. I don't get any plant at home that is toxic to cats, and for the most part the leaves just come right out the other end (he's thrown up only once after chewing on it). I've done a lot of googling and most of what I see is either he's eating it out of boredom or he's eating it due to some kind of vitamin deficiency.
I've tried moving plants out of his reach, but with the way my house is laid out there's very few places I can put a plant where he can't reach it but it will still get the light it needs. I've tried providing him with cat grass, which he loves, but he still chews on the plants even when the cat grass is more accessible. I also tried some live catnip but after he ate more than half of it in one sitting I realized that wasn't going to be a long-term solution! I've tried bitter-tasting sprays, which he seemed to think I put on there as some kind of seasoning just for him (I caught him licking it off the leaves!).
I've also tried solving a possible boredom problem by leaving his toys out (I keep them in a basket that's accessible to him, but I've noticed he's more likely to play on his own with what's already out than pull things out, unless he wants something specific or wants me to play with him) and getting a bird feeder so he has something stimulating to watch (he LOVES the bird feeder), and he spends less time eating the plants than he did before but he still does it! The only thing that actually stops him is when the counter the plant is on is too cluttered for him to get to it, but that's not really a solution I like on a regular basis!
Does anyone have any tips on how to keep a very determined cat from eating houseplants, or should I just give up on having any kind of indoor greenery? Besides the general unattractiveness of a chewed-on plant glistening with cat spit, I'm also worried he's going to choke on it the way he scarfs it down sometimes.
