Tips to keep kitty happy

If you don't want your cat slicing and dicing the wing chairs, consider offering an alternative - cat furniture, such as towers, trees, scratchers and tunnels.

Cats scratch to sharpen their claws, remove old nail sheaths, and mark territory with their scent. Well-placed cat furniture can divert those scratching and climbing tendencies away from your furnishings better than virtually anything else.

"Cats are individuals," says Mary Klinck, a veterinary resident in behavioral medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. "Provide lots of outlets for normal cat behaviors, such as scratching. Then let the cat tell you what items he prefers."

When buying cat furniture, "look at its construction," recommends Josh Feinkind, owner of the Refined Feline, which sells directly to the public from its Web site (www.therefinedfeline.com). His Lotus Cat Tower won a 2006 Editor's Choice award from Cat Fancy magazine.

"Are there sharp things jutting out? Does the carpet pull up easily? Is it sturdy? Does it have replaceable parts?" Big pieces can run $300 or more. For that price, it should be rock-solid and long-lasting.

Materials and shape are important, too.

"Sisal, jute, cardboard, wood, wood composite, and some fabrics and carpets tend to be attractive [for scratching]," Klinck says. "Vertical surfaces should extend high enough that they are taller than the cat when he is standing on his hind legs."

Klinck suggests putting cat furniture "where the cat spends the most time" - near where it likes to sleep, usually. "This means providing scratchers in several rooms, and on different floors of a house."

Though she admits the idea isn't the most aesthetically appealing, Klinck says cats tend to use scratchers in the middle of a room.

Once a cat becomes accustomed to using a scratcher in a prominent place, she says, "it might be possible to move it gradually to a more desirable location." From the human perspective, that is.

Put scratching posts directly in front of spots, such as the arm of a couch, that your cat likes to scratch. And position cat furniture so it's the first thing your cat reaches when it walks into a room.

If you put the scratching post in a far corner, Buster may stop at the furniture first and never bother to move on.

- Therese Ciesinski