Open-door policies take time, patience and understanding
Play
Manohra discovers the delights of freedom but quickly returns home
HEY! Want to know how to drive your cat completely crazy? It’s simple. Just close a door that you usually keep open.
My cats, especially the boys, like to patrol the house in the morning and evening. When I open the patio doors after I wake up, the cats rush outside, just to make sure that everything is all right and perhaps even chatter at a bird hanging on an electric wire nearby.
I open the patio doors on all the floors so that each cat can patrol the house at leisure. The open-door policy continues, even after Manohra, the Wild Child, joins us.
A problem soon appears. Soi cat Thep can easily reach the street by climbing up the gate, slipping over to a nearby tree and then leaping down. I see Manohra watching him with interest, and then, one day she starts to climb the gate just the way Thep does.
Thep is street-smart. He knows how to take care of himself. It’s true that Manohra was born on the street, but when she was scarcely three weeks old, on what was probably her first patrol of the area where she was born, she was caught in a rat trap covered in glue.
She’s alive today because an animal-rescuer found her and brought her to a vet. She doesn’t seem to have much luck on the street.
Manohra isn’t stupid. She quickly realises that she isn’t allowed to climb up the gate. Instead, she takes over the patio.
The little cat refuses to allow anyone to go outside, not even the dog. Claws, teeth and terrible yells drive everyone inside.
Manohra has turned into one very unpleasant animal.
So I shut the patio door – and no one is happy, until one cat learns how to use a clever claw to open the door. Another cat learns how to give me the Look to tell me she wants to go out.
Manohra isn’t allowed. At first, she moans and cries. Then she rushes upstairs and claims another patio.
She still wants to go outside on the first floor, but I don’t want to see her aggressiveness return.
Now that she’s around three years old, however, she seems to have changed. She’s still aggressive, but she listens to me. When I call her, she comes to me. When she’s attacking another cat, I can distract her with food.
So I open the patio door again, and the entire household relaxes. Animals can come and go as they please. Even the doggie is happy. She can run out to call to passing dogs and other friends with ease.
Then Manohra shows me just how much she’s changed. In the morning, I keep the door shut until I open the gate and let Thep inside. As soon as he comes in and the gate is shut, I open the door.
One morning, I don’t notice that Manohra has slipped outside before I open the gate. While I call to Thep, I see a streak of white and grey, and Manohra is on the street.
This cat is fast, and even though she’s no longer a kitten, she’s difficult to catch. I see her run under a parked car and I wonder just how I’m going to catch this energetic little cat.
She pokes her nose out from under the car and stares at me. I suppose she’s waiting for me to run after her, a new game. I stare back at her.
Then, even though I don’t say anything, she does run – right back into the patio.
Do you think she was reading my mind or my face? Or maybe she has turned into an obedient little cat?
Or is she trying to teach me a lesson – that no matter where she goes, she’ll always return home.
