I just read on vinegartips.com that you can stop your cat from scratching furniture by spraying it with white vinegar. Within two minutes of reading this, I sprayed our entire sofa. I would recommend that you spot test the interaction of the vinegar with the material of your furniture, but I was at my wit's end. My cat Lucy has been ripping it to ribbons for years so I am anxious to see if the smell deters her.
On CatsScratching.com, Veterinarian Christianne Schelling offers a plethora of tips for dealing with wayward cats. She suggests covering the spots your cat scratches with aluminum foil or double sided tape. Spraying scratched spots with pet odor removers may also work. (Yay! Another use for Nature's Miracle!) She also says shooting a cat with water while she's scratching might change her behavior, but that hasn't worked with Lucy.
Dr. Schelling emphasizes that it's equally important to provide cats with an attractive alternative scratching surface. That seems fair. Lucy loves to scratch her Emery Cat and the sofa. Our living room is a regular cat amusement park as far as she's concerned! But the vet recommends a sisal post at least 28" high to enable a cat to stretch the full length of her body, so maybe the Emery Cat isn't enough. You can buy a post for $60 or more (whoa!) at PurrfectPost.com. I'm thinking about making my own.
Have you had any success getting your cat to stop scratching the sofa? What worked for you? (Please don't suggest declawing because that's just mean!)
Olivia Lane is a Blogger, Green Living Educator, and Health Coach trained at The Institute for Integrative Nutrition. She's also author of Baking Soda & Bliss: The Healthy & Happy Guide to Green Cleaning.
So it's been 2 years, did the vinegar solution work? you said you just sprayed it on. did it work?
ReplyDeleteOh my gosh! Thanks for asking me to follow up. Sometimes I write these posts and totally forget. Sadly, this did not work. My cat loves to scratch. She's unstoppable!
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