It has become extremely popular with all the cats. I think of it as the first of the cat haven highways.
Here's the entry from the front porch:
The cats often don't even use the handy table - they just sail from porch floor into the opening. It occurred to me after the fact that it would be handy to have a little tunnel door we could use when needed to block the opening. I'm going to have the carpenter make one for each end next time he's here.
Next you can see how the tunnel extends around the corner of the house:
The ramp even has little "steps" for footholds if needed!
And here is Pixie showing off how it works:
And on she goes to the back yard:
And on and on and on. They seem to enjoy stopping along the way too!
The final leg of the cat haven highway, exit back yard:
And the "off" ramp:
I can't tell you how much they love this entire tunnel feature.
I have more projects in mind that we'll add on when we can. For now, they're having a blast.
We do still need to get everything painted and/or stained to blend in with the porch and house. We debated when the carpenter was here how best to do this - he doesn't paint so we would have had to do it ourselves ahead of time or hire someone to coordinate with him while he worked.
If I had known exactly what I was going to do ahead of time I might have gone ahead and stained and sealed the wood before he started - which would have required him to drop it off and label it for us in advance so it would have time to dry.
It seemed like a lot of work up front and so we went forward with the construction. It will require a bit more finesse to paint it now, but at least we can see what it looks like against the house and color it accordingly for best blending in.
I'll post after photos once we get that done!
Looks like they are having a blast! Nice job.
ReplyDeleteIt's so great having the porch and back yard accessible to them without having to worry about the front door being open and cats getting out.
ReplyDeleteJust amazing, if I were a cat I would do this all day long!
ReplyDeleteAnd so they do!! :)
ReplyDeleteEnviable!!! However, I don't think this cat-easement type of work will go over with Helen and Ted….But I love how you give built-in kitty-access freely, which is how cats actually live. I will continue to open doors for them, and feed the outdoor cats in the garage…which gives me opportunities to get up close and friendly to my sweeties!
ReplyDeleteHi, Judy! We are cat people (and Corgi people and horse people and donkey people...) so for us this was fun and in the end necessary with all the coyote activity close by and the cytauxzoonosis that is rampant in our county. I had to figure out ways to make these former free-ranging farm/barn/house cats happy. The four who live here now love it and don't seem to miss the free-range life. I suspect the next generation of kittens will love it even more since they won't ever have known anything else!
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