Once upon a time I had a house with lots of scratching surfaces that the cats liked, and furniture upholstered in things they don’t find so appealing. Then we had a flood which managed to destroy all the scratching posts and upholstered furniture. And the cats were unsettled by the abrupt uprooting to a new home. All of which meant that the replacement furniture got shredded pretty quickly.
So, our future includes a project to replace or recover some upholstered furniture. But before doing that, I want to provide some good scratching surfaces that the cats will prefer, to shift their habits away from the furniture before there is nice new furniture to destroy.
Since we are doing lots of shopping online, there is a steady supply of cardboard in the house. So I sat down with a straight edge, x-acto knife, and cutting mat and turned a box into two-inch strips. Rolled them, securing the roll with glue (basic white glue, with dots of hot glue to hold things in place while the white glue dried). And tucked the final thing inside a round cat toy.
I think it looks pretty nice; we will see whether it attracts anyone’s claws!
