MagicMelon
Well-Known Member
So we have 2 Bengals, one in particular is rather a character. They are both very good, well behaved cats but this one has always gone through phases of scratching on the kitchen door at night, recently its got a lot worse and its now been 7 nights straight meaning we keep getting woken up by her and OH is really irrirated about it this morning.
We shut the kitchen door at night, it leads through to the hall and all our bedrooms. We dont leave the door open as she's bad for having mad playtime in the middle of the night and scratching the carpet! Our doors are thin cottage style wood doors so they also rattle when she scratches. Its always about 2 / 3am ish that she'll start. I thought it was that she was cold so I've been ensuring the fire was stoked up before we go to bed and leave her a blanket on the sofa (she has cat beds too but rarely uses them). Then I thought it was that she wanted to scratch on something as that end of the house is all hard floors except upstairs which is carpeted so I left the baby gate open so she could go upstairs to scratch on carpets and sleep on the other beds (with duvets etc. on them). She has company at all times - our other cat and our dog (who she has wrapped round her paw!). Still to no avail. Then we've tried getting glasses of water and splashing her with it as we open the door but she thinks thats hilarious and makes a game out of it (Bengals like water). Last night at 3am I dragged my youngest childs tent thing up against the door thinking that would stop her but she just spent ages pulling it away so she could get to the door again!
We're getting pretty peed off being woken up 2 / 3 times a night, she'll scratch for ages. She does give up eventually, Ive tried ignoring her loads of times but its never helped. Feliway does nothing. I think she wants to be with me, she loves bounding in to see me in the mornings.
Does anyone know what else I can basically do here? Im thinking our only option is to put baby gates across the door to keep her away from it (she's useless at jumping) but they're so cumbersome to have sitting about in the kitchen all the time when not in use.
Anyone know why their cat scratches and what could be done?
We shut the kitchen door at night, it leads through to the hall and all our bedrooms. We dont leave the door open as she's bad for having mad playtime in the middle of the night and scratching the carpet! Our doors are thin cottage style wood doors so they also rattle when she scratches. Its always about 2 / 3am ish that she'll start. I thought it was that she was cold so I've been ensuring the fire was stoked up before we go to bed and leave her a blanket on the sofa (she has cat beds too but rarely uses them). Then I thought it was that she wanted to scratch on something as that end of the house is all hard floors except upstairs which is carpeted so I left the baby gate open so she could go upstairs to scratch on carpets and sleep on the other beds (with duvets etc. on them). She has company at all times - our other cat and our dog (who she has wrapped round her paw!). Still to no avail. Then we've tried getting glasses of water and splashing her with it as we open the door but she thinks thats hilarious and makes a game out of it (Bengals like water). Last night at 3am I dragged my youngest childs tent thing up against the door thinking that would stop her but she just spent ages pulling it away so she could get to the door again!
We're getting pretty peed off being woken up 2 / 3 times a night, she'll scratch for ages. She does give up eventually, Ive tried ignoring her loads of times but its never helped. Feliway does nothing. I think she wants to be with me, she loves bounding in to see me in the mornings.
Does anyone know what else I can basically do here? Im thinking our only option is to put baby gates across the door to keep her away from it (she's useless at jumping) but they're so cumbersome to have sitting about in the kitchen all the time when not in use.
Anyone know why their cat scratches and what could be done?
