Cromulent cat carrier

December 8, 2015 7:51 AM

I'm looking for an excellent cat carrier in which to place my anxious, ridiculous fluff of a cat for long car rides.

My cat does not do the car well, but I need to drive her from New Jersey to North Carolina in December and then back to New Jersey in January. And then I plan to do it again over the summer. She howls the entire time and hates it, no matter how much vet-prescribed Xanax I give her. She pants, screams, and struggles endlessly, until the ride is over. Then she's absolutely fine.

She's had two carriers since I've had her: one of the standard plastic ones with metal bars, which she proceeded to chew frantically, harming her teeth. Her other carrier, a meshy fabric bag with zippers, was a bit better, but she escaped during our last long NC-NJ car ride and was screaming around in the car as I sped down the highway. Not good. She ended up in my lap, looking out the window and panting, and I was able to safely get us to a parking lot, where I fed her more Xanax and stuffed her back in the carrier. It was traumatic for everyone. Letting her roam free in the car is not an option.

I'm looking for a carrier that is pretty big. I plan to put it on the back seat, rather than on the floor of the passenger seat as I've done in the past. I think it will be less stressful if she's higher up, farther away from the noise of the car. I'd like this carrier to be some kind of plastic so that she can't wrench it open and escape. I also don't want it to have any metal involved, so that she can't damage her teeth. I'd like her to be able to see me, and I'd like to be able to give her water (which she won't drink, but I need to attempt hydration, at least).

I would also like any tips on making this as stress free as possible for her. I leave in about three weeks, so I'm thinking that if I can get a carrier soon that I can start giving her her wet food in it every night so that she associates it with The Best Time Of The Day, but maybe this is not the best plan. Any advice in this arena (aside from "just leave her in New Jersey," which is also not an option) is welcome. Thanks!

posted by k8lin to Pets & Animals (14 answers total)

I can't recommend a carrier that fits your requirements, but I do have a comfort tip for kitty. Put a rubber backed bath mat in the bottom of the crate (you can get these super-cheap at places like dollar general). Then you can cover that with blankets, towels, pee pad, whatever your preference. The rubber backing helps prevent sliding around, gives the beastie something to grip.
posted by slipthought at 8:14 AM on December 8, 2015 [4 favorites]

Best answer: I wonder if she would do better if she could see out of the crate easier? So maybe the biggest dog crate you can fit into your car (example). I know you said no metal, but if I'm picturing it correctly, the crate she chewed looks like this, which isn't easy to see out of. So maybe it's not the metal bars that is the problem, it's the lack of visibility.

If you got a big crate, you could put a little hidey-hole in it like this. So she's got a place to hide when she gets overwhelmed.
posted by SuperSquirrel at 8:16 AM on December 8, 2015

Oh, and forgot to add that your plan to acclimate her to a crate using food is an excellent plan.
posted by SuperSquirrel at 8:18 AM on December 8, 2015

Response by poster: Yes, the crate she chewed on looked exactly like the one you provided in the link; thanks, SuperSquirrel.
posted by k8lin at 8:30 AM on December 8, 2015

Any advice in this arena (aside from "just leave her in New Jersey," which is also not an option) is welcome.

Is it possible that being in the carrier is causing or compounding her stress? I'm not suggesting you let her roam free - that would be dangerous to both of you! - but have you considered using a harness and a seat belt tether instead of a carrier? You could confine her to the back seat.

I am the owner of a car-loving dog, not a car-hating cat, so big grain of salt here!
posted by schroedingersgirl at 8:31 AM on December 8, 2015 [1 favorite]

Huge grain of salt because I haven't tried it personally, but there was someone at our local pet expo selling Cat in the Bag carriers, and the reviews I've heard have been pretty stellar. You'll know best if your cat would be happier (does she settle down when she's swaddled?), but they're cheap enough that it might be worth a try. You can buy them on Amazon too, I think.
posted by specialagentwebb at 8:44 AM on December 8, 2015 [1 favorite]

I think you need one that's specially for the car, that has a flat back. You can also strap it in. I think cats tend to freak out more if they can't rest against the back and have a sense of flatness, because car seats are slopey and carriers are slopey and the car is moving and they feel like they can't find solid ground, poor little peas.

If you Google "cat car carrier" there are a lot, though they're not hard plastic. I think plastic without metal that you can also get a lot of visibility into is kind of a tall order.
posted by sweetkid at 8:57 AM on December 8, 2015

Awww, cute cat you got there.

I moved my sweet nervous car-hating kitty across the country in this:
http://sturdiproducts.com/collections/pop-up-shelters/products/show-pop-up-shelter-double-solid-colors

She complained for awhile and then went to sleep.

It's been used for two other long distance cat moves (other people's cats) with the same result.

I put a towel over the top so kitty's mind would not explode trying to comprehend the fast moving scenery and constant flashy blinky lights. Seemed to work.
posted by TheClonusHorror at 8:59 AM on December 8, 2015 [6 favorites]

Plastic, no metal, good visibility, water dish. I think this one meets all your criteria. I took my cats from WV to TX in these and they worked fine.
posted by MsMolly at 9:03 AM on December 8, 2015

I like the look of a number of these choices.
posted by bearwife at 9:11 AM on December 8, 2015

Be wary of using harness/cat seat option. This might be a great choice for an animal that's okay with the car, but an animal that actively panics in the car could get twisted up in the harness/car seat attachment, snap the harness, or any one of a hundred things that wound end up in injury or the cat getting loose in the cabin.

The Cabrio listed a few comments up should work well. I would also consider going to the vet to seek an alternative tranquilizer (tranqs will occasionally have the opposite effect, in cats as in humans). And, when you do get the new carrier, put a soft blankie and some treats in it and leave it out around the house for her to examine and get comfortable with. Our cats use their carriers as kitty beds when they're just lying around.
posted by Nyx at 11:41 AM on December 8, 2015

I know a friend who transports their cats loose in car. They wander around for a while and then use the litter box for stinky, stinky fear poop, then settle down on the floorboards for a nap. I understand the risks, and acknowledge a box is probably a better option, but my friend says the value of not having to clean smeared poop off the carrier and having a calm cat vs an insane one in the box is worth it to them.
posted by Jacen at 1:31 PM on December 8, 2015 [2 favorites]

I have two of these for each of my kitties. There are seatbelt loops to safely buckle them in and keep them in one place. I leave these out open in my living room all the time so that they're used to them (and don't run away if I had them elsewhere and only took them out for like visits to the vet), one of my cats regularly naps in the one he claimed as "his".

When I travel with them I do give them each a mild, vet-prescribed sedative, and then cover the carriers with a towel, and then they go to sleep.
posted by raw sugar at 8:57 PM on December 8, 2015

I have a large Sturdibag - the sort with a divider, which was an accident, but I ended up liking it more than I'd like the normal sort, because it has doors on both ends plus openable windows at the top, and all of these can be zipped open/closed (locked!), or just screen (very durable plastic-coated (?) mesh), or with the screen covered. My catdude likes hanging out in this carrier if both doors are open, and he tolerates being in it very well, and we travel a lot (plus we carry it when we go for leash-walks in case there's a dispute about it being time to go, and also he will hide out in it if he gets freaked out by something during the walk). The carrier has straps you can pass a seat belt through so he's secure in the car.

The same people also make carriers designed just for cars in single, double, and triple sizes. I haven't tried these but I'm thinking very seriously about it, and would definitely go for it if I knew for sure I'd be travelling by car more than I currently do. It looks like they can be accessorized, including (I think?) a space for a water bottle, if your cat could drink from one. And it looks like you can get a hammock that would give a comfy bed/second level, and with the larger ones you could fit a small litter box in, I think.

I stopped using the hard sided carriers after a previous cat got so freaked out when he was in one that he would smash his face into the wire door so much/hard that he got a bloody nose - I stopped using carriers at all for a while after that, and then tried the Sleepypod Air (meh. narrow. looks so nice, though.) and then found the Sturdibag because of of dog jaunt and I just love the thing more and more the more I use it. It's durable as hell, and judging from a few times my dude has suddenly decided that he'd had enough and he tried like hell to claw through the mesh doors (with no visible effect) - they are cat-proof. Well. Claw-proof. He has figured out how to open the zipper from the inside, which is why I'm so grateful for the little zipper-clips they include.

Expensive but comfortable and well designed and durable and I really just can't say enough good things about them.
posted by you must supply a verb at 4:54 PM on December 9, 2015 [1 favorite]