How can I keep cats from defecating in my garden?

Your cats poop in your garden, my dog pees in her bed. The trial and tribulations of animal ownership. Can you fence the garden? And isn’t the defecating a natural fertilizer? Would seem like a suprise bonus lol.

Go to the local zoo/safari park, buy some lion/tiger poo, I also hear some places may give it away for free if you pick it up yourself. mix with some compost and spread it around as fertilizer. The cats will not come near you garden and you will have some lovely fertilizer for your plants. Gross I know but it apparently works. I used to work at a safari park painting kids faces and people used to come to have the big cats poo all the time in an effort to rid their neighburs cats from their garden.

Oh and please don’t get a cat scarer, they do my head in walking past peoples houses and hearing high pitched squealing. Just because you cant hear it doesn’t mean other people/animals cant! I really think those things should be banned. My mates neighbour had one for a while and she couldn’t sleep with her window open. I stayed over one night and I cant believe its legal to produce such a loud continual noise like that.

@bongo What do they sense the presence of a greater stag lol!

@Ponderer983 Actually no. Cat and dog poop are harmful to gardens. BUT, there is a way to process it. Only I haven’t studied it yet, and have plenty farming work to do already.
...grrrrr….

@bongo So… that seems like a very interesting solution… Hmmmm..
Problem is, there are no zoos nearby here were I live.
Hey, but, wouldn’t Feline droppings be all harmful, as a criteria?
They eat meat… and artificial foods.

@Ponderer983 Yeah, I’d assume the exact reason for which it would work!
but that’s my say.. let’s wait for the expert’s say

Here is an article about a london zoo selling tiger manure, but I know for certain that they also sold it at West Midlands safari park, UK. I think it works on that principal of scaring them away because of the presence of something much larger.
According to my aunt, citronella also works in deterring them and I just had a search online and found These which to me look like worth a try although I have never used either method myself being as I don’t have a garden!

There are various products around to deter cats from using certain areas as a litterbox. All in all though, if you really don’t want to deal with it, keep your cats indoors.

Cats are cats, they love to go in areas of soft soil, sand, etc. and the better the dig site, the better they like it.

My cat (s) one’s gone now have 5 acres to crap on, the world is literally their litter box, but, they prefer to go in my corral where I lay down a truckload of sand once or twice a year.

I just periodically rake out the poo.

Trying to get a cat to not behave like a cat is an exercise in futility.

@bongo The customer reviews on those deterrent sticks are hilarious! Was greeted with a cat poo actually draped over one of the sticks today. Completely ineffective waste of time and money.

I’ve sat in ambush with a super-soaker but that isn’t a great use of my time. I’d be inclined to try one of these motion activated water sprayers. I wonder how effective that would be for deer?

Go to Costco or smart and final and get a big industrial; sized bottle of cayenne pepper and spread it over your yard. When their nose and butt burn they will find another place to go.
@Blueroses, I have one of those for my garden, but I think the birds like it. I went through 4 batteries this summer.

Bury easily poppable balloons just under the surface throughout, the shock of htem popping should scare the cats.

In reality though, I would expect this to be a lost cause. You could put some different kind of topsoil that is less appealing to them as litter.

Pepper will work for about a week. There is stuff at the garden store specifically for this purpose, that works better but costs more.

Cats like to dig when they poop, so they can bury it. Have you considered anything that prevents them from digging, like laying chicken wire (cut to shape) over the dirt? Perhaps the plants can even come up right through the wire.

Here’s a tutorial.