¿Es injusto NO DEJAR SALIR A TU GATO a la calle? 🐈🏡❌ | Gatos indoor vs. gatos outdoor

Today we're going to talk about a topic that has generated a lot of controversy since the channel's inception. Do we have the right to keep our cats locked up at home their entire lives, or should they go outside? Hi, I'm Carlos and I'm a veterinarian, and this is alcatotho. Welcome to the happy pets and families channel. One can always ask, hey, is it fair that a c neighborhood going out meeting other kitties, quote? So if you have a position contrary to mine or something, I say in the video, well, I don't know. To make the video, I've grouped together the arguments of people who are in favor of their cats going outside for a very long time now, evolution has always led them to live more or less closely with humans because they can take advantage of a number of things from humans, so, such as protection. A cat lives in an environment surrounded by people because those people will scare away the predators that may be stalking them. But also, cats that live in urban environments will often take advantage of the leftovers from the meals of the people who live near them. And for this, they usually also resort to the trash. It is true that they hunt, but it is also true that if they have another more convenient source, they will resort to that source. So for this reason, I have to tell you that we cannot idealize that a domestic cat will live better in nature. Perhaps it has a lot of competition, and although it could hunt some small prey, there may be other stronger cats or other animals, and the cat may not feed itself properly. And of course, this leads us to the next question. Does a cat not know how to defend itself if, for example, it encounters a predator? It is true that the cat will have a series of strategies to be able to face that possible predator. But it is also true that when it is facing it, even if it is facing it by running away, by hiding, avoiding being hunted, it may not be successful. It is possible that the predator will eventually hunt it down and the life expectancy of a cat on the street will be considerably reduced. In fact, in recent years, studies have been conducted to compare the life expectancy of a cat on the street with that of a domestic cat at home. And the conclusion has been reached that it is almost half. An average indoor cat can live around 15 years and on the street around seven. So, of course, many people idealize that, well, our cat will be better off on the street, or if it goes outside, well, it will have fun and so on, but it will also encounter a series of dangers that it cannot directly manage. Such as for example, a car that could run them over, or malicious people who could put poisoned bait for them. Come on, I'm sure you know some stories, and that's all. Not to mention the diseases that other cats can transmit to them. But of course, there are some people who wonder if our cats get bored indoors. Well, since their environment is always the same, their life becomes monotonous, something constant, and that can eventually affect them, which is why they prefer to let them go outside. Don't get me wrong with what I'm going to say. It's true that if our cat goes outside, it probably loves it. Well, you know how curious cats are especially. And they start going out and coming and going and starting to see certain areas of the neighborhood that they don't know. They want to explore them, they want to climb a tree. I mean, that's completely normal because it's also part of the cat's idiosyncrasy, its way of acting and seeing the world. Right. But we have to use that curious nature of wanting to explore new areas to our advantage. When they live inside a house, we can help them so that the environment of A4 walled house changes and that they end up having some options to continue exploring. So it will be up to the human who lives with the cat to keep the environment cat friendly. That's what I often mean when I tell you that your cat should have everything inside the house. If our cat is an explorer, we will have to give it options inside the house so that it can explore. You don't have to move house every day, but you can create nooks and crannies in your own home where the cat can move and go. They don't have to change much, but you can modify them little by little or put them on one day and take them off the next. All you have to do is move the sofa away from the wall a little. Create a little alley behind the sofa so that you can see what's going on behind it and you can spend a little time playing with it in that alley so that it's stimulating. In the end, what it's all about is emulating the exploration possibilities that our cats have outside in our home. Obviously, we can't ignore the fact that they'll be much more active outside, but what we have to do is prevent our cat from getting bored indoors. And there's another thing I want to think about regarding boredom, which is that we often think that cats that are outdoors spend all day playing. Well, I don't know if you've ever observed cats that are in colonies, feral cats? Well, those cats don't play much. Why? Well, because a cat that lives outside in an environment with less people around, is aware of threats from other cats that enter their territory and that they have to defend. So it's true that this cat can explore, but not so much play. The playfulness is generally maintained in cats that live indoors as neoteny. Neoteny is a behavior that our animal companion exhibits when they are young and that they maintain when they are adults. This playfulness is very common in young kittens, but adult kittens that are in the wild, as I said, Right. And your cat at home, since it has peace and security, it lacks nothing. It knows that no other cat is going to come in and take what is its, so it can dedicate itself to playing, it can entertain itself with little toys, hunting things, and well, interacting a little with you. And this leads me to think that the only thing it will have in our house that it will not have on the street, since we can give it something so that it can explore, so that it can play and well, have social interaction, our cat at home will not have to worry about maintaining its territory. But apart from the fact that our cat can go out and have a better or worse time outside on the street, there are some people who say, hey, yes, that's all very well, but in the end, my cat's mental health inside a house can't be as good as if it were outside, because it says, well, in my house there might not be another feline companion to live with, to interact with, to do things with other cats. And so that could have a negative impact on it. Apart from the fact that you can adopt another cat or not, that's a personal decision for each person. Okay? Cats don't always have to be in pairs. Our cats are not very sociable animals in the wild. Females may form slightly more stable social groups, especially when giving birth, because they help each other raise the kittens. But males are not part of that stable group. The male defends the territory around these females and defends the females as if they were their own. A natural resource. I'm telling you, in the natural state, don't be mistaken. Don't think that your cat is going to go outside and when it meets another kitten, it's going to greet it with its paw and want to play with it out of nowhere. When your cat goes outside, it's probably an intruder in another cat's territory because there may also be feline colonies in your area. The most common thing when it meets another cat is that stressful situations occur for both of you, and your cat will probably either go on the offensive and want to attack the other cat, or go on the defensive because the other cat is defending its territory and becomes aggressive, it's not going to be a friendly encounter at all. If we extrapolate this a bit to a cat that lives only indoors, it has a direct impact on the introduction, which I've told you many times here on the channel. To me, it seems crazy to bring a strange cat to live with you if you already have another cat living with you, because your feline companion will defend its territory tooth and nail against this intruder. That's why I always tell you that you have to introduce them and gradually allow them to adapt, because the usual first reaction, the most normal one, is, well, a little aggressive, although there are many people who argue the opposite. Honestly, the cases I've seen show me that it's very important. But it also goes in line with the physiology and ethology of the cat itself, defending its territory. They are territorial animals. Well, it could also be that you've adopted a cat that was already used to living on the street because it was rescued. So what happens with these cats? Well, here it's possible that the cat that comes into your house misses the street a little, especially at first. For that, you have to be aware of what the cat will need in order to give it. This, of course, will depend on their age and the amount of time they have been on the streets. That is why some cats are more likely to be rescued from the streets than others. The current trend is not to break up feline colonies, but to take feral cats that are in their colony in a small park in your city and bring them inside. If you notice, what is done is to manage that colony, to prevent it from reproducing uncontrollably. Younger kittens, who may still be a little more adaptable to a life more inside a house, are usually rescued because, in addition, they also have a lower survival rate on the streets. But adult cats are left well controlled in that area so that they can continue carrying out their daily activities precisely so that problems of maladjustment do not arise when they enter a house. But anyway, if I want to talk to you about adaptation, here we have a cat that has been on the street for the entire first stage of its life, and right now I open the door and it doesn't even want to look out. It has adapted perfectly to living inside a house and in fact, we have been doing it since the first day, even though it came from a shelter. But anyway, I have a loose end that I don't want to let go. Regarding the dangers that our cats can encounter on the street, the there is a very important one which is diseases. And now you're probably thinking, well, the vet is here nagging about diseases. This professional deformation is just trying to scare us. It's true that there are some feline diseases that can be prevented by vaccination. For that, they should always have their vaccination up to date. Because it's also true that vaccines lose effectiveness over time. But there are other diseases that can't be prevented by vaccination, such as feline immunodeficiency or other completely different diseases that are parasitic, which don't have any type of cause. Like for example, well, I don't know about toxoplasma, which we've already talked about a few times. Other intestinal diseases such as cochadilla or yeast infections, which can also cause diarrhea. When we let our cat go outside, we're exposing it to an entire environment that is quite uncontrolled. We don't know what our cat is going to have to deal with. We, on the other hand, we can't prevent, for example, our cat from getting into trouble with another cat and them scratching each other. And those scratching, for example, is a disease that veterinarians often call the disease of aggression because it's usually transmitted through blood to blood contact or open wounds between cats. Also, with the issue of sterilization, it's true that the cat won't bring unwanted litters into the world, or that they could well proliferate in your neighborhood or anything like that. It's good that it's sterilized, but it's also true that it's not only dangerous for the cat that goes outside, but the cat itself can also pose a danger by going outside. Let me explain. In recent years, there has also been a focus on the role of cats that form colonies in biodiversity and in the animals that live around them. When there is a colony of cats living on the street, well, we have to try to keep that colony well controlled, etc. Well, those poor cats don't have a family, they don't have a place to go, and we have to keep them in the best possible conditions. But we also have to be responsible by preventing our cats from becoming part of the problem. If those cats that live on the street that have to find their own food hunt, that's normal. That's how they live. But why are we going to put our cats in competition for that type of food? That's also why it's so important that colonies on the street are counted using methods called capture, sterilization and re entry or return, or capture sterilization and release. By sterilizing cats in the colony, we prevent them from reproducing indiscriminately. If the colony is well controlled and well cared for, it will be well fed. As I said, cats will always tend to eat the food that is easiest to find, the food that is closest to their paws, and therefore they will hunt other animals less. In this way, the colony can live in balance with the other animals that live around them, with the rest of biodiversity. And let's also address a question that I could consider the million dollar question. Many people say, well, if cats have always gone outside, why not now? As I said, cats have learned to live with people, but people too, especially in recent years, have evolved in our way of understanding the world. Before, cats were, well, I'm not going to say a working animal, but they were animals that provided a series of advantages or positive aspects to the people they lived with. For example, people who lived in the countryside and mice ate their crops. If we had cats, they would either eat the mice or scare them away. Therefore, it was in our best interest to have cats. And these cats did not live indoors. They lived in more or less close contact with humans, but they were usually outside. Right now the perspective has changed. It has changed radically. In other words, what we are proposing is not that the cat should go back to living on the street, but that it should have the advantages of living at home, of protection, of security, but also that it should be able to go out on the street with all the dangers that this entails. Before, if a cat, for whatever reason, did not return to the house where it lived, it should, well, the family might miss it more or less. But since such a strong bond had not been established, well, I am not going to say that they cared less, but it is true that, well, they saw it as a necessary evil. But today the concept is completely different. We think much more about the well being of the cat. You actually want your cat to go outside because you think it's the best thing for him, but you want your cat to come home. Are you willing to put your cat through that completely avoidable risk? Wouldn't it be better for you to give your cat a safe environment where he can be calm and comfortable with you and you provide him with everything he needs. Would you ever think of leaving your dog alone outside? Right. If you live with a canine companion and you have to take him out for a walk, you're always the one who takes him out. You don't open the door and say, hey, Toby, go away and he'll be right back. That's never crossed our minds when it comes to dogs. The thing is, people have a lot of misconceptions about cats. I'm telling you this from personal experience. I've had to learn the hard way about the risks cats face when they go outside. Well, when I was little, my family always lived in a house, well, in an environment that wasn't very urban. So you might think, hey, maybe cats there are less likely to go out into the street without supervision. Right. Well, as I was saying, this happened a long time ago when I was little, and maybe we didn't have this whole concept and this learning that we've acquired over the years, and we thought that our cat's life was better if it could come and go without any problem, if it entertained itself with the trees in the garden, or if it could go out into the street from the garden and do its business. We always expected our cat to come home because we loved it. It was. It was a member of the family, although we let it do these kinds of things a bit irresponsibly. But it's true that more than once there have been cats that haven't come home, and we've felt it a lot. Well, I already told you about that in another video from many years ago that I'll leave a link below so you can take a look and see what my past mistakes or my family's past mistakes have been so that you don't make them. And that's it for me to tell you a bit about all my arguments against our cats going outside without supervision. Very important. If you have an argument against what I've said or whatever, if you want, leave it in the comments and we can have a little debate. Now, let's get to a very important part. If you want your cat to go outside, but have it supervised and you have the possibility to do so, you can build a ctio for it. Okay, what's good? A small cage that attaches, for example, to a window or has access from a door of the house so that the cat is in contact with the outside world. There may be bugs. It can entertain itself. And of course, if you live in a house that has a garden, you can let it out into the Garden. Hey, there are some cats that do great with supervision. For example, Milou, the cat that lives with my parents. If you're out in the garden, he doesn't move. You have to always keep an eye on him. But even so, you can also do other things like protecting the cat with nets or fences so he can't climb. In fact, there are some systems that have recently become very fashionable with rollers, so that if the cat jumps, the roller moves and he falls back inside. On the other hand, if you don't have the possibility of a cat litter box, because, well, not all of us can, neither can we. You can use the windows of your house for him, like we have for the cat litter box, with a little bit of a relaxation area so he can see the street, see the birds and entertain himself. They really like that. Or you can put a bird feeder in your window so that your cat can see them through the glass and also be entertained and other options. There are some cats, although not all that tolerate wearing a harness well. So although it is something that we have to train our cat to wear and know how to wear, you can start using it inside your house to see how the cat responds to having those straps on its body. Then, little by little, in addition to the harness, you can put the leash on it inside the house and then take it to a more or less protected environment or different from your house, such as the landing of your building, and then little by little, perhaps to a field that is not very crowded, or a park that is not very crowded, always carrying it in the carrier, taking it out for a little while with the harness, and then putting it back in the carrier if your cat, and then, as I said, tolerates it. In fact, I can tell you that there are some that do go around calmly. There are even people who take it with them on the road. If your cat doesn't tolerate the harness well, you can also look for other alternatives. It's true that cats don't like it very much when we make them. Well, you probably know this, but if your cat gets along well with the car, you can even take one of these large folding cages. You can go on a picnic one day and take the cat inside the cage so. So that it is in contact with nature and with you nearby, but that it is controlled and protected, of course, in an environment where you know that it will not have contact or confrontation with dogs and other predators, because the fact that your cat is in a cage, if a dog comes to sniff it, can cause it a lot of stress. In short, there are many alternatives and possibilities that you can carry out at home so that your cat does not get bored, so that it can fully develop its feline activities. What often happens is that people have an idealized image in their heads of what life is like for cats outside, what our cat would be like in its natural state, its wild state, which is little more than a panther living inside our house. You have to think that your cat is a domestic animal. It is vulnerable and needs you to make it safe. We humans live in an environment that is designed for people and not for cats, where there are many dangers that can put their lives at risk. In any case, as I said during the video, if you have another way of thinking, leave me a comment. And if you agree with me too, you can also give me a like so that YouTube knows that you liked this video. And if you want, you can subscribe to the channel, if you haven't already, and give us a super thanks to support this channel a lot. Also, remember that we have a secondary channel here on YouTube called Questions and Answers from a Veterinarian. And before we go, we have Rodolfito and Mario here, who live with their human companion, Maribel Lopez in Dos Hermanes, Seville. By the way, I have to tell you something. If we hadn't decided on the name Alcachofo, the one Jose was considering would have been Adolfoido. This adorable little girl here is called Kitty, and she lives with her human companions Javier and Diana in Barcelona. And to say goodbye, we have a large feline family, Gontes, the oldest, Freya and Oreo. They greet us with their human companion, Jose from Vallejos. Thank you very much for following the Happy Pets and Families channel and Happy Artichokes too. And I'll see you in the next video. Foreign hey, Today we're going to talk about a topic that has generated a lot of debate since the beginning of the channel. Okay, Today we're going to talk about something that has generated a lot of debate since the beginning of the channel. I can't remember what to do. Today we're going to talk about something that has generated a lot. Damn. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. Today we're going to talk about something that has generated a lot. Oh, no, I'm laughing now. Today we're going to talk about a topic that. What do you say to the whole thing? What do you have to contribute to this debate or have it right? Like we can't. Well, hey, that also implies. Oh, if you don't do it for me, do it for this Kitty pee. Who's eating the mouth?

And it always seems like it's not the mouth. Huh? That it's the beard. Look. Kitty kiss. Oh, look. His name is Ratolfito. Oh. I want you to say here about two sisters. Look how strong, huh? Where there's a lot of risk, dangers. So you're going to have to put this in another part of the video because it doesn't belong here. Okay? Okay. Okay. That's why I don't know how to close it. Start over.