Lucio lives in a small apartment in Brooklyn, NY and he needed to add a scratching surface for his cat, America. He looked around for existing objects that could serve double duty and made a cat scratching post out of a table leg. This is a brilliant way to create an easy scratching surface for your cats, especially if you live in a small space where you don’t have a lot of room.
“I just wrapped a 1/2″ thick sisal rope around one of the legs of my dining table, and America, my cat, loved it right away. I didn’t want to add another vertical structure to my small apartment (to look like a cat tree) so the table leg seemed like a ready-made cat tree.”
Notes from Jackson:
“Catification 101! Think first and foremost about what your cat needs in your home. Then, remember it doesn’t take shopping and spending sometimes, just imagination. Great work!”
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The Catification column on JacksonGalaxy.com is written by Cat Style Expert, Kate Benjamin. Kate specializes in environmental enhancement for living with cats and is the founder and editor of hauspanther.com, the premiere online magazine for design-conscious cat people. Kate’s design expertise and Jackson’s cat behavior know-how combine to create cat-friendly environments that are sure to please both human and feline family members alike.
We regret that Jackson does not answer questions posted in the comments. This is due to his demanding schedule and the high volume of requests he receives. But most importantly, since he has not met your cat, it would be contrary to his approach for him to give specific personalized advice for your specific situation. That being said, general questions and issues are addressed throughout this blog, in his book CAT DADDY and of course, the show My Cat From Hell.
THAT, sir, is simply brilliant, and quite attractive, to boot!
What a great idea for a cat scratching post!! Imagination is a wonderful tool!!!
very nice!!
Haha, funny. It’s such a good idea, and so easy. Yet we never thought about it!
I bought a $20 curved scratching pad for my kitties from PetSmart….my kitties won’t touch it. I put cat nip all over it to try to lure them to it, their fav treats….no dice. I also placed a long rectangular fav scratching pad next to the new curved scratching pad….again…no dice. How can I make my 3 kitties (ages 10, 9 & 5 yrs old) to scratch the new curved scratching pad?
A question to those who have made something like this.
I’ve got a metal table leg which I’d love to wrap and make a scratcher, but how do you make the rope stay where it should? How do you secure the beginning and end of the rope, and wrap it all around so that the rope actually stays in place when the scratcher is used?
Will google it, but I’d also appreciate any tips straight from the horses mouth, so to speak.
Great idea! Perhaps you could try wrapping a cast-off towel around the leg to protect them, then duct-taping furring strips* (no pun intended!) around the leg to make a thicker wooden leg. Wrap the rope around that. You could use Gorilla Glue or something like that to make the rope really adhere to the wood, and use a couple of heavy-duty staples to the ends of the rope to prevent unravelling over time. It’s possible you’d also need to secure the furring strips to the underside of the table and/or the floor with some kind of flange, to keep them in place.
* This is inexpensive 1″x2″ wood sold in varying lengths at most hardware stores. (You might even get them for free in the “sawed-off leftovers” bin. Can’t hurt to look there first.)
We cut a 36″ long piece of untreated pine 2″x12″ lumber and rounded the corners and edges on the top face so they are no longer sharp and pointy, then stapled a long piece of craft felt to the bottom face so it wouldn’t scratch the antique hardwood floor. Sprayed it with catnip oil, and left it out on the floor for our older (and more dignified) cat. He loved it! When the top face gets too scratched up, we just have to sand it down and it’s ready to go again!
We have lots of places for out two cats to scratch, but one insists on scratching the two sofas. Is there something I can put on the sofa (plastic, fabric, etc.) that will discourage her from scratching there? We want to buy new sofas, but don’t want the new ones ruined too. Thank you!