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ULTRASONIC DETERRENTS TO KEEP CATS OUT OF GARDENS

First broadcast on www.provet.co.uk  


This information is provided by Provet for educational purposes only.

You should seek the advice of your veterinarian if your pet is ill as only he or she can correctly advise on the diagnosis and recommend the treatment that is most appropriate for your pet.

Cat owners are rightly concerned about the possible side-effects of deterrents used by neighbours to keep their cats out of gardens. 

Owners of cats are not easily able to control the actions of their pets once they let them outside and they frequently cross natural boundaries such as fences and hedges between adjoining properties. 

Neighbours often resent other peoples cats using their garden as a toilet, as a battlefield  for fighting territorial border disputes with other cats, and for spraying pungent urine in marking out their territory. So, it is not surprising that a wide variety of methods have been employed to deter cats from entering gardens, although many of them do not have good scientific evidence to support their use. Examples include :

  • Chemical deterrents (commercial) - granules, sprays, plant tags
  • Aromatic deterrents (traditional) - eucalyptus oil, garlic, lemon peel, moth balls, naphthalene, pepper, surgical spirit, tea bags
  • Physical deterrents - nets, fences, movement-sensitive water jets, ultrasonic products

Ultrasonic deterrents are popular, and in a recent scientific paper* the effect of ultrasonic devices was evaluated to determine whether or not they are harmful to cats. The authors concluded that :

  • Cats flicked their ears more often when the ultrasonic cat deterrent device was switched on 
  • Cats were less likely to explore the area covered by the ultrasonic device, however
  • Cats spent more time in the area covered by the device when it was switched on compared to when it was switched off !
  • The ultrasonic device used in this study did not deter cats from entering the test area 
  • The ultrasonic device did not appear to cause any harm or pose a welfare risk for the cats

The authors of this paper accepted that many people believe that these devices do work - and as they were unable to shown any direct deterrent effect on cat behaviour, they proposed that the devices may have a deterrent effect on birds or rodents and so reduce the movement of cats into an area for hunting....but further studies are needed to confirm this.

* Mills D.S. et al Veterinary Record (2000) 147 , 678-680

 

Updated October 2013