Jumping Up On Tables

[MKitty]

Hello,

I first want to apologize if this has been asked 200 times before. I tried to find an option to search the board, but couldn't find a place to do so.

We have a new kitty - she is around 12 weeks old. She's an awesome cat and is full of personality... even my husband that isn't a cat lover, really loves her! She's a domestic cat, but resembles a siamese seal point or ballinese cat and has blue eyes and longer hair (just sharing, none of this has anything to do with my question)! Onto my question...

She is constantly jumping up on my kitchen chairs and my table top and I respond by just removing her and calmly telling her down. She will repeat this behavior a few times and then finally I am able to distract with a toy or something of interest. The issue is one that I don't really want her on my kitchen tables and two, her claws from jumping up on the chairs has put holes in the material that covers the cushions in my dining room. I also have caught her scratching on things she shouldn't like my couch, the door frames, etc. I don't want to have her declawed, but I also can't have her tearing up my house and things that we work hard for. So I have been researching ideas to help with this behavior to hopefully correct while she is young.

She already has a scratching post/hammock bed. It's not super big, but since she's little there is definitely enough room for her to climb, scratch, stretch, etc. I have sprayed it with catnip spray. She occasionally will use it, but I want her to use this more than my furniture. I have tried moving the location of it, but that hasn't seemed to help. She currently doesn't sleep in the hammock part, she prefers to sleep on the back of the couch, a pile of laundry, etc. haha! So I need more ideas to help keep her from scratching my furniture.

As for the jumping up on my kitchen and dining room chairs/tables... here are the things I have read to try... I am hoping you can give me some insight on what has worked for you so that I choose the best option to try without wasting a ton of money for something that may be useless.

• Double Sided Tape - I read I can put this on my furniture and places I don't want her on like kitchen chairs/tables. Does this actually work and can I use a generic brand or is there something special about the sticky paws brand?
• Air Spray in a can... I am not sure this will help with my issue because I don't want her jumping on the chairs and not sure how I would set this up. I could put on the table, but don't want to scare her so much that it changes her personality.
• Scatmat - Do these work well? I imagine I could put on the chairs/table and move around to the off limit places (please remember she has LOTS of other places she can be on like the regular furniture, beds, her bed (she has 2), etc.). They are pricey so don't want to spend money on this if it's not really going to work.
• Cat deterrent spray- Does this work and if so which brand would be the best? Reviews are so so on all of them.
• Peppermint Castillo Soap. I read that I could use this dilluted with water to wipe my chairs and table down and that cats don't like peppermint. Anyone try this?
• Buying a large climbing cat tree - I can do this, but would this really help the issue when I don't have one in every room?

Those are the only ideas I have come across thus far... if anyone would let me know what has worked for you and any ideas you might have I would greatly appreciate it!!

Thanks so much!

 

[abyeb]

I'd reccommend getting a large climbing tree (Chewy has some nice, big ones: Cat Trees & Condos - Free shipping at Chewy.com), and putting it next to the table. You can cover the surfaces you don't want her to scratch with specialty tape, like this one: SmartyKat Scratch Not Tape, which is cheaper than the Sticky Paws, but I think just as effective. If your kitty tries to jump on the table, tap the climber, and when your kitty goes on there, give her a treat. Same goes for scratching furniture, point to the scratcher, and reward her when she chooses that over the furniture. Also, play with her with a teaser toy around the scratcher, putting the toy on the scratcher for her to grab. This will help show her that the scratcher has a nicer surface for claws than the furniture.

 

[Kieka]

We don't allow the cats on tables and have done the removing them and saying "get down" the entire time since they were kittens. Two out of my three rarely go on the table and the third does probably every few days. The best thing is to just consistently take them off. All three of ours have gotten to the point where just saying "get down" and looking gets them off, at least most of the time.

For scratching and furniture, a taller cat tree will likely help. You can also put smaller scratching posts at locations that your cat frequently scratches to give an alternative. Our cats are good about most furniture but we have an old chair they are freely allowed to scratch and they like the couch. If we remove the scratching post from the couch corner (or it is even pushed over a little) they will go after the couch. So we keep the post there and they scratch the post instead.

We just got some of the sticky tape for a spot that we are having trouble with. But I haven't had any experience with any other scratching aide. From what I have heard, you can remove the tape after a few weeks because your cat just needs to learn it isn't good. Once she gets the idea that scratching there isn't comfortable, and has alternatives, she won't go back to the spot.

I think abyeb has excellent advice about the redirecting and training. Cats are extremely trainable provided you are consistent in the rewards and direction. They unlearn extremely quickly if you stop following through with the rewards and reactions. It would be helpful if you could get your husband on board with the redirection because if he isn't your cat will learn it is okay when you aren't there.

 

[ondine]

Thank you for your patience. It can be a pain to train them but consistency works.

I used the air can and I only have to have it sitting on the counter now - it doesn't actually work anymore but no one knows it because they see it up there and will not go on the counters.

I second the idea of a larger tree, too. Cats are natural predators and need height to "scan" their territory. It will help her feel safer in her environment.

 

[Gizmobius]

I agree with all the wonderful suggestions already but I do want to add that sometimes it just takes a bit of time, especially with kittens! With my kitten, he would jump on the kitchen counters constantly, over and over, all the time. I would just repeatedly remove him or block him when I would see him prepare to jump. He has a myriad of scratching posts and cat trees but sometimes he still does scratch at a chair or speaker or something he shouldn't, so I pick him up with his paws still in the air and place him in front of an appropriate place to scratch.

Kittens really are little terrors but they can be conquered! Good luck on correcting your little troublemaker!

 

[MKitty]

Thanks so much for all of your replies! We haven't had any cats for quite some time and our last kitty was declawed (now that I realize exactly how they do this, I don't want to repeat with another cat). Our last kitty maybe climbed up on the table once or twice and then never did it again (at least while we were around). She never clawed anything up because she was declawed. There are some good suggestions here and I will use all of them!! I have been clipping our kitty's nails, which definitely help some!!

As a side note... outside of these issues, she is a wonderful kitty. She follows us around, loves to cuddle (on her terms of course) and I love how she comes running when I get home. She's very vocal too, which cracks me up! Oh and we also have a parrot, who now mocks her meow's. Speaking of the bird... my husband is worried that she might attack the bird if given the chance. I am hoping since she's growing up around him that wouldn't be the case though!

 

[kissthisangel]

Lovely thread with great advice! Our cats get up on the worktop and all sorts. I think they just want to see what we're up to alot of the time, they can be very social cats. A perch in the area can help. We allow the cat to watch from the washing macine in the kitchen, but she's not ~really~ meant to be in there at all.

When they're this young their little claws are like needles and snag everything. I had vertical cat trees when we got Mojo, I'd got one big one for my birthday and then I got some from an animal charity shop nearby just little ones but she soon grew out of them. One thing both of my cats use are some cardboard cat scratchers, they are on the ground and shaped to support the cat scratching on the floor, they also double as a bed for one of mine too she just loves the shape. You can pick these up fairly cheaply or If you have time and patience, you can easily make these from strips of corrigated card. Link to the type we have

 

[MKitty]

So interestingly enough, I sprayed lemon scented dust spray on my chairs and table the other night as I had read they don't love the lemon scent... And not once did she try to jump up on the table last night. Might be a coincidence, but Ill take it as a win. I also stopped in the store and noticed they had the cardboard scratching mats so I got one. I rubbed a little catnip on it and she was in heaven... she scratched it a little, but mostly rolled around on it and just hung out. Another win!

I do have another issue that popped up that I wasn't expecting. She is litter box trained and I have never noticed her going anywhere else until last night. We have an atrium and down our stairway we have a cut out in our concrete that has live plants in it, dirt and then rocks on top. I am pretty sure she has been going potty in there because it smelled awful. I sprayed water on it and rinse good, but does anyone have any ideas how I can keep her from going potty in the planter? I was thinking maybe I could put a cat box right by there and it might deter her. I can't block it off as we have an open floor plan. Any other ideas?