Help me keep an eye on my cat while I'm gone
February 10, 2023 12:06 PM Subscribe
I'm planning to be out of town for a few days in the future, and there's nobody available to check in on my cat while I'm gone. I'd like to install a camera so I can check in on him from time to time, but I have no idea what would best suit my needs.
He'll be confined to the main room of the home to limit his ability for mischief, so I think I only need one or two camera(s). I'd prefer tilt/pan capability, though that's not an absolute must have. The most important thing is having access to the feed in an app on my Android phone. Having browser access would be nice also. I do want access to past video feed, but I don't need much- maybe 12-24 hours at a time? I don't need continual, ongoing service- I only need it for short bursts once or twice a year, and don't even plan to leave the camera set up between uses, so a subscription I can buy a month of when I need it would be great.
I notice there's a lot of low-cost options on Amazon et al but don't know enough about the various products, subscriptions, and services to tell which ones are best, so I would appreciate any advice and/or testimonials.
He'll be confined to the main room of the home to limit his ability for mischief, so I think I only need one or two camera(s). I'd prefer tilt/pan capability, though that's not an absolute must have. The most important thing is having access to the feed in an app on my Android phone. Having browser access would be nice also. I do want access to past video feed, but I don't need much- maybe 12-24 hours at a time? I don't need continual, ongoing service- I only need it for short bursts once or twice a year, and don't even plan to leave the camera set up between uses, so a subscription I can buy a month of when I need it would be great.
I notice there's a lot of low-cost options on Amazon et al but don't know enough about the various products, subscriptions, and services to tell which ones are best, so I would appreciate any advice and/or testimonials.
not Anker/Eufy (they fixed it but man what a bad look and why would you trust them at all after all that?)
The Wyze Cam Pan v3 is very cheap at $66 for a two-pack. The lowest tier of Cam Plus would get you cloud storage backups and time machine functionality but you might be able to do it with just an SD card in the cam (don't forget to budget for SD cards, though a couple of 32GB ones will cost you almost nothing these days). (I can't verify this because all mine are on a Cam Plus sub. It's like $2/mo per cam. I also can't necessarily vouch for the pan ones but I have a bunch of the regular kind and they work pretty well.) They have a bunch of additional things that do active monitoring and all that, which you can safely skip for this use case.
posted by mrg at 12:22 PM on February 10, 2023 [2 favorites]
The Wyze Cam Pan v3 is very cheap at $66 for a two-pack. The lowest tier of Cam Plus would get you cloud storage backups and time machine functionality but you might be able to do it with just an SD card in the cam (don't forget to budget for SD cards, though a couple of 32GB ones will cost you almost nothing these days). (I can't verify this because all mine are on a Cam Plus sub. It's like $2/mo per cam. I also can't necessarily vouch for the pan ones but I have a bunch of the regular kind and they work pretty well.) They have a bunch of additional things that do active monitoring and all that, which you can safely skip for this use case.
posted by mrg at 12:22 PM on February 10, 2023 [2 favorites]
+1 Wyze with the $2 subscription. I also don't have any of the pan versions but I have several of the v2 and v3 cameras and they've been great. Over the years I've also had Blink and a couple others but the Wyze have been much better.
I also have a Furbo as my dog cam, which is much much more expensive than the Wyze. It does great at pet tracking but is probably overkill unless you also want to talk to your cat and have the camera spit out treats! It also requires a subscription to get cloud recording but they do offer the first 30 days free.
posted by cgg at 12:31 PM on February 10, 2023 [2 favorites]
I also have a Furbo as my dog cam, which is much much more expensive than the Wyze. It does great at pet tracking but is probably overkill unless you also want to talk to your cat and have the camera spit out treats! It also requires a subscription to get cloud recording but they do offer the first 30 days free.
posted by cgg at 12:31 PM on February 10, 2023 [2 favorites]
The Geeni Glimpses let me talk to my cats, but they seem pretty weirded out when I do so, so it's not a super useful feature :) ymmv
posted by Tandem Affinity at 12:53 PM on February 10, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Tandem Affinity at 12:53 PM on February 10, 2023 [1 favorite]
Cameras can't scoop the litter box nor reassure your cats that they haven't been left alone to die.
Would you want to be trapped indefinitely with a toilet that didn't flush, a limited supply of food and water, and no idea when or if it would ever be over?
You may think "it's only for a few days" but your cats won't know that it's only for a few days.
Please just hire a cat sitter. They're only $20-$30/day.
posted by Jacqueline at 3:14 PM on February 10, 2023 [21 favorites]
Would you want to be trapped indefinitely with a toilet that didn't flush, a limited supply of food and water, and no idea when or if it would ever be over?
You may think "it's only for a few days" but your cats won't know that it's only for a few days.
Please just hire a cat sitter. They're only $20-$30/day.
posted by Jacqueline at 3:14 PM on February 10, 2023 [21 favorites]
Strongly seconding Jacqueline's recommendation to hire a cat sitter if possible. Cats can hide illness very well. Male cats especially can develop serious urinary issues quickly.
posted by cozenedindigo at 5:59 PM on February 10, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by cozenedindigo at 5:59 PM on February 10, 2023 [2 favorites]
The thing about checking in on him with a camera is, what are you going to be able to do about it if you see something alarming, with no one available to check up on him?
Agree with the cat sitter suggestions, but you might also consider boarding if you don't want a stranger in your house. The cat won't love it, but the upside is that there will be someone around to check up on him throughout the day. Our vet offers boarding for around $20 a day.
posted by Serene Empress Dork at 8:11 PM on February 10, 2023 [5 favorites]
Agree with the cat sitter suggestions, but you might also consider boarding if you don't want a stranger in your house. The cat won't love it, but the upside is that there will be someone around to check up on him throughout the day. Our vet offers boarding for around $20 a day.
posted by Serene Empress Dork at 8:11 PM on February 10, 2023 [5 favorites]
I've just recently been very happy with the Wopet Bluetooth pet feeder and app. It downloads to your home wifi, feeds your cat on intervals and portions you control and has a camera and microphone to interact with your cat whenever you want to feel close. It works awesome.
posted by The_imp_inimpossible at 6:41 AM on February 11, 2023
posted by The_imp_inimpossible at 6:41 AM on February 11, 2023
I once knew someone who was supposed to cat sit for a week but skipped all the visits until the day before the boss returned, so I prefer the route of getting a bonded, insured cat sitter *and* a cheap camera.
posted by metonym at 10:04 AM on February 11, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by metonym at 10:04 AM on February 11, 2023 [3 favorites]
I leave my cats alone for three days every single week, and they are perfectly content. I have 2 Wyze cameras and a subscription, and I’m very happy with them. I also have a pet fountain, an automatic feeder, and a fancy Litter Robot. It’s less ideal that the cat will be alone (no second cat for company), but I’m sure the cat will be happier being comfortable at home than at a scary boarding place. Also, I’m sure you’ll have a plan in place (leaving keys with someone) in case you see something alarming when you check the camera and saved ‘events’. As long as there is some emergency backup plan, I think it’s a fine solution. Also, if you leave a great big bowl of food and extra water, I’m sure the cat will get the message that you’ll be gone longer than normal and have prepared for that. I truly believe that.
posted by asimplemouse at 2:44 PM on February 11, 2023
posted by asimplemouse at 2:44 PM on February 11, 2023
I once knew someone who was supposed to cat sit for a week but skipped all the visits until the day before the boss returned
The cat sitters I've hired texted me pics of my cats every time they visited. And if you use a service like Rover then the sitters check in on the Rover app, which confirms their GPS location.
I prefer the route of getting a bonded, insured cat sitter
That would be ideal if you live in a metro area large enough to support full-time professional pet sitting businesses. If you live in a smaller area where it's just a side gig for people, you can screen for quality by looking for Rover profiles that have high repeat client counts.
AFAIK, while Rover lets clients who originally booked you from outside of Rover create an account and rate you once, those people won't show up as a repeat client unless they actually book you through Rover multiple times. So while someone could inflate their reviews with fake accounts, I don't think there's any mechanism that would allow someone to inflate their repeat client count without spending real money on fake bookings, too. (If someone is willing to invest that kind of money and time into fraud then they usually set their sights a little higher for their scams than just beating the competition in the local $20/day dog walking and pet sitting market.)
Not to turn this into an ad for Rover (it's just the one I'm most familiar with) but apps like that have done a great job using technology to mitigate most of the biggest concerns about hiring a pet sitter. It's like how 20 years ago most people wouldn't want to catch a ride from a random stranger, but now we do it all the time via Uber and Lyft. There's always still a possibility for abuse and failure, but it's significantly less than it would have been before all these apps and the safeguards programmed into them.
posted by Jacqueline at 5:38 PM on February 12, 2023
The cat sitters I've hired texted me pics of my cats every time they visited. And if you use a service like Rover then the sitters check in on the Rover app, which confirms their GPS location.
I prefer the route of getting a bonded, insured cat sitter
That would be ideal if you live in a metro area large enough to support full-time professional pet sitting businesses. If you live in a smaller area where it's just a side gig for people, you can screen for quality by looking for Rover profiles that have high repeat client counts.
AFAIK, while Rover lets clients who originally booked you from outside of Rover create an account and rate you once, those people won't show up as a repeat client unless they actually book you through Rover multiple times. So while someone could inflate their reviews with fake accounts, I don't think there's any mechanism that would allow someone to inflate their repeat client count without spending real money on fake bookings, too. (If someone is willing to invest that kind of money and time into fraud then they usually set their sights a little higher for their scams than just beating the competition in the local $20/day dog walking and pet sitting market.)
Not to turn this into an ad for Rover (it's just the one I'm most familiar with) but apps like that have done a great job using technology to mitigate most of the biggest concerns about hiring a pet sitter. It's like how 20 years ago most people wouldn't want to catch a ride from a random stranger, but now we do it all the time via Uber and Lyft. There's always still a possibility for abuse and failure, but it's significantly less than it would have been before all these apps and the safeguards programmed into them.
posted by Jacqueline at 5:38 PM on February 12, 2023
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posted by Tandem Affinity at 12:18 PM on February 10, 2023 [1 favorite]