Nocturnal cat

When I got a cat to look after, I kept her indoors for a while. You don't want her to get lost in a strange environment. Or try to walk back to her old house!

After two or three weeks it was time to let her out. I was a bit nervous about that! But all went well. But as the only place I thought I could reasonably put a catflap was in the conservatory, I had kept her indoors at night. She can only walk in and out through my bedroom, and I don't want her to have access to that when I am trying to sleep. But cats are pretty much nocturnal. Shouldn't she be outside at night?

One Friday I gave it a try. When she was outside, I just locked the catflap that leads from the conservatory to the bedroom. That way she could come and have a nap on the comfortable chair in the conservatory if she wanted to. The disadvantage of this configuration was that there was only a thin door between her and me. Would she let me sleep?

I went to bed and all was well. But in the middle of the night I was woken up by scratching at the door. The cat had been fed up with the conservatory! So I let her in, and through, because if she didn't want to be locked out of the bedroom on the one side she had to be locked out of it on the other side. And I went back to bed.

The next step was: locking the catflap that leads into the conservatory when she is outside. Then she really can't get into the house. I don't think she will like that very much as her normal routine is to just pop out for fairly short amounts of time. But if I lock her out altogether, she can't wake me up! I don't think she could, anyway. She can't really get close to me then. Watch this space…