Ideas for Cat Toys. 27 Cats Fixed Last Month

I took in 27 cats to be fixed last month. That isn't close to the 51 in January, but I couldn't get appointments one week and then took in only three on another week.

I am hoping Poppa will allow me to overflow some of last month's fixing allotment to March. I have been receiving a lot of calls. It is more effective to fix females before they are pregnant even before they are in heat, rather than after, because of cost increases. A lot of the females are already pregnant.

So, I made appointments to take ten cats Monday to one clinic and five to another. At the clinic I made ten appointments for, females, whether pregnant or not, cost $43, so if half are female, that's $215 right there and if the other half are males that would cost, at that clinic, $165. That would be $380 gone of my allotment right there. If you add in the five going to my usual clinic, if three are females, and not pregnant, which most have been there, that's $185 there, for the five, although they will pay $45 of that, bringing it down to $140. In one day, that could be $520 gone from my monthly allotment. Yikes. Almost a third of it. With 15 fixes. And that's just an estimate, since I don't know the sexes I will be trapping tomorrow. That's still a good price for 15 fixes, less $40 per cat.

The 15 for Monday include five more from the Scio group, bringing the number fixed there, by Monday evening, to 11, with nine or so to go. And ten from the Jefferson desperate woman colony. I will also be trapping the 8 or more on Columbus, just to end reproduction there, too. But they'll be going in on Tuesday, or a mix from both colonies. I don't like to wait around on colonies when I find them and the only reason I have to is due to money. That's why there's a cat problem, I guess. I need to find some money to use for fixing more cats.

I have an idea for a cat toy I think the cats would love. Here it is: I would take a length of PVC, maybe four inch diameter and cut an inch wide hole along its length, leaving maybe a couple inches intact on each end.

The length of the PVC pipe I would use would be approximately 12 feet. That's just an estimate, because its dependent on where I would put it. I would want it slanted rather severely. The cats are going to ride this down.

How? I'd use a ball socket inside the pipe, made maybe of a smooth material, maybe wood, if I could make a round ball of wood. I can probably find something in a junk store that would work.

A piece of something, wood or pipe, would extend out from the ball inside the PVC. To that, I would attach a platform, with edges. This is what the cats would ride down on.

On at the top of the slanted "ride down" PVC, I would attach a vertical piece of PVC. A piece of cable rope would attach to the ball inside the ride down slanted piece of PVC, go through an eye hook at the top. The other end of the cable rope would be attached to an eye hook attached to a piece of smaller diameter PVC, that would fit inside the larger vertical piece of PVC. I would screw in a bottom on that smaller diameter inside piece. I would add a proper amount of sand or other heavy material and it would be used as a counter weight, to not only slow the slide down but to pull the platform back up after the cat rides the platform down.

The larger vertical piece of PVC would double as a cat climb. I would glue carpet around it.

Now what do you think of that idea? Would it work? How much counter weight would I need? Enough to keep the platform in the top position, for sure, when no cat was on it. Most of my cats weigh between five and 8 pounds. I suppose it depends on the slant and distance of the ride down piece? The travel length of the counter weight and ride platform will have to be the same. So, I need to make the size of the counter weight itself small (intensely dense mass, like lead maybe?), to not take up too much of the distance inside the vertical PVC. I'll have to experiment.

I had also thought of attaching the slant down inside piece to a strong spring, but that seems hard to calibrate and to brake, when the cat gets off at the bottom, and the platform zooms back up. I don't want a cat getting knocked in the teeth if isn't property braked and whips up too fast.

The third idea I had was to somehow make it a teeter totter type ride. Cat gets off at bottom. Platform with that end of the PVC then slowly swings up, to be ridden down from it's new position.

I plan on making a separate teeter tooter type toy also, rigged on bungees. It's fun to try to think up new ways to entertain the cats and me, too.