How can I find out where my cat's been going all day?

August 6, 2013 6:29 PM

My usually very stay-at-home cat has recently taken to disappearing before I get up in the morning and coming home late in the afternoon. I think a neighbor may be feeding her because, besides the fact that my cat's always been a homebody, I feed her in the morning, so she would likely stay around to be fed unless she had an equally good reason to go elsewhere. When this started last week, she didn't have a collar, so conceivably someone could have thought she was homeless and tried to take her in. But after two days I put a collar on her, with an attached note to the effect of "please don't feed me or take me in", but she's still going off every morning. I miss her and worry that one day she won't return. How can I track her movements?

I know there are GPS trackers for pets, but they're expensive and I'm poor. There are also collar cams, but the affordable ones I've seen get terrible reviews on Amazon and have a battery life of an hour or two, which might not be enough. There's the added complication that conceivably, if a neighbor has been feeding her and disregarding my written request to the contrary, they might just as easily detach the cam when they see it. Ideal would be a very small and inconspicuous cam, but again these are sure to be too expensive. Any bright ideas?

posted by zeri to Pets & Animals (22 answers total)

As a disclaimer, I have never owned a cat so my assumptions about cat behavior might be way off base.

What if you blocked her means of egress in the morning until you wake up -- presumably once freed she would go wherever she wants to go, and then you can follow?
posted by telegraph at 6:34 PM on August 6, 2013

I miss her and worry that one day she won't return.

You could just stop letting her go outside.
posted by kinetic at 6:38 PM on August 6, 2013 [43 favorites]

You could try and literally track her movements. Wake up early and follow her around.
posted by Rock Steady at 6:38 PM on August 6, 2013

attach a note explaining this? if its still there when she comes home, assume no outside human agency is keeping her.
posted by The otter lady at 6:42 PM on August 6, 2013 [1 favorite]

If you do the camera thing, rig one up yourself. Tiny video cameras aren't actually that expensive, and it's trivial to attach one to a collar.
posted by SMPA at 6:47 PM on August 6, 2013

I may be missing something here, but...my experience with cats is, if they can get outside, they'll go outside. And just...wander at will. There's not necessarily anything more to it. I'd gently suggest that you're being a bit paranoid about the neighbours, here.

For example, there are a load of free-wheeling cats around where I live. One of them decided she liked the way the sun warmed up my front doormat in the morning. Plonked herself down there for 2-3 hours every single morning for a fortnight (forcing me to flatten myself in order to get through my own front door, like the sucker I am), before moving on.

In short, I wouldn't worry too much. Rig up a camera if you want, but I think it'd be easier to just keep her inside until you've fed her in the morning.
posted by Salamander at 6:50 PM on August 6, 2013 [2 favorites]

Also, I suggest making the note guilt-provoking. "Smunchkins is on a special diet because the doctor says he'll die of [horrible disease that cats get] if he keeps eating the way he has been. PLEASE don't feed him, he's all I have in the world."

Well, maybe less silly - but I bet they're feeding the cat because of pitiful noises and sorrowful looks from said cat. There's an extremely well-fed cat next door to me who will spend hours outside on my patio making sad faces at me in (futile) hopes of getting even more food. It's sort of hilarious that he keeps doing it, as I've never once even hinted that there's food in my apartment, let alone given any to him.
posted by SMPA at 6:50 PM on August 6, 2013 [3 favorites]

Response by poster: Not to threadsit, but there's no way I could follow the cat around without traipsing through neighbors' backyards and climbing their fences.

my experience with cats is, if they can get outside, they'll go outside. And just...wander at will -- True, but my cat had literally never missed breakfast in her four-year life until last week, and now she's doing it every day, so something must be going on.
posted by zeri at 7:04 PM on August 6, 2013

My neighbors have "outdoor" cats, between the two houses they have four cats that wander our neighborhood, run across the road in front of cars, expose themselves to rabid bats and raccoons, climb up under the hoods of warm cars, sleep behind the front wheel of my own car, and get chased by the dogs that roam the neighborhood.... I live on a hill above both their houses, I get to watch the fun from my windows....From observing them, it's clear that there is no real way to keep track of a cat and, as you're requesting, keep it safe short of taking it out on a leash or keeping it in your house.

or, like kinetic said...
posted by HuronBob at 7:05 PM on August 6, 2013 [6 favorites]

A collar camera is a great idea!

That being said, a sudden change in behavior can be a sign that your cat is sick, especially if she's been refusing food from you. It wouldn't hurt to take her in for a checkup.
posted by faethverity at 7:08 PM on August 6, 2013 [3 favorites]

File a Freedom of Information request with the NSA, which probably has a minute-by-minute log of your cat's travels ...
Actually, there are small GPS transponders you could attach to a cat collar. Don't know the cost and the details, but phones transmit location info, and the cops put such devices on cars (yes, i know, the Supreme Court said they shouldn't), so the technology is out there.
Track that kitty -- sounds like a fun challenge!
posted by LonnieK at 7:19 PM on August 6, 2013 [1 favorite]

Could you just ask your neighbors? My cat, who simply refused to stay inside (and I mean, screamed at the front door for the first year of his life) has snacks at a lot of people's houses. This could be a problem if their food made him ill, but I actually feel like a lot of people are looking after him.
posted by mmmbacon at 7:26 PM on August 6, 2013

Best answer: Hang a Tile on his collar? (When they're available)
posted by lakeroon at 7:31 PM on August 6, 2013 [12 favorites]

If your neighborhood is quiet, you could get a bell, and walk around and listen for it.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 7:39 PM on August 6, 2013

There's absolutely no chance she has a bunch of kittens secreted away somewhere, is there?
posted by aryma at 9:04 PM on August 6, 2013 [2 favorites]

So I got this four-year-old rescue kitty that I wanted to make an indoor cat. Yeah, that went well. I found out after nearly a year that I was going to lose the war, because if she ran away (and she ran away ALL the TIME), she wouldn't come back sometimes for days, but if I let her out, she would come back in a couple of hours. Then one summer she did exactly what your cat is doing. When she hadn't returned overnight, I was terrified, and a neighbor came over and asked me if I had an orange cat with golden eyes.

Apparently she'd decided that she could find herself a new home with neighbors. They couldn't take her (not that I wanted them to), so she got that eventually and tried a few other houses before deciding it was worth sticking with me. She was like this little kitty Goldilocks or something.

Sometimes they just get a wild hair, you know? They might just want a change of scenery or something. As many Mefites have said over the years, cats are weird.
posted by emcat8 at 11:03 PM on August 6, 2013

Is she spayed? If not, look for a handsome boy-cat she might be visiting.....
posted by easily confused at 2:43 AM on August 7, 2013

You can already buy GPS trackers for your cat if you are worried, although they are pretty big and cumbersome. Then you'll get the data you need. you can also buy cameras for cat collars, also big, so you can see exactly what is going on for about $25. If someone removes the camera or the collar then you know there is a good chance someone is up to funny business.

My folks have had a succession of very sociable cats. When they were both working, the noticed one of their cats going right off his food, despite being full of beans and in good health. It turns out a little old lady up the road was feeding him steak mince, so it's unsurprising cat food was less attractive. He had a collar on, and clearly was no stray.

I should add that despite getting food from this lady he was tucked up in bed every night at home.

Cats are brilliant at making out they are starving. They do wander. People do feed them because they, the people, like the company. But cats also have a powerful sense of territory and don't give up a nice cosy home easily unless they have a background as a stray. I'd be concerned if your cat wasn't coming home at night.

You can also try and break the habit by keeping your cat in for a few days.
posted by MuffinMan at 2:44 AM on August 7, 2013 [1 favorite]

My previous cat started doing this before he passed away near a stream. But he was 19 years old. Maybe a check-up just in case?
posted by KogeLiz at 3:34 AM on August 7, 2013

Here's a little tale:

About, oh, I don't know, let's say 18 years ago, my father-in-law Tom, a collector of people, Melville first editions and harpsichords had been recently left bereft by the sudden loss of my charming and gracious mother-in-law Charlotte.

Charlotte and Tom were a social and gregarious couple, known for their wonderful Fourth of July party where guests were invited to the Annual Reading of the US Constitution. They went to museum openings, opera, theatre, had a Fulbright year in Finland and were simply marvelous.

But Tom was a Cat Person, Charlotte was a Dog Person, and worse, Charlotte hated cats.

About a month after Charlotte's death, Tom excitedly called and told me of a gorgeous orange tabby who had taken to lounging on his back deck, right next to the sliding glass door. This little fella would come early in the morning, stare into the house through the sliding glass door and lie happily on the sun-baked California deck.

Tom fell in love.

Whether it was the grief or just a deep and mysterious attraction I'll never know, but I know that Tom began feeding that cat.

Just a teaspoon of wet food daily at first.

Then a bowl of water.

He then delicately and purposefully left out a bowl of Kitty Kibble so the handsome little munchie wouldn't starve. You know, he didn't want his new friend to go hungry.

And by doing so, my father-in-law was able to slowly overcome his debilitating grief and motivate himself to again, become a member of the world that had so missed him and worried about his lack of joy. He again became the Tom we all so cherished.

As the vagrant cat sat again, regularly and with apparent purpose and comfort, Tom opened the patio door open one morning. The cat slowly raised itself from his reclining position, looked at his now empty bowl of kibble and again to Tom, then delicately walked into Tom's living room, slowly settled himself into the coziest corner of Tom's reading chair, closed his green eyes and purred as he napped for several hours.

Tom, thrilled with his new best friend, called to tell me. And the best part? "Kinetic, Charlotte never let me have a cat and I wanted one for oh so many years. I feel as though she is granting me this from Beyond and I feel it is meant to be."

And so Mikko (named for Tom's favorite Finn student) became a member of our family.

For many years, Tom and Mikko had a special connection; the kind only found between delightfully eccentric old men and equally crochety cats. They ate fish together, they read together, they watched PBS.

But one horrible day, Tom fell over in his favorite Mexican taco joint and died. A terrible loss.

I went with my children to California to grieve over Grandpa and to prepare his estate. For weeks I read his books, cried over his opera recordings and slept in the living room, Mikko firmly resting upon me.

The day came when I completed all of our arrangements, had Mikko cleared to fly back to Boston with us, and we stood in the driveway waiting for the taxi that would take me, the kids and Mikko home.

As we stood upon the curb, a woman named Elda who lived two houses down the road approached me and spoke of her fondness for Tom. It was a sweet tribute and as the taxi pulled into the driveway, she peered into the cat carrier.

She looked closely into the carrier, again at me, and again to Mikko.

Raising her eyes, she said, "I'm sorry but, that's my cat. He went out one morning five years ago and never returned. We thought he was dead."

She graciously allowed us to keep this most special cat and Mikko lived a happy indoor life in Boston until he quietly passed away, a geriatric tabby aged 22.

tl;dr...yeah, cats find second homes. Often next door.
posted by kinetic at 3:41 AM on August 7, 2013 [26 favorites]

Response by poster: The problem with not letting the cat out is this, which I should have mentioned: she goes out through a cat door which opens to the balcony, and jumps down from the balcony to the yard. Her litterbox is located on the balcony, so if I block the cat door, she won't have access to that. (There's no good place for the litterbox inside my small apartment.)
posted by zeri at 9:25 AM on August 7, 2013

Block the door and bring the litterbox in.
posted by kinetic at 9:38 AM on August 7, 2013 [1 favorite]