Grass for Cats

With 11 cats, I dedicate a good bit of time to finding ways to enrich their lives, keep their attention, get them thinking/solving puzzles, and so on. The truth is, if they're busy and happy, they are less likely to fight with each other or destroy things. Plus I just  genuinely like making them happy.

A lot of houseplants are deadly to cats. Houseplants Poisonous to Cats They are so curious about them though. Behaviorists say for every "no" to your cat, you should also provide at least one yes. Catnip is easy to grow and can be an option - but some cats don't like it or have a negative reaction. I'll do a post on Catnip later, but today I wanted to talk about grasses.

Most cats seem to really like grasses and they can help with minor digestive problems as well. Cat safe grass is easy and pretty cheap to grow as well.

The two cats in the picture are Faith (a senior tuxedo) and Maya (a 7 year old calico). The planter I used was purchased on Amazon. When I stopped being able to find refills for it, I looked and saw the same variety of seeds were available in mixes - and I bought a bag of seed starter pellets as well. It was cheaper and I get the same stuff as before! There are several different types and sizes of starter kits available as well.

I like this mix (Oat, Barley, Wheat, and Rye) because different cats seem to prefer different grasses. Usually I keep it away from the cats until it is about 3 inches tall. Let them chew on it until it's short (with my crew that can be an hour or two), then take it away again and let it grow back out. It only takes about a week to be ready from seed and I usually get three or four sessions in before the grass is just not wanting to grow back anymore. You may be able to stretch it out even longer.

The biggest keys to success are not over watering it because that can grow mold, and letting it grow fairly thick so they don't just pull out the baby plants.

If you try this or already grow cat grass, let me know what your cats think and share any tips.