The Litter Box

JoshDM

04:20

Going AFK for a while, so bounties ahoy!

user15026

07:39

Short of blocking up the window, I have tried everything in the answers to the "how to keep my cat from being bothered by outside stuff" question and my cat is still getting bothered by something that I can't see, but that is upsetting him enough that he is keeping me up with the noise and general freak out. Yah.

Esa Paulasto

Ouch, too bad :(

I was pretty sure it was about making eye-contact with the outsider, which means your cat feels exposed, i.e. its cover blown.

Had hoped the ability to stay stealthed up on a perch would help.

Do you have a digital camera with video recording ability? Webcam, or anything to allow you to record a video during the night to see where your cat is sitting at the moment it freaks out.

I mean, would be neat to watch the video and see if your cat is on the windowsill (too close to the outsider) or is he on the high-up vantage point and still gets annoyed by the outsider.

user15026

Yeah, the perch worked fine I thought but tonight he was sitting there and still freaked out. I don't have anything I can record with, though.

user15026

I just don't know what it is or why and I wish I could fix it because even though it is rare it still makes things like sleeping pretty difficult. V

Esa Paulasto

Do you use a night-light in that room?

Visibility through the window depends on the lighting difference between the outside and inside.

The idea was to let your cat observe the intruder, whatever it is, while the cat himself can stay invisible to the outside.

user15026

07:55

I don't, it is dark with all the lights off, but there is a light outside shining in

Esa Paulasto

Does it shine unobscured on the high-up perch too?

The outside lamp post is just perfect, as long as it only illuminates the yard outside, but it ruins the magic if it also lights up your cat :(

user15026

Yeah, because this is a basement window, it hits pretty much everything and I don't know how to avoid that

Esa Paulasto

:(

user15026

It is a pretty unpleasant situation all around.

user15026

I appreciate the help, though.

Esa Paulasto

08:14

@AshleyNunn Perhaps a horizontal curtain, halfway down?

A roll-down curtain, I think it is called? google.fi/#q=roll-down+curtain

oh, Google address came out localized, www.google.fi :D

the link should work in the US just fine though, I hope :)

@AshleyNunn My interest here is, so to say, academical :) as I have no personal experience in a problem like this. Thank you for the info, that you have tried the suggestions and how it has worked so far.

Ceiling Cat

12:41

0

Q: Leopard geckos and their nutrients

Myself and my partner have had many reptiles over the years (Bearded dragons, snakes of various sizes etc) but our latest additions have been 2 leopard gecko's - we're not sure exactly what breed, but we think the younger female is a hypo, if that means anything to anyone? The live in the same v...

John Cavan

15:23

Need to think of a better way to ask this question... The concept is sound, the execution is, well, meh...

-1

Q: How to handle if a dog attacks you?

In case a dog is running towards me and I notice the tail is up and ears back, I would stay at my positions and make my self bigger. Screaming "NOO" might help. In case a dog is biting me, I would pull his ears as much as possible or maybe punching the dog with keys or a pen. Not sure if this ...

dogs

Ceiling Cat

15:49

0

Q: What vegan mammals are commonly kept as pets?

We know from Can I feed my cat a vegetarian or vegan diet? that trying to force a vegan diet on some types of pets might not be healthy. If someone is looking for pet, with a preference for a mammal that can be housebroken, with a naturally vegan diet, what common animals would they want to co...

diet vegan

Matt S.

16:02

I think the problem with that question is it's not quite a question yet. It's more of a discussion, where there's not an option for a 'correct' answer.

John Cavan

@MattS. - Yep... so it's not worded well for this type of site.

Matt S.

Do you think that vegan animal question is too broad? I don't see anything wrong with it really...

John Cavan

16:19

@MattS. - I don't, I think it's answerable. However, it thus excludes lizards and several varieties are not meat eaters.

Having said that, it's kind of a "list" question and those are often ill-suited to the site.

Matt S.

Fair enough

I just noticed there was a close vote already, and it seems like it should be put on hold before closing it.

John Cavan

hold is closing... :)

Matt S.

ah

John Cavan

I haven't voted because it's an immediate close if I do and I'm not convinced that it's too broad. However, I think the wording needs work.

Ceiling Cat

16:44

0

Q: How often should I perform water changes in my Red-Devil Crab terrarium?

I have a terrarium of Red-Devil Crabs. The terrarium is about 70% land, 30% water. I have pea gravel underneath the exo-terra bedding, so that it isn't touching the water. I want to keep the water fresh for them, but if there's nothing in the water to cause it to go "bad" how often should I ch...

care terrariums water-changes invertebrates exotic-pets

Matt S.

There we go, let's get some interesting questions in ther.

Mammals are boring. :P

user15026

16:54

I do think the vegan pet question needs work. As it stands, it can easily develop into just a list of animals, or a discussion over various animals diets, and I think it needs a bit of work to make it less broad and list-like. I think it is a decent question somewhere in there, we just gotta draw it out some.

user15026

If no one else gets to it, I might poke at it some when I am not on my phone.

Chad

19:54

@AshleyNunn It really is not a list since the result set is limited to mammals you have lagomorphs(rabbits) and rodents.

It could get listy if we allowed exotics but since the question was commonly I think exotics are ruled out

user15026

21:14

@Chad True enough, I suppose. :)

Baarn

21:37

So if I say dogs, that will sure as hell develop into a discussion…

The qualifiers are "commonly kept" and "healthy", the last one is highly subjective.

"healthy" it is redefined to "natural" in the question body, I'm not sure if that is good though.

user15026

Yeah, that is one of my concerns, that people will say "well I keep my cat on a vegan diet and he is fine, therefore...."

Chad

@Baarn Id say lets see if it becomes a problem before we try to deal with it for that reason

user15026

I still feel like it is rather list like, even with the mammal limitation.

Baarn

@Chad I prefer to deal with problems before they exist. Taking care of things is a lot easier than cleaning up the dirt afterwards.

Chad

@Baarn I agreed with that at the start of the workplace. The truth was with a few limited exceptions that actually came out of perfertly fine questions, the community handles bad things pretty well.

I do wish they would implement a way that mods could act as community members with reguards to close votes though. So that your vote did not have to be binding

Ceiling Cat

21:48

1

Q: 5-month puppy first day at home: guarding couch, growling, biting

Apologies for the long post in advance! After our beloved Dobermann passed away some time ago, we decided to get a new dog. We picked a cute 5-month mixed race puppy from a local shelter. In the shelter she looked lovely: active, curious, loving of human interaction, very good relationship with ...

puppies growling

user15026

@Baarn We do need to remember to not let that sort of thing force us into unnecessarily limiting what sort of questions we can and will accept

user15026

Fixing things just because they might be a problem someday can also mean that we end up with a very large list of dos and don'ts that might deter new users.

Baarn

@AshleyNunn of course not, I still see too many unspecified qualifiers here. "can be housebroken", "vegan", "healthy", "natural", "common"

user15026

@Baarn some of those make sense - vegan is a clearly defined diet, housebreaking is a clearly defined term, etc. natural might be a little tricky, but if we limit it to, say foods that are naturally produced and not, say, vegan pet foods that are manmade (if such things exist). Common might vary a little depending on areas and laws, but generally, there is a subset of animals that most people recognize as "animals that are usually pets", and I think that is what is being referred to.

Chad

@AshleyNunn Natural in this case I take to mean that in normal conditions they would eat a diet consisting completely of plants

user15026

21:53

I mean I am more concerned about teh fact it is asking for a list of pets based on a specific criteria, as I am not entirely sure it is bounded enough. But I am willing to let it go and see how it rolls out - if we find we are getting a lot of these types of questions, and they become unwieldy monsters, then I think we can deal with it then.

user15026

We are a relatively new site, and I would hate for us to make rules that eventually killed us off because we were too much rules-lawyers and not enough content.

3

user15026

@Chad Yeah, that was my interpretation as well.

Baarn

If I had seen it as too problematic, I would've closed it. Currently I think it is borderline and maybe needs an edit for clarification.

user15026

@Baarn Yeah, I suspect it could use with some editing for clarity of language and intent, but I don't think it needs to be closed at this point - it does have merit, it is just a little buried.

Baarn

@AshleyNunn I never intended to close it, just to deal with it somehow.

Even talking about it, is dealing with it ;)

user15026

21:55

Definitely. :)

user15026

I wonder if there is a way we could clear up those qualifiers a bit to make them clearer to understand, and make the qualifiers in the title match the ones the question uses (I don't know which ones to change or keep, but I think they should match up better than they do currently)

user15026

stares at the question, hoping lightning will strike and she can find the perfect wording

Chad

Have you tried a Cathaurus? They are like a Thesaurus only filled with epiphanies and breakthroughs. Sadly they are very rare items that are only awarded at the end of a long and dangerous quest... and your like seriously I risked my life for you old man and you give me a stupid book...

user15026

@Chad hahahaha sounds like what I need, but I am not sure if I have time for a long and dangerous quest at the moment....

Baarn

Simple title "What are commonly held, herbivorous pets?"

user15026

22:08

@Baarn The comma isn't need, but it works well, I think.

user15026

Not sure if we want to include the vegan bit for Googling purposes or not, but that can always be in the question body someplace

Baarn

commas in English grammar always confuse me

user15026

@Baarn No worries. The English major in me is just picky.

Baarn

@AshleyNunn No problems, I try to learn here

user15026

@Baarn Well, glad I can help! :)

Chad

22:10

@Baarn that opens up reptiles, birds and other things... that crosses the line to a list i think

user15026

@Chad oh, yeah, I forgot we had bounded it with mammals, so that should be in the title.

Baarn

@Chad right, I just forgot including mammals

is there an adjective? Mammalian? ;)

user15026

Also, the hat I put on makes me laugh - if I was wearing a hat with strings that close to my cat in real life he would have attacked them and likely pulled the hat off.

user15026

@Baarn That is the proper adjective.

user15026

So it could work

Baarn

22:12

really? I just thought if there was something similar in German and couldn't find one

user15026

@Baarn yep, refers to any animal of the mammal class. :)

Baarn

In German we only have a prefix for that, not an adjective

German nouns are funny

user15026

I don't know very much German

Chad

Dont mispell it because Mammarian means something completely different

Baarn

It's just that you can chain any amount of nouns to create a new noun.

user15026

22:16

@Chad this is very true :P

user15026

@Baarn oh my. That would make for some very long words, no?

Baarn

yeah, infinite ;)

Chad

So all of german is one big hashtag?

Baarn

haha, exactly!

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