How to prevent cats from shitting on my lawn?!?

Neighborhood cats shit right in the middle of my lawn. It stinks and the robot lawn mover makes it even worse.

I do NOT like cats, and this is not helping.

What works to keep them from shitting on my lawn?

The votes have spoken. Some people are cat lovers; thanks for the great advice from the rest of you! I will not go out of my way to accommodate other people’s pets that aren’t welcome on my property. My first weapon of choice will be chili because it’s simple and cheap. Other ideas have been noted.

iquanyin,
iquanyin avatar

@PlutoniumAcid i’m 64, i’ve lived in over a hundred different places, including rural and suburbs with lawns. literally never ever had this problem. not even when i owned cat! so it seems you’re cursed. you need to find the witch or wizard you offended and make amends.

i’m really amazed this would even happen, as cat prefer to bury their waste so they like places they can dig miles more than lawns. i wonder: did your u maybe see one cat, once, poop and now you think all poop is cat poop? because dogs are a lot more likely to be doing this regularly than cats.

Turkey_Titty_city,

yeah, cats bury their shit. they don't shit on grass and leave it exposed.

only time cats shit in the open is to prove a point. OP probably pissed off this cat

Pisodeuorrior,

Cats definitely shit on grass or anywhere else without a thought in the world, I had the same problem in one of my houses.

Also, my wife's cats have started, for some fucking reason, to shit in one of our plants.

Their litter box is always spotless, they've just decided that's where their turds go now.

Cats are assholes.

downpunxx,
downpunxx avatar

I wouldn't trust anyone whose lived in a hundred different places about anything at all

Bo7a,

Can you explain this a bit? I am having a hard time understanding how living in different places would make someone less informed. I would assume the opposite by default, but I’m interested in your thought process.

Pisodeuorrior,

It's the narrow thought process of one who has always lived in the she spot, I would imagine.

fushuan,

I’m guessing that their thought process is something akin to, if they have had to hop THAT much, their judgement can’t be good since if it were, they would have settled before reaching the high number of 100. I don’t agree, but that’s my guess

MrsDoyle,

Elderly cats don’t bury their shit. A neighbour’s cat used to bury stealth bombs in my garden until he got too old and decrepit to bother. The pinnacle was a gross runny shit on top of a creeping thyme. I was thrilled when he died, but then she got a young feisty cat that slaughters birds. Sigh.

socsa,

In general, many feral cats do not bury their shit. I have no idea why people keep saying this like it’s a fact - I have dealt with this exact same, well, shit at several places I’ve lived. Most of the time it is cats shitting in the raised beds, but I have also seen some who like a certain plot of grass or weeds.

01189998819991197253,
@01189998819991197253@infosec.pub avatar

I saw a guy on YouTube make an automated water turret that shoots the water hose (not a water gun, but the actual hose) at anything that the camera recognized as a cat on his lawn. It was awesome. I tried finding the video, but can’t remember his name.

Side note on the chili idea, it doesn’t really work on many shorthaired cats. Neither does cayenne pepper powder. [E] That was a problem I had at a previous house. I had a neighborhood cat that kept meowing hella loud in the middle of the night right outside my window. The cayenne and chili actually attracted him and more cats, and I ended up with three visiting cats, instead of the one original. Just be aware this could be your fate, too, if you use foodstuffs.

Deepus,

I think your looking for I Did A Thing’s video.

chepox,

Place a box with sand near the area you want to protect. Move it further away a feet or so by day. In 10 days that cat will be shitting wherever you guided it to. Leave the box and or the sand. Done.

Low cost. Low effort. No animal cruelty. No dealing with neighbor. Effective.

Vengefu1Tuna,

Using this method, OP could guide the cat poop in the owner’s yard.

qyron,

A motion activated or retomely deployable sprinkler system would work wonders. No need for drenching the critter, just interrupt or annoy the cat. After a few forced baths, the cat would associate shitting on your lawn with getting wet and just move to safer grounds.

Yokozuna,

All these psychopaths saying kill the cat or catch it and relocate it are fucking deranged. Talk to the owners if you know who it is… firstly, I’m sure they would at least be receptive to the problem and if they’re not then maybe look into legal outlets. If you’ve gone out of your way to post on lemmy you’re technically savvy enough to look up local laws. people have also posted actual remediation methods that aren’t terrible and could actually improve your lawn in some scenarios as well so maybe try those out if you’re into them.

I’m positive that no one wants to lose a pet in any capacity. Just some simple communication with the owners could solve this, and if not, there are other options.

Sorry you’re going through this though, shit sucks. Pun intended.

socsa,

I can 100% guarantee you that the owners will just be extremely confused about the idea that people might not want other people’s “pets” in their yard. I can 100% guarantee you that the response will just be “well it’s a cat.”

And it means that if something ever happens to this small animal, OP will get blamed for it if he says anything to the neighbors.

Patquip,

100%?

socsa, (edited )

Yeah, I’ve dealt with this situation before. People who let cats roam free like this seem to live in a world where there is precisely one socially acceptable exception to otherwise generally accepted neighborly decorum - cats. Suggesting that you don’t want their cat on your property makes you the asshole in their eyes, because they literally cannot comprehend any solution to the problem. Obviously the sky is blue, and cats are allowed to shit wherever they want. Thus spake the toxoplasmosis.

zikk_transport2,

ULPT: Get simple cat traps. Then bring this cat to shelter.

Get ultrasound devices triggered by motion. E.g. from AliExpress.

Zuberi,

:(

agent_flounder,
@agent_flounder@lemmy.one avatar

Go xeric and nuke the lawn or motion activated sprinklers.

eltimablo,

My parents used to have this problem with dogs (our neighbors loved to let them shit everywhere but their own yard) and had a great amount of success with lining the perimeter of the property with moth balls.

radix,
@radix@lemm.ee avatar

What do the moth balls do?

can,

Smell

eltimablo,

Apparently, fuck up the environment, so forget I said anything

BananaOnionJuice,
@BananaOnionJuice@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

For dog poop I remove it and sprinkle coffee grounds on top to confuse the scent.

USSEthernet,

Absolutely do not do this. It’s both illegal and harmful to the environment. I feel OP’s anger at the situation because we deal with it too, but moth balls is a big no no.

Manifish_Destiny,

Get a dog

Floey,

There was an old woman who purchased a dog.

butterypowered,

Cat shits in garden at night. Dog is in garden during day, eating and rolling in the cat shit.

Source: my dog.

random_character_a,
@random_character_a@lemmy.world avatar

Go with it, not against it. Make a small sandbox. Cat would favour that as a toilet over anything else.

Fiivemacs,

Go with what…continuing to allow people to have strays? No thanks… relocate the cat or give it to the SPCA to be sold to someone who ACTUALLY cares about the animals wellbeing.

Don’t cater to neglectful owners by providing places for them to shit in the wild. Disgusting

lol3droflxp,
lol3droflxp avatar

The cat is happy to go outside. It’s their natural behaviour. Doesn’t mean I approve but don’t spin this as being neglectful.

Fiivemacs,

No shit. Dogs like going outside too, but it’s considered neglect if you aren’t in direct supervision.

It’s neglectful. You don’t know when it last ate, you don’t know what diseases it gets…it’s uncaring, and neglectful to the animal.

lol3droflxp,
lol3droflxp avatar

They get vaccinated and fed and a place to rest. That’s not neglect. Also, a Farm dog that can roam a large property is most likely happier than one who can only go outside on a leash.

macisr, (edited )

Throughout history, humanity has had to adapt to nature instead of trying to change it to suit humans in various ocasions. Where a cat takes a shit is one of those times lol. That said, cats are normally clean as fuck. My cats live free in the backyard and I have never seen or smell where they shit because they bury it very well and never in the middle of the yard. I don’t know how op is having problems with that, it is just weird.

Fiivemacs,

Cats are domestic animals. We literally altered nature then flew them around the world. They are not native to NA. Keep your cats leashed or indoors and monitored when outside.

can,

Cats are semi-domestic at best.

TheWeirdestCunt,

They aren’t domestic animals they’re tame animals, they still haven’t diverged from wildcats and there are a bunch of wildcat/house cat crossbreeds because of that.

filcuk,

Ignoring strays, you do realise there is no practical way for a cat owner to control where their cat takes a shit?
That is not negligence, it’s nature.

You can’t tell a dog where to shit, the difference being you’ll pick it up where you can, and it probably can’t climb fences.

socsa,

There literally is. You can respect your neighbors by not letting your cat roam free, the same way I don’t let my dog roam free. I really do not understand why people have trouble with this very simple concept.

Fiivemacs,

Yeah…keep it inside and give it a box of whatever to shit in. This also isn’t just about their shit but the utter disrespect for the animal to allow it to roam free, unsupervised and the disrespect to the other humans who are forced to live with the animal you chose to set free

Poppa_Mo,

Plant some lemongrass.

When that shows to only be partially effective, accept the fact that you can’t control the ongoings of the world in every fashion.

MNByChoice,

Don’t some varieties of Lemon Grass kill cats? Something about shutting down their liver if eaten.

BananaTrifleViolin,

Are you sure it's cats?

Have you seen the cats pooping or just sniffing the poop?

Depends where you are, but foxes would be a more likely bet. Fox poop stinks too - really foul stuff. Cat poop generally is quite inocuos once it drys out, although a lawn mowing bot slicing it up would make sense for making it worse.

I have never heard of cats pooping in the middle of a lawn before. Normally they like private and safe spaces to poop as they're vulnerable when pooping, and normally they're fastidious about burying it where possible.

iF it really is cats, then maybe get a gravel section next to your lawn that they might prefer to go in? A litter box essentially.

can,

Sure looks like a cat to me.

PlutoniumAcid,
@PlutoniumAcid@lemmy.world avatar

Yes, it’s cats. From the neighbors. Seen them in the act. No doubt.

uphillbothways,
uphillbothways avatar

Easy. Get rid of the lawn. Animals live outside. If it's not this cat, it'll be something else.

PunnyName,

Learn to love cats. Then they’ll leave you alone forever.

doublejay1999,
@doublejay1999@lemmy.world avatar

Bushmasters are good for this.

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