Hi, ive posted about my cats being hunters before but things have escalated and I’m wondering if any cat owners/sitters here might be able to help.
Over the last 3 weeks both of our cats have been bringing in catches, it was every couple of days but now its up to 2-3 times a day and its really starting to stress us all out (i have pre teen kids who love animals). Mice and birds, they appear to be fledglings. Quite often the mice are dead and birds are alive. Both cats have bells on their collars but it doesn’t appear to be helping.
Does anyone have any ideas as to why this might suddenly have started happening and what we can do to stop it? Is it because its been so hot? We know there must be a birds nest nearby but can’t find it let alone move it. We are due to have sitters end of July and also in August and I have said the cats are hunters already which they’re OK with but not the extent because its escalated in the last week.
Help?! I’m so sick of finding dead mice and feathers everywhere 
One of our cats was a prolific hunter; his catch count seemed to increase seasonally as opportunities increased. We tried to spend more time playing with him using dangly, feather toys, and adding fresh meat treats throughout the day to his diet. I think it helped, but I’m not sure that this didn’t coincidentally align with a reduction in opportunities.
Hunting cats are such a huge threat to songbirds 
Maybe not a short-term solution by the time you need a sitter, but could you have a catio constructed? They could still have their outdoor time but be contained.
I don’t know if this is available where you live. If not, maybe you can find something similar. Birdsbesafe® Cat Collar For Birds | We Help Birds Be Safe From Cats | Birdsbesafe
You cats must have some way to enter the house with their prey. Can you close that entrance? If it is a dog door that needs to be available to the dogs, there are doors that are chip-activated. You could program it so that only the dog chip worked. You can also set them so that any animal can go outside, but they can’t enter the house unless they have the correct chip.
Do you have (or can install) means to restrict the times they are outside (lockable cat flap) which will help the local wildlife?
I sat for a couple of prolific hunters and they humans kept them in overnight, which seemed to be when they hunted most.
So we have a chip activated cat flap. The problem with closing this is it means they are either in or out all night.
They dont usually stay out all night and we are worried about them wandering if we lock them out.
If we lock them in, which we used to do when we moved house a while back, they go absolutely bananas chasing each other around, fighting, and generally waking us all up.
Have to have a conversation and decide what’s the best option I think
I will look into this but not sure we have an appropriate space, our garden is a bit of an odd shape!
Thanks for the collar link will definately invest
We did a sit where the cat was a hunter and pretty smart. The listing warned of the likelihood of “gifts” but since writing that, they had found a solution. They set the cat flap to exit only. The cat was still able to open it to enter, but needed to use a paw to pull it towards him, then put his head inside. In order to do this, he had to put down anything he was carrying his mouth. No “gifts” entered the house, they were either released, consumed or left outside the door!
The people I know that got gifts (live mice, lazy cat) got fed up, closed the flap and the cat had to make herself known by the door to get in, helped by a consistent feeding routine.
I sat one outdoor cat once that had specific feeding times, it always came then, waited by the door.
That would ofc anly help not getting the gifts in.
Not a solution, just a story-
While in grad school I did a year-long sit with a dog and cat (along with my dog and cat) in the San Bernardino mountains of Calif. About a mile up the mountain and although there were houses, we were all set in the woods.
The resident cat would bring me a California scrub jay about once a month.
The cat flap was on the ground floor in the bath shower room along with the kids’ room, it was a flight of stairs up to the living room, and another flight of stairs to the loft master bedroom and bathroom.
The cat would come through the cat flap and bring the dead bird all the way up to the loft bathroom and present the dead bird for me in the bathtub.
Fortunately, Fritz my own cat who had never been an outdoor cat never had any interest in the cat flap and venturing out. And Sam, the Irish Wolfhound who traveled to Calf with me wouldn’t fit through the flap.
My current sit includes an indoor cat and a pair of indoor/outdoor cats who’ve not gotten close since I got here. I did ask the HO about that she replied that it was fine - they are hunters, but mostly for rabbits and moles (not sure that is better than birds, but I think birds are more endangered).
One of our cats doesn’t have the brainpower for such complicated matters!