How To Train Farm Cats

2010 - Volume #34, Issue #1, Page #31

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Roger Gutschmidt was tired of his family's 8 cats always causing him trouble. They would break into the cat food dispenser that hangs on his garage wall, and leave muddy footprints on his vehicles.
  To solve the food dispenser problem, he installed a spring-loaded bolt and a small tarp strap. But he had to get more serious to solve the muddy vehicle problem.
  He used a 110-volt electric fencer, .035 welding wire (super thin, almost invisible), and 3 flat pieces of 10-in. long plastic to act as insulators.
  "I fastened the plastic pieces to the door jams of my 2-stall garage with sheet rock screws," he says. "I attached one on the far end of each of the door openings and one on the middle post between the doors. I ran the wire through 1/16-in. dia. holes drilled in the end of the poly."
  On the insulator furthest away from the 110v fencer unit, Gutschmidt attached the wire to an eye bolt held in place by a small compression spring that gives the wire some "give" when driving over it with his vehicles.  The wire was 3 in. off the floor and he left the garage doors open about 6 in., leaving a narrow access for the cats.
  Gutschmidt says they all received a shock when they tried to enter the garage, and after only one day, they have never tried to come in again. Because the wire was spring loaded, he could have left it there permanently, driving over it when coming and going from the garage. However, because there's always the risk of forgetting it's there while on foot, Gutschmidt decided to take it down once the cats were trained.
  "They don't even hang around the garage at all anymore, which I like," he says. "If I had known it was going to be that effective, I would have done this years ago. I have a neighbor who wants to borrow it for his own pesky cats. I'm also considering putting this same electric wire system around our porch leading into the house. They're always hanging around there, too."
  Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Gutschmidt Manufacturing LLC, Roger Gutschmidt, 6651 Hwy. 56, Gackle, N. Dak. 58442 (ph 701 698-2310; shopdoc@drtel.net).

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How To Train Farm Cats FARM HOME Miscellaneous 34-1-31 Roger Gutschmidt was tired of his family's 8 cats always causing him trouble. They would break into the cat food dispenser that hangs on his garage wall, and leave muddy footprints on his vehicles. To solve the food dispenser problem, he installed a spring-loaded bolt and a small tarp strap. But he had to get more serious to solve the muddy vehicle problem. He used a 110-volt electric fencer, .035 welding wire (super thin, almost invisible), and 3 flat pieces of 10-in. long plastic to act as insulators. "I fastened the plastic pieces to the door jams of my 2-stall garage with sheet rock screws," he says. "I attached one on the far end of each of the door openings and one on the middle post between the doors. I ran the wire through 1/16-in. dia. holes drilled in the end of the poly." On the insulator furthest away from the 110v fencer unit, Gutschmidt attached the wire to an eye bolt held in place by a small compression spring that gives the wire some "give" when driving over it with his vehicles. The wire was 3 in. off the floor and he left the garage doors open about 6 in., leaving a narrow access for the cats. Gutschmidt says they all received a shock when they tried to enter the garage, and after only one day, they have never tried to come in again. Because the wire was spring loaded, he could have left it there permanently, driving over it when coming and going from the garage. However, because there's always the risk of forgetting it's there while on foot, Gutschmidt decided to take it down once the cats were trained. "They don't even hang around the garage at all anymore, which I like," he says. "If I had known it was going to be that effective, I would have done this years ago. I have a neighbor who wants to borrow it for his own pesky cats. I'm also considering putting this same electric wire system around our porch leading into the house. They're always hanging around there, too." Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Gutschmidt Manufacturing LLC, Roger Gutschmidt, 6651 Hwy. 56, Gackle, N. Dak. 58442 (ph 701 698-2310; shopdoc@drtel.net).

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