Moving House, Taking The Colony With Me.

kittypa

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I hope you can update us with beautiful fall pics!
Yes !
The mountains in Japan are so beautiful in the fall. One year I was in a van with 5 other people driving over this mountain and at one point everyone just went silent. The colors were breathtaking. After a few minutes my sister in law broke the silence and started singing softly. It was an unforgettable, surreal moment.
 
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Norachan

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It's a bit too early for red leaves here, but I will update with some pictures soon. I promise.

I'm working on a kind of walkway thing for them out in the enclosure at the moment. As soon as it's finished I'll take some pictures and let you all see.

Thanks for being so interested in the furry beasts. I'm sure they're going to be very happy to know they have admirers.

:heartshape:
 
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Norachan

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Well, I finally got around to putting all the pictures off my cameras onto the PC. Hope this doesn't break the internet......

Winter wasn't as bad as it had been in previous years. We got some snow, but not enough to bring any trees down.
Button55.jpg
JiroButton1.jpg

The fence only collapsed in one corner. of course the cats worked out that they could climb out straight away.
Hiro34.jpg

And then they realised they could get onto the roof of the car and sun bathe.
Fynn31.jpg
Toby79.jpg

We had a couple of big typhoons in the summer. Lots of trees came down and one side of the fence was trashed.
Garden129.jpg
Garden130.jpg

A few cats got out, but they all managed to find their way home again.

The clever ones all sleep together in a big pile whenever it rains.
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All that rain makes the garden really green. Here's Hiro and Albert enjoying the foliage.
HiroAlbert1.jpg

We built the cats a tree house.
TreeHouse18.jpg
Forest loved it, he was up there every morning to watch the sunrise.
ForestCat106.jpg

I used all the wood from the trees that came down to make them a log walkway. Here it goes from left to right, connecting three of the cat trees.
Walkway1a.jpg

This bit goes back towards the fence.
Walkway9.jpg

Had to sprinkle lots of catnip on it so they would get used to going up there. Now they've realised they can walk around without getting their paws wet they seem to really like it.
Walkway19.jpg
Walkway22.jpg
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A few more cat pictures. Albert.
Albert34.jpg
Chicken
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Forest on his favourite indoor perch.
ForestCat125.jpg

Fynn, using what is supposed to be a cat-proof fence as a hammock.
Fynn36.jpg
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Another one of Fynn.
Fynn44.jpg
Happy. She seems pretty healthy apart from occasional sticky eyes. She's put on plenty of weight.
Happy83.jpg
Happy84.jpg

Happy and Albert.
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Hiro.
Hiro36.jpg

Jiro
Jiro52.jpg
Marley.
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Twinkle and Little Boy.
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The Mu. Mu turned 10 this year! I can't believe it's been so long.
Mu67.jpg
Suzy being cute.
Susy21.jpg

Toby escaping over the fence when it snowed.
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Twinkle.
Twinkle29.jpg
Sadie and Twinkle.
SadieT2.jpg

That's all!

There's already snow on the top of Fuji, so we might be in for another tough winter. Keep your fingers crossed for no trees down, collapsed fences or power cuts this year.
 
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Norachan

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Thank you everyone.

:touched:

Forest is so magnificent!
He knows he is! But he's very happy whenever anyone else notices too.

And look at Happy!!! She's HUGE
I loved seeing Happy.
I know! She's like a little furry pudding, isn't she? She still gets her special expensive extra-soft, high calorie food twice a day, but she scarfs down all the regular food too. Even without any teeth.

A few more pictures.

Carpet.
Carpet61.jpg

Forest in his sun bathing spot.
ForestCat122.jpg

Henry Lee happened to catch me in the shower one morning. I think we were both surprised.
Henry32.jpg

Heidi.
Heidi22.jpg
 

Avery

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These photos are magnificent! Thanks for taking the time to post them. They are also an inspiration! I have hired a guy to build a catio in my backyard in the spring. It will not be NEARLY as wonderful as your beautiful space, but I'm hoping the cats will enjoy a little extra room and being outside but safe. It will be about a 10' x 12' space where the cats can climb out a window and I can go in a door and join them. I'm hoping to incorporate some fun climbing things in my catio and I love seeing the "extras" you have done, like the walkways and the upright logs and the tree house! Very nice! You have done such a wonderful job taking care of all these lucky kitties!
 
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Norachan

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Thank you Avery Avery

I'm sure your cat are going to love their catio. It doesn't matter that it's not that big. My cats spend a lot of their time sprawled on the deck watching the birds and sun bathing. Just having a bit of space where they can safely be outdoors makes them happy.

Please post some pictures of your catio when it's finished.

:heartshape:
 

kittyluv387

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I'm excited because my cats are going to have a real patio! Right now its like this:
20180414_183929.jpg


But we're moving to a new apartment (4th floor) and the patio is going to have solid floors with bars surrounding it. And it will be a bigger patio so I'll be able to have some fun with it. :)
 

Solcita

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Oh my! What an adventure! I just went through all your thread!
I cannot admire you more for what you did and do with all those cats!

I am very curious about the fence you built. I understand that you had to adjust a lot to make sure the cats don't get away, plus snow damage.

Where did you buy the materials?

I am seriously considering closing our backyard and allow Kato to go out... I have been seeing in this forum about the araiguma bothering kittens, and a lot of people are freaking out when we post videos of them in our backyard... so it would also help to leave them out and away from our cats...
 
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Norachan

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Solcita Solcita If you already have a fence around your yard it will be pretty easy to cat proof it. We had to ask someone to come and sink the vertical fence posts in for us, then attached the horizontal posts and netting ourselves.

You can buy the green nylon netting at any garden supply shop. They sell it in places like Kuroganiya, J-Mart, Cains Homes etc.

It's sold as deer netting or boar netting. It was about 5,000 for a huge roll of 1 meter wide netting. The wood all came from the same kind of stores. I guess you don't get a lot of snow, so you don't need to worry about making it snow proof.

If you already have fencing around your garden you can just attach a wire overhang like this.

upload_2018-10-28_12-37-37.jpeg


upload_2018-10-28_12-37-57.jpeg


You can also buy these rollers that turn when the cat tries to grab them, so Kato won't be able to climb out.


Cats can jump about 6ft straight up, so the top of the fence needs to be higher than that. Make sure she doesn't have anything she can climb onto to jump over the fence.

One of our cats, Jiro, worked out how to get onto the roof and escaped that way a few times.

If you don't want to cat-proof the whole garden you could make her a little catio that is just outside the window.

upload_2018-10-28_12-43-3.jpeg


Have a look on Google or YouTube. So many people are making their own catios and cat enclosures, there are plenty of ideas to inspire you.
 

Solcita

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Thank you so much for the reply. I was considering constructing a big catio where Kato's house is located right now. Our house is not enclosed, but it also has a "public" mini street behind that we are using (just like our neighbors) as part of our garden... some of our neighbords even installed storage closets there.

When we did our cat's catio in the balcony in our previous house I explored the options in the home center, and I thought they could break that type of net, that's why I was surprised you even used outdoors. I also thought of using chicken nets but hubby didn't like it.
The mesh we are using now with the kittens would end up being too expensive for closing the garden... and actually the kittens climb it like a ladder... but maybe we could do a catio outdoors...

We are a little overwhelmed now but maybe in the future I will be able to convince hubby to do it :) (prob after winter!)

Thanxxx
 
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