The noise usually scares them away from the door, giving me enough time to get into the house. When i am inside and leaving, I will throw treats as far away as possible to distract them while I leave.
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Tangentially, I’ve done two sits so far where the pair of cats each never got treats, which made me kind of sad for them. One pair were rampant food thieves, according to their humans, so they said the cats didn’t need more calories. The other pair were normal, no medications or weight issues, but still no treats, poor fellows. Yet another sit had a solo cat that received no treats.
Till I encountered them, I figured pets generally got treats, though maybe healthy ones or few of them. And of course, their primary humans decide what they eat or not, so I followed their guidance.
Personally I think a ‘headcount’ of all pets in regular intervals is pretty much the ‘bare minimum’.
As too is making sure a room is ‘pet free’ before opening doors to the outside (groceries, washing etc.)
I have yet to have an escapee, I am sure one determined animal will successfully ‘breakout’ but I can tell you it would be me outside trying to find it!
So glad ‘inside kitty’ is back safely inside!
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This is exactly what our cat did 3x. Now we know.
It’s in our welcome book
and…truth be told…I put a fun sign on this door for the sitters as a reminder.
Now we open this door with our hand down while making a swishing noise. It seems to work but we are still VERY careful using the door.
In my role as sitter, I ask about escape artists tendencies🙂
Unpopular view, but I have some sympathy for the sitters here. Losing an animal is every sitter’s worst nightmare. It could just be that they were very nervous and either genuinely confused about when they’d last seen the cat - rather than lying outright - or they decided not to fess up because they were simply scared. Either way, they’re probably feeling absolutely terrible. I’m not condoning dishonesty, if that’s what it was. But it wasn’t necessarily dishonesty and I don’t think a punitive review would be fair.
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Ignore anyone blaming you for the sitters losing your cat and lying about it. This happened to us last December, and it is why I am not renewing my membership to this platform anymore. There was no responsibility taken from TrustedHousitters regarding the issue, and they didn’t even kick the sitters off after we provided proof of them harassing us and blaming us for them losing our indoor cat while we we’re overseas. We found our cat, thankfully, after literally flying a family member out from another state to search in our absence because we couldn’t get home quickly enough. The sitters finally seemed to have been kicked off the site…. 6 months later after what I can only assume was another horrific host experience.
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I too suggest a GPS tracker for this purpose consideing their ability to track very effectively. There are devices that allow multiple users to be logged in at the same time. SO when in sit you could also try to find it on your own. Or may be set a virtual fence or something. The possibilities are endless with technology and i guess every HS should use it for a perfect sit.
(Edited by Forum team to remove link)