Help! - Cats are destroying my polytunnel

[madmax]

I do believe cats are not protected in law. and if they stray onto your property you can kill them humanely.

I would gently tell their owner this and then start trapping them.. or shooting them.

(We have a cat which annoys our turkeys... I throw water at it and chase it away whenever I see it. Makes no difference:-)

You can't just go and kill cats!!! That's horrible. We once had a Siamese cat caught in a gin trap. At the time I still had my rifle and I nearly shot the trap owner... (I used to be an international shooter for Wales)

I see you have a typical cat then!

my cat likes olives

T-Rex poos in the beds himself. No other mog gets a look in.

A great organic and FREE repellant is to urinate around the polytunnel....honest. It works to deter foxes, and cats are even fussier......they HATE the smell of urine (especially male urine)....but no hovering around public toilets to collect supplies because you will get a reputation!!

We will be building a sand pit for the cat to use. I have had orders from OH to get this sorted as a matter of priority! In the meantime roll on the outdoor urinal then!!

[Eyren]

Just as an aside, cats don't necessarily bury their poo, at least not outdoors. They do tend to bury it when they use a litter tray, because we are the "top cats" indoors, but outdoors they may be defending their territory against other cats and need to leave a prominent "marker".

I have a similar problem to the original poster - my Burmese boy climbs the mini-greenhouse in my conservatory (if it didn't have the plastic cover on, he'd just jump onto the shelves and crush the seedlings!). Squirting him with water has only a temporary effect - I think that putting something sticky on top may be the way to go...

[SusanWoodman]

I tried scattering a mixture of out of date cooking herbs and spices and the strong smell did put off the cats until it rained.

I have had success this winter protecting a small lawn by spreading plastic mesh (the rigid kind that you use for supporting sweet peas, otherwise birds might get tangled) over the grass at a height of a couple of inches (sopported by a few bricks, flower-pots,etc). Cats really don't like having to lift their paws high and not being able to run away if frightened, so they haven't been on it for three months now.

Only disadvantages are: it's expensive unless you already have the mesh, and it's difficult walking on it myself (but then I don't much in the winter when it's frosty), and as yet I don't know whether this has permanently deterred the neighbouring cats from using my garden as a toilet or whether they will come back again now I've rolled it all up.