Hi,

Pepper is 10 months old now, and she hasn't started going outside yet. She's never shown any interest in the outside, even though Guinness (our dog) is in and out of the garden all the time, and I haven't wanted to push the matter as I'm a little nervous of what could happen to her outside. But the OH is starting insist that we start letting her out.

We live near a fairly busy main road, but we have a completely enclosed back garden which backs onto allotments and fields, and it would be quite a trek for her to get to the main road. I'd always make sure that she only ever goes out the back, just so that I know I've done everything I can to keep her away from the road. There are lots of other cats on my street that all seem fine, although they are all 3x the size of Pepper.

I guess my main question is if she's happy staying indoors, (she's not damaging stuff) is it worth the risk of letting her out into the great wide world where there are so many things that could hurt her?

Also what is the best way of introducing her to the outside?

I know I'm probably being a little over protective but she's such a sweet little thing I'd hate for anything to happen to her.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

there have been a number of threads on this recently My view, having owned outdoor and indoor cats and having lost a number of outdoor cats to the roads, dogs, torture or just disappearing off the face of the earth is: if your cat is happy indoors, let her stay indoors. it's not cruel and she'll probably live a longer, happier and healthier life away from all the threats an outdoor live has to offer.

Personally I think if she and you are happy her being indoors then whats the problem? if you really want her to go out she might just slowly begin to venture into the garden if you leave the door open on a nice day...cats love sunshine.
But I agree with Katkin its a big bad world out there and if she is happy then I wouldn't push it.

leave her indoors. i made the mistake of letting ziggy out she is no longer with us.

guess i agree with the previous posters...i dont think you should force cats to stay inside, but its quite different if the option is there and they just dont fancy it.

Leave things as they are i reckon. I do worry about my ones getting squashed all the time, but they have always been outdoor cats so i have to let them be.

I use the term 'outdoor' loosely though. The slightest hint of cold weather and they clamour for the warmth of indoors. Soft, they are.

we have a little kitty in the sameposition. we want to let him out now he has had all his injections and been castrated. but he has never had an intrest in the outdoors(apart from chasing snow on the window!)
But even when we have the front door open and the windows, and the other 2 cats Lulu and Mossy are going out, Little Tiggy jut sits watching and not bothered about it all!
We are thinking of keeping him in til the Summer unless he begins to getintrested in the outside!

make sure that you let her have a sniff around the garden for a while, make sure that you are still with her though for about 10 mins. We have always put ours all (7!) on a lead and introduced them to the outdoors over a week or so, and they are all still with us.

Our next door neighbour let her 2 out one day, without staying with them for a while, they came back for the first week and then they were never seen again after that.

like helenasq said let her out for 10 mins if she will let u take her out, i had a cat that would NOT let u take her out side if u tred she would attack u and run back in

as for the main road it shouldn't be much of a problem with the land to the rear, cats aint stupid, from my experience of living in the centre of chapeltown as a lad you NEVER saw cats on the front of the houses, but to the rear which backs on to the park and scout camp you often see lots of cats, probably after a nice big take-a-way feed rat(i can tell u i often saw rats in my back garden easily 3foot head to tail)

Our cat never goes out because we live near a busy main road and cats don't have traffic sense.

My sister's cat used to go outside and they lived on a quiet street. A couple of Christmases ago they returned home after the family dinner and the poor cat was dying on the road. It had been hit by a car and despite a large vets bill, didn't survive. My sister was really upset and blamed herself for letting the cat out.

When we got our cat we decided he would always stay inside, and he seems happy with that. He is really affectionate and just wants to be with people. He's not a particularly inquisitive cat, so we don't feel he is missing out. For us, we just would be too upset if he got knocked down and we would blame ourselves on some level.