Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Cats - indoor outdoor or both in cohousing

[fergyb2 (fergyb2]

    At Swans Market (20 units, downtown Oakland,CA, very urban). The original 
founders had no restriction on number or kind of pets.  This quickly became a 
problem after move in.  Although the people  had been  meeting together for 
years before move in the pets had not.  We are densely built with almost no 
outdoor space.  So the first years there was a lot of territorial squabbling 
and much peeing on people’s doormats.  We have only a small communal garden 
space where we tried to grow both vegetables and flowers.  The garden committee 
became very cranky about the amount of cat poop in the garden.  People stopped 
having doormats since they were always pee soaked.  Pet issues became some of 
our most contentious issues.  I would recommend no outdoor free ranging pets if 
you don’t wish to spend an inordinate amount of time arguing about pet policies 
for years on end.  Even indoor only pets can become problematic if they whine 
continuously while their owner is away.  We had two next door neighbors who 
fell out over this issue, the quarrel lasted many years and it was only 
resolved after both the neighbors and dog in question died.  It’s less 
stressful to decide on more restrictive policies before move in I believe.  
Currently all but 1 of our cats are indoor only and the three dogs must be 
“under the control of their owners” when in common spaces outdoors and no pets 
allowed in the Common House (allergy issues).  It’s working now, only took 20 
years to work it out. 😏
    Bonnie Fergusson
   Swans Market Cohousing
     Oakland, CA
         

Sent from my iPad

> On Apr 28, 2020, at 5:50 PM, Linda Hobbet <coho [at] lindahobbet.com> wrote:
> 
> At Village Hearth, we are about to move in, our policy is that 
> indoor/outdoor cats belonging to original residents can be grandfathered in, 
> but after that, only indoor cats.
> 
> There are collars that are quite effective in protecting birds from cats, 
> https://www.birdsbesafe.com/. Belled collars are not very useful because cats 
> learn to walk without ringing the bell. The collars protect birds but not 
> reptiles and small mammals.
> 
> Linda Hobbet
> 
>> On 4/28/2020 8:11 PM, Muriel Kranowski wrote:
>> Re the concern that such a policy might make sales more difficult, one of
>> our original founding couples dropped out of the project because we didn't
>> have a no-outdoor-cats policy at that time. The man was a passionate birder
>> and was not willing to live where his neighbors' cats could be outside
>> killing birds at any time.
> 
> -- 
> coho [at] lindahobbet.com
> 706-202-7178 (mobile)
> www.VillageHearthCohousing.com
> Durham, NC
> 
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