You know what a chain reaction is ? No ? I’ll explain…

First, television has shown serious signs of weakness. As long as we had to change it, Claire and Momo thought they could take a bigger one. They realized that the current furniture would be too small.

Since the cheap cabinets in Momo’s office had already been patched up many times and they were no longer really closing, our humans thought they could be replaced by the cabinets in the living room. So they made that change. Our living room looked like this :

After a trip to Ikea, a few hours of putting shelves together, and a good series of swearing, our living room was back to normal. You could again pass from the cat tree (right) to the staircase (left). But we could no longer go on our beloved cabinets, as they were now in Momo’s office…

Momo then decided to catify his office ; instead, see what he did so that we could walk around our cabinets again :

Cool, huh ?

Here is the last part of what we want to share with you after the training followed by Claire two weeks ago (part 1 : how to put food available in a way which increases the cat’s level of activity ? ; part 2 : which games and activities offer to your cat ?).

Reminder : according to a study of Bonnie Beaver (Feline Behavior, 2003), the approximate time dedicated to various activities by a free cat is the following one : sleeping 9 hours, resting 4-5 hours, bathing 3-4 hours, hunting 4 à 9 hours, moving and feeding 1 hour, other activities (game, marking, elimination) 1 hour. Numerous indoor cats are sub-occupied and spend their days sleeping to pass the time.

How to increase the available space to your cat ?

In an apartment, the available space is 10 to 50 times as small as the space that a cat would occupy in nature. Thus it’s necessary to increase it at the most by using the vertical space in various places of the house, by multiplying the accessible locations in height for the cat as well as the observation posts on the outside.

You can do it by adapting your existing furniture : summits of shelves or cupboard cleared, furnish near windows, wall shelves reserved for your cat, …

You can also invest in one or several cat trees placed in places where there is something interesting to observe.

An old or overweight cat will need additional landings, a banister, or a staircase to reach the various points in height, but will be very happy being able to do it thanks to these arrangements.

A free access to an edge of window, or even better, to a terrace or a balcony, is also ideal, provided that the window or the balcony is secured.

• No, a cat doesn’t have a perfect sense of balance.
• Yes, he risks to have a fall, even if he is skillful.
• No, a cat doesn’t always come out from a fall unscathed : he is in a state of shock, he can break itself the members, but he can especially suffer from sometimes fatal internal injuries: bleeding, fracture of the palate (palatine crack), pneumothorax, bladder break, diaphragm break, heart and lungs compression, …

Thus it is strongly recommended to install or to make install a anti-falls net.

We live in paradise : we have a home designed for us, and a secured garden. If you want ideas, “Catification” from Jackson Galaxy is Claire’s favorite book : he is abundantly illustrated, and presents many easily practicable ideas for catifying your home.

You can also find other ideas here if you like Ikea.