Rescue cat scratching window at night

emhorsleyy

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Hi guys! First post to the website, and first time cat owner😁

Me and my partner rescued 2 tabby’s 3 weeks ago (brother and sister) aged 10.

Brandy is good as gold at night and just sleeps. Ramos however (the male) constantly tries to sit on the windowsill in our bedroom and scratch the window which is 20cm away from our head. He will not scratch at all during the day, he isn’t even really bothered by that spot at all during the day, it’s only as we go to bed through till about 4am when he will then just sleep on the bed?

We’ve had to resort in shutting the bedroom door but we would really like to be able to have him in the room with us as we know he does like to sleep on the bed during the day it’s his favourite spot…and sleeping with the door shut means it does get very hot and ideally we prefer it open.

Any suggestions on how to help this? I’ve tried taping a blanket to the window, he just claws till it’s down. Does tinfoil really work?
we play with him before bed, he gets a treat, he has scratching posts around the house but it all doesn’t work. Putting one by the window would keep us just as awake as the window is about 20cm from our heads.

Please any advice would be fab thank you!
 
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emhorsleyy

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my partner gets up at 4am for work & I suffer from insomnia so getting this sorted quickly would be ideal as we want him to feel comfortable in his new forever home and not learn to think the bedroom is out of bounds? As having him as a companion at night helps with my depression and anxiety❤
 
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emhorsleyy

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Pet safe screen installed or sticky tape. Maybe consider making your yard less friendly to community cats and/or taking your cst for daily walks in a harness?
I will try this, thank you!! Will see if we can install stuff on top of our fences. Would this be why he does it every night? And the harness is something we definitely want to consider after the initial 4 weeks is up and he’s used to the house as we were advised to keep them inside until then, but I’ve read some cats who aren’t used to a harness and show a lot of hunting behaviour can be distressed in a harness as they feel restricted? we have been debating buying a tracker for his collar & letting him out, but we would really love to avoid this so we can definitely try the harness first and see if that’s enough stimulation for him!
 
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emhorsleyy

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Can you try to determine what's happening outside that has his attention so focused?
I’ve sat and watched with him to see but Atleast to my eyes I can’t see anything, and it’s the same time everynight he tries but once my partner is up for work and leaves, he comes and snuggles on the bed happily (like he is now) but tonight we had the door shut.
We have a long garden with new gazebo and furniture right by the window which are new but he was doing this even before them and it doesn’t restrict his view he can still see out.

Just seems a coincidence if it was something in the garden it’s everynight same time he tries to jump up, he’s very persistent, and he does it straight away, which is why I was worrying if it’s something else wrong with him?
 

danteshuman

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It might be hard to find out why he wants out at the same time every night. It could be a cst of dog goes out for the night or foxes or possums. If you could, building him a catio would be ideal. For harness training it is in steps that takes weeks, so maybe start now.

1) get them used to you just putting on & taking off the harness.... then give treats.
2) slowly extend the time they wear thd harness, before you take it off. Distract them with play or food. The goal us to build up to 30-60 minutes of wearing their harness, where they sleep in it, play in it & are at ease in it.
3) while wearing the harness, get them to drag a short leash behind them in the house.
4) yeah they are finally ready to go outside! Allow them to go out on their own and to set their own pace. Always reward with treats when they come back in.

This is Jackie completely comfortable in his harness. I use the kitty holster harness for ease of putting it on/taking it off. He runs, jumps, rolls around outside, climbs trees and yes naps outside.
 

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Maria Bayote

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My Bourbon does that once in a while. She scratches like she is exercising. It is her cue that she wants to get out of the house.

Try to take him out for walks more frequently too, even for short durations.

I hope this gets resolved soon. Sorry you have to go through this.
 

Antonio65

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In my opinion, he just needs to get out. Probbaly he was used to do this in his old home.
I believe he will forget this soon, when he realizes his attempts lead nowhere. Have you tried to "blind" your window so that he can't see outside at night?

As for the harness, I believe that the models with buckles rather than velcro are better, because the velcro is very noisy when pulled off and it could scare he cats.
The collar with a tracker is useful to find your cat when he doesn't come home, but it's completely useless in avoiding accidents. Letting a cat out is always a risk.
 
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emhorsleyy

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It might be hard to find out why he wants out at the same time every night. It could be a cst of dog goes out for the night or foxes or possums. If you could, building him a catio would be ideal. For harness training it is in steps that takes weeks, so maybe start now.

1) get them used to you just putting on & taking off the harness.... then give treats.
2) slowly extend the time they wear thd harness, before you take it off. Distract them with play or food. The goal us to build up to 30-60 minutes of wearing their harness, where they sleep in it, play in it & are at ease in it.
3) while wearing the harness, get them to drag a short leash behind them in the house.
4) yeah they are finally ready to go outside! Allow them to go out on their own and to set their own pace. Always reward with treats when they come back in.

This is Jackie completely comfortable in his harness. I use the kitty holster harness for ease of putting it on/taking it off. He runs, jumps, rolls around outside, climbs trees and yes naps outside.
This is really helpful, thank you very much! We will definitely train him like this & get him used to the harness, I’m sure he will enjoy it. Thank you, and a catio will be something we hope to build or invest in soon when we have the funds !:)
 
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emhorsleyy

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In my opinion, he just needs to get out. Probbaly he was used to do this in his old home.
I believe he will forget this soon, when he realizes his attempts lead nowhere. Have you tried to "blind" your window so that he can't see outside at night?

As for the harness, I believe that the models with buckles rather than velcro are better, because the velcro is very noisy when pulled off and it could scare he cats.
The collar with a tracker is useful to find your cat when he doesn't come home, but it's completely useless in avoiding accidents. Letting a cat out is always a risk.
Probably is used to it but I can’t say for sure as their background going out is unknown as they came from a flat, we will definitely try the harness idea and it’s a really good point about the Velcro! I’ll discuss with my partner for sure, thank you! Yes letting him out is really not what we want, so we’ll hope the harness solves his needs!:)
 
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emhorsleyy

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My Bourbon does that once in a while. She scratches like she is exercising. It is her cue that she wants to get out of the house.

Try to take him out for walks more frequently too, even for short durations.

I hope this gets resolved soon. Sorry you have to go through this.
We’ve only had him 3 weeks but we have taken other advise and we will definitely start harness training straight away to see if this fixes the Problem! Thank you :)
 
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emhorsleyy

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In my opinion, he just needs to get out. Probbaly he was used to do this in his old home.
I believe he will forget this soon, when he realizes his attempts lead nowhere. Have you tried to "blind" your window so that he can't see outside at night?

As for the harness, I believe that the models with buckles rather than velcro are better, because the velcro is very noisy when pulled off and it could scare he cats.
The collar with a tracker is useful to find your cat when he doesn't come home, but it's completely useless in avoiding accidents. Letting a cat out is always a risk.
And as to the window I tried to cover where he sits with a blanket but he just constantly digs and eventually gets it off as it’s only secured with tape, if I tried a harder material to secure easier such as a bin bag or something it will make just as much noise scratching unfortunately as we are so close to the window! But I can see if I can work out something else whilst we are hardness training…
 
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emhorsleyy

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probably some type of small animal is passing by each night
yes quite possibility! Will need to see if I can work out an efficient and long term way to black out the window… hopefully it may stop once he’s out on a hardness.
 
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