Getting Cats To Sleep Through The Night. What's The Secret?

limestonekid

No matter when we feed them or whether we play with them during the evening or not it is almost impossible to have our three cats sleep through the night.

Inevitably one, if not two, of them will be in our bedroom before 5:00AM wanting to be fed. Sure closing the door would be an easy thing to do but then they sit outside the door and scratch and whine.

Suggestions?

goldemi

ambien

or, if feeding is the driver, do you not always have a full bowl of food and water out for them?

bohuma

You could try an automatic feeder, but I haven't always found that effective. At the moment I have one elderly cat and two juveniles, and I am taking the view that they get fed on my schedule, so I ignore the 5 a.m. requests for food and get up when I am ready. The older cat is fine like this, the new cats were wanting earlier feeds, but now are used to getting fed later.

If your cats are mature, you'll need to work your own way.

Cats have evolved as crepuscular hunters, i.e. lowlight hunters during early dawn and dusk, so a 5 a.m. feed is what they've evolved to have.

alana

As your cats get older they will be less likely to wake you in the night. I keep a water bottle by the side of my bed and give a squirt in the general direction of the kitty if they pounce on me in the night. Eventually they will be trained so that you don't have to squirt the bottle just give it a shake and they will scamper.

I would give a handful of dry food before you retire for the night so that they won't wake you extra early for food but there is little you can do otherwise except make sure they have toys and entertainment. I wouldn't advise giving catnip late in the evening if you expect to sleep.

opossumqueen

If it doesn't already exist, it sounds like there's a market for a cat feeder that is on a clock. You could set it to release some food at a programmed time. Just set it to dispense food around the time they wake you.

steveo

I think the secret might be fooling them into thinking night is day and day is night. Could probably be accomplished with those lights they sell for seasonal disorder therapy.

the psycho-ologist

First you are going to have to leave extra food out. Leave dry cat food. Most cats will not eat to excess and become obese unless you are feeding them really yummy table type food ( think tuna, chicken from the grocer etc).

When and if that doesn't get them to stop nagging you, you will have to learn to ignore them, until they stop. Cats know exactly how to manipulate you to get your attention, and get you to do what they want. My cats would yowl until I got out of the shower. The only solution was to leave the bathroom door open.

In the case of the bedroom, they would yowl because I refused to have them in the bedroom, because they will play all night on my bed.

They yowled for ages, and it was hard to sleep. I had to get ear plus, but eventually, when I didn't cave they realized the yowling was useless and stopped.

You will have to live through it for a while and ignore them.

booklaw

Just like human babies!

whynot_31

Does telling cats they have a cold even though they don't, and then giving them benadryl because you know it will put them to sleep work?

If not, then they are not like young humans.

the psycho-ologist

booklaw said:

Just like human babies!

Except that when my cats grow older, they won't ask me for college tuition, bombard me with their loud obnoxious music, eat up all my food, drink my wine, and use up all my household products.

/end bitter cat lady rant

the psycho-ologist

whynot_31 said:

Does telling cats they have a cold even though they don't, and then giving them benadryl because you know it will put them to sleep work?

If not, then they are not like young humans.

Wow. Did this go on in YOUR house? o_0