All great advice. I pin aluminum foil (you could tape it, too) to the
places they like
to scratch. They hate it and will not touch it--and you sure can tell
that they have
not been there. After two weeks of a funny looking chair, you can take
the foil
down because the cat will be trained.

Meanwhile ... everyone offered this same advice the first time around,
no?

Try REAL catnip.
http://www.petsmart.com/products/product_21483.shtml

Also, if she likes trees and the deck, try a wooden post.
http://www.lovethatcat.com/cat-scratching-post.html
Or even a natural log from your area, bark and all, secured well with a
screw onto a flat, thick board.
http://amby.com/cat_site/declaw.html#build-it

--
~kaeli~
Support your local medical examiner: die strangely!
http://www.ipwebdesign.net/wildAtHeart
http://www.ipwebdesign.net/kaelisSpace

I had the same problem with my cat.  I bought her a scratching post and she
absolutely wouldn't use it.  She seemed to prefer waiting until I was asleep
in bed and scratching the bottom of the bed.  My solution was to put the
post right next to the bed (which she obviously liked scratching).
Everytime she started scratching the bed I shouted "NO" really loudly.
Secondly I made a point of playing with her at the scratching post by
dragging pieces of wool over it so that she sank her claws in.

She got the message eventually and now she uses it all the time.  Funnily
enough I bought catnip spary initially to try and lure her to the post, but
my cat HATES it so now I spray it on things that I don't want her to touch.

Jeannie

You can make them at home for much less, plus you can incorporate some
fun surfaces like tree trunks, etc.  Of course, you have to be a
little handy. ;)

-L.

I read about that tip from someone else in here, and I just used it on
my new cat. Worked great.

Actually, he's a used cat, not new, although a reasonably late model.
Met him at the county animal shelter and he just insisted that I be
his new papa. He's in the middle of acclimatization to his new house
and doing wonderfully.

As for the scratching post, he had been living in a steel cage for the
past month at the shelter, so I can understand that he feels a real
need to scratch. Steel just doesn't cut it as a scratching material.
On the first day he scratched on my computer chair (which earned him a
swift swat and a loud NO!). He ran off and hid for a bit afterwards.
Then I heard a noise from the living room and he was scratching the
top of the couch. Another loud NO! and he ran off and hid again.

Then I decided I'd really better get a scratching post. I drove to the
local PetSmart, but everything they had looked ridiculously overpriced
and ugly as well. I ended up going to Home Depot instead, thinking
maybe I would just make one. I looked all over the store for carpet
remnants, but didn't find any. Then I wandered through the lumber
section and discovered rough-sawn cedar fencing boards. I bought four
of them that were six feet long and 5.5 inches wide. I took them home
and cut them in half, making eight 3-foot long boards, then nailed
four into a hollow square, repeating with the other four (planning to
make two scratching posts). Then I used some scrap plywood I had to
make a base and a top shelf for each post. They came out really great
and the fencing boards only cost about $8.

But the cat ignored my fine handcrafted scratching posts, so I rubbed
some catnip on them. That did it. He went nuts scratching on them. So
far he has come back to scratch on them a couple times when I was in
the next room, and he has not scratched on the furniture at all since.
So thanks to the person who suggested using catnip to train a cat to
use a scratching post. It seems to have done the trick.

If anyone needs a scratching post, rough-sawn fence boards are cheap
and the cats love them. After all, in the wild they use trees to
scratch on, so it's probably more natural and effective than carpeting
or sisal. Cedar is a very soft wood that is perfect. You wouldn't even
need to make them into a fancy post like I did -- just buy the board
and lean it against a wall.

More about my used cat later.

--
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