Keeping Cats off Livingroom Furniture

Put strips of packing tape across the couch... couple of times of walking around with tape on thier paws for any amount of time and they will learn their lesson. Good luck!

No suggestions but I wanted you to know you are not alone. My cats do the same thing and I have learned to live with it by buying cheap throw blankets (washable). I throw over the part they sleep on and then wash them.

Enjoy them they give unconditional love.

We use the squirt bottle when we are awake and around the house. But at night or when we are away from home, we use aluminum foil. Yes, it's ugly. But it's also cheap and effective. Just tear off a few sheet and place them where they like to lay the most. After a while, we could stop doing both as they finally gave up.

Tough one, you can try getting a squirt bottle, fill with water, and every time they get on the sofa squirt them. I think this will work, but not sure if when your gone it will. Have you tried to put them pet beds on the sofa, maybe they climb into them? Cats just love to be up high. Mine love a window seal bed. Best wishes

Hi,
I can certainly relate to your dilemma. Cats naturally love warm and fuzzy, comfy places, especially where their people are. Thre can be a few things worth trying:
1. Spray the furniture with a citrus-smelling spray made for deterring cats. They hate the smell of citrus, especially orange and lemon;
2. If they have special places on the sofa to sleep, put a special blanket or towel down to limit their taking over the sofa. My cats love my knit throw, so I put it down and they sleep on that. And all I have to do is wash it. It certainly has minimized their cat hair on the rest of the sofa. Sometimes, you just can't fight them and expect to win.
3. This will be tough if you're not home alot -- get a squirt gun and shoot them with a couple shots of water, all while you are telling them "no!". Aim for them since they will definitely get the message with cold water (which most cats hate even if they like to play in water). You must be consistent however.
4. Set a booby-trap. Something like a loud noise, a popped balloon or something that startles them when they step onto the sofa. This way, they will learn that it's not cool to get on the sofa since it's very startling, and they don't correlate the "surprise" with you.
5. Striking them doesn't work and it's only cruel. they will, however, respond more readily to your shout and loud noises. They also really do understand "NO!" when accompanied with a loud noise (like the slapping of a newspaper or magazine against your palm).

I realize that cats have a mind of their own and they're often quite indifferent to their owners. However, being intelligent as they are, they can be trained thru consistent constructive discipline and diverting their attention to something they like.

Best of luck to you!
aly c.

the best way to keep pets out of areas you do not want them, you can get at your local pet store its called bitter apple spray, it does not stain or harm the cats if they lick it. They do not like the taste of it and once they discover it they will not go back in that area again. Hope this helps, good luck!

I've used Grannick's Bitter Apple Spray. Spray it on a towel and put it on the couch or chair your cat like to lay in and it works great. I've heard of another similar product called Bitter Yuk that works the same way. Another spray that is supposed to be safe to spray on your furniture and is designed specifically for cats is called No Stay. The price on any of these is around $10.00 for a 16 oz. bottle.

You can buy these motion sensing things at any Pet Store like Petsmart or Petco. Ours is a little grey box with a switch to turn it on. When the cats jump up on the surface, it beeps loudly. It's an obnoxious sound and unfortunately, it will bug you too. Use it for about a month and they will get the picture. We used it to keep our cats out of the baby's crib and our 90 lb dog off of our couch! Like another poster said, I'd get a cat tower too. They will prefer that over your couch!! As I'm sure you know, they love to be up in the air.

I agree about the squirt bottle..My husband used that to train our cats. He uses the water hose from the roof to teach them how to stay in the yard.. It has worked great.. Maybe when you are not home you could also keep them in the room where their litter box is kept..

I have the same exact problem. I just started putting a piece of material on the side they like to sleep, like a pillowcase, the material is cold and they don't like it, the problem is the same with the plastic doesn't look very nice but I can remove it quick if I have visits and the cauch is not full of hair. I do have a problemt my cat found another spot LOL, so please let me know what god advise you get and how it worked maybe I can try.

Please do NOT use mousetraps as one poster suggested. That could break your cats' legs. I can't believe she does that!

The pillow cases are great advice. Other than that, just be glad they're not scratching the couch!

Keep a squirt gun around....it works wonders!

We have also had excellent luck with the OFF spray from Petsmart. It repels cats and dogs very effectively. I have sprayed it all over my living room and it has not damaged the furniture at all....and it is safe to use around children.

Hi! Why don't you use a nice slip-cover or bedsheet? I got one for like $1 from someone & used it. True it's not as 'attractive' as the actual sofa pattern but it helped & you can remove it easily if company comes over. I got lucky w/my kitty. She knew which pieces she could get on & which she could not. I had to get on to her if she got on my easy chair (or any other piece) & she didn't do it again. I just said a firm "NO! GET OFF THAT CHAIR!!" & she'd get scared & wouldn't get back on there. She wasn't hurting anything by being on it but didn't want the cat hair on certain pieces. Try either squirting her w/water & saying "NO!" or saying "NO!" then picking her up & placing her on the piece you don't mind her being on. My kitty had two chairs she could get on & she knew it plus one that had plastic bags over it since it wasn't ours but she could get on that one too. Plus the sofa (w/the coverlette I put on there). I would also let her up in my lap if I was sitting on the "forbidden" chairs & she knew that she could get up in there if I were sitting in it but not allowed if it were empty. I felt bad for being 'mean' to her so I let her slip sometimes since she really wasn't hurting it, just sleeping in it. Sometimes you hafta clap your hands together along w/the "NO!" or rattle a plastic sack (like WalMart sack) & that sometimes is scary. I know my kitty was petrified of plastic sacks. Hope these suggestions help! Also they make really good rubber brushes just for pet hair on cloth furniture that work really good for getting that off or you can use a good housecleaning type rubber glove too but the brush works best. Cats ARE trainable, one poster said they're not but she may've just had bad luck. All cats are different and ARE trainable, some just take longer than others. I had good luck w/all of my cats. They all were good & behaved themselves. You just hafta be more consistant w/some. Good luck!!

We use aluminum foil. Cats hate the look and feel of aluminum foil! We tried to get her into a cat bed, but she didn't care for it.

We tore off several sheets of foil for our new furniture (b/c I love my rescue cat and would NEVER get rid of her!).
The foil stays on until one of us wants to sit down. Then we take it off and put it under the coffee table. Last person off the sofa gets the foil from under the table & puts it back on the seats. (Sometimes I forget to put it away when guests come over...so I hurriedly explain why the foil is there....they all have thought that is a great idea.)

Nice thing about foil is after about 3 weeks, Daisy stopped looking to the sofa as a place to sleep....guess she figured there'd be foil up there so why bother.

We also put a nice comfy old sweatshirt in a corner of her favorite room, so when she was evicted from the sofa, she had a comfy option.

I have a Jack Russell that loves to get on the kitchen counter. I bought a Scat Mat from Amazon.com and I put it on the back of the chair that she jumps from and it keeps her off the counter. I have also used it in front of a baby gate to keep her out of a room since she can jump over about anything and she won't go near it. The Scat Mat has little lines running through it that shock when touched. It has three different settings. They also have mock mats you can use once you see that your cat or dog won't go near the mat.

Good luck!

Many, Many years ago I used a product that kept a dog off my sofa. I don't remember the name. It was a spray that was sprayed onto a cloth that was then pinned to the chair. It did not leave an offensive smell on the chair and it kept the dog off. I don't remember how long I had to leave it on the chair, but surely a pet store could help you.

We line foil on our couches keep our dog off the sofas. It has worked wonders. You could try it.

couch covers that are washable

Not sure if it'll work on cats, but it worked like a charm on a dog. . . . A friend of mine bought one of those things from the office supply store, the hard plastic runner-thing, that offices put in their hallways to save the carpets. When she wasn't using the sofa(s) herself, she would lay the runner thing UPSIDE DOWN/little grabby teeth-side up on the couch. NOT the most comfy thing to lay on, and it kept the dog off. Like I said, I'm not sure if it would work on cats, but may be worth a try.

The only other alternative I could think of (since you can't be there 24/7 with a water bottle), is to buy some cheap slipcovers (you don't have to tuck them in all pretty, but they'll keep the sofas covered). When company comes over, you just yank them off, and POOF, you have a nice pretty sofa.

Best of luck!
M.

Good Luck with that. Cats do when they want when they want! :)

lol! I was going to say get rid of the cats or the furniture! When I was growing up we had cats and we never came up with a way to get them off furniture. They are very strong willed creatures:) I think we just always kept a lint roller handy! I know the hair is a pain, but it tends to come with the territory. Now my mom will put blankets over furniture sometimes at her house when she is working. That will keep the cat hair down to a dull roar. When she is home, she takes the blankets off and enjoys her furniture. Sorry if this is a repeat!

They probably prefer the height... meaning they want to be on the most prominent and tallest furniture in the room. The kitty beds are on the floor.

Would you consider getting one of those cat climbing structures...? Because, although you can train dogs to stay off furniture... that never seems to work with cats. They will learn to just stay off it when you are there.

(I assume you are trimming their nails... because they will shred the sofas otherwise! Especially if they start to resent the area.)

We love our cats for their independence. It's cute until they overrule our rules. You can try the water bottle and IF the cats WANT to decide that they're willing to behave it might be a good option. But be careful they might rebel and start doing other not so nice things to get back at you. They can be cute but they can also be vindictive little brats.

My best advice is to just invest in a good pet hair vacuume. I like our handheld dirt devil but you have to make sure it the kind with a direct plug and not cordless if you want enough power to suck up all the hair. Another suggestion is to brush or comb your cats. They might like it and it can really help with the shedding.

Good luck! And love them no matter what!
Jen
http://www.mommysjoy.com

I suggest getting a good vaccuum cleaner. Because cats are just like that, they are not going to stay of your furniure unless all you do is chase them off all day. I grew up with cats and they are not "trainable" like a dog would be. Dysons seem to be my favorite right now.

My cat hates foil. We got a cat genie cat box and he decided he didn't like it so he urinated on our leather couch. Let me tell you, it smells lovely now. I know the foil looks bad but maybe it will just be temporary. They also make these little pads that give a slight shock when jumped on. I can't bear to go that far but there are products out there.
Good Luck!

H. P, The thing that cats hate the most is water, Buy you a squirt bottle put water in it. eveytime you see your cats on the furniture spray the water right in there face. This doesn't hurt them they just don't like it! but be consistant! this is key within a couple of weeks you should see them jump at the sight of the water bottle and over time will learn that furniture equals water and they will avoid it. Kind of how they avoid the tub or water puddles. Stay with it though!!

I always thought we bought furniture _for_ cats! ;)

I know they don't like citrus smell too much, so if you could stand it, you can try citrus air freshener on the furniture. I think all the pet repell stuff they sell at pet stores stinks, so I don't think that would help your situation (unless you don't use the particular pieces of furniture that the cats do).
The other thing you might try is the Feliway spray and spray it (follow the directions and don't over spray) on the beds you bought them. It might make them like the beds more. Using a plug-in version of Feliway won't work because Feliway mainly makes them content in life, so they'd probably be even MORE content to lay on the sofas. ;)

Other options would be rolls of tape (sticky side out) or ballons (really big, so they'd pop if a cat jumped up on the sofa) attached to the sofas - but again, those aren't options if you actually use the furniture.

You may just have to deal with them sleeping where they wish and covering the sofas with a pretty - washable - blanket. You can take it off when you have company and voila - no cat hair.

Or you can shave them :p

Good luck!

Oh- I feel your pain. We have 2 cats that lover to sleep on our brown microfiber couch. But you can't stop cats from doing it. We noticed our cats prefer the top of the cushions along the back of the sofa so we bought pillow cases that kind of blend in with the color of the couch and just whip them off and wash them once a week. It works for us. Good luck.