# Making cats sleep through the night **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 10, 2004, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073 "2004-12-10T04:35:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/1 "2004-12-10T04:35:02Z")
I have 2 cats that wake up sometime in the 2 hours before sunrise, disrupting my sleep pattern. They start meowing outside my door and won’t stop until I get up and add food to their bowl. How can I get this to stop? Ignoring them doesn’t seem to work, they just get more boisterous. I don’t think they’re hungry. I feed them liberally before bedtime and sometimes there’s even food in the bowl when they wake me up at night. I find it strange that they would wake me to let me know the “food is low.” This is costing me a lot of sleep… please help. Can’t get rid of them, they are my wife’s and I do love the little bastards otherwise. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/2 "2004-12-10T04:41:00Z")
Boy am I going to be watching this thread closely. I know it won’t encourage you, but my remedy is to cave in completely to my cat’s every demand; because he is relentless, and ignoring him only incites him. ---
**Author:** ![LifeOnWry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/96bed5/32.png) [@LifeOnWry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LifeOnWry)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/3 "2004-12-10T04:42:12Z")
I was going to suggest buying one of the dispenser type bowls that automatically refills, but then I remembered that while we have one, it doesn’t stop the cats from trying valiantly to convert us to morning people. It might work for YOU, though. The one we have has sort of a “tower” that screws into the dispenser bowl, and we can fit about 7 pounds of dry cat food in the “tower” part. We got it at Petco, I think. ---
**Author:** ![Duckster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/duckster/32/1244_2.png) [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/4 "2004-12-10T04:49:41Z")
Cats are nocturnal critters. You ain’t gonna win. 😃 That said, we have three of them and do our best to play with them _hard_ in the early evening. We figure if we can start to tire them out in the early evening, but keep them awake, when comes time for bed we fill the food buckets and water trough. They feed their pretty little faces as we go to bed, they play a bit more and finally call it a night. While they often get up later in the night, they don’t bother us. Much. Except when one or more of then climb onto us and _s c r e a m_ for attention. At 4:00 am. Hey, look at it this way. They don’t take money out of my wallet, I never have to hand over the car keys and the phone is always available. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/5 "2004-12-10T04:50:17Z")
Do they each have a proper [little kitty bed with blanket and teddybear](http://catkiss.tripod.com/cat_contest/sleepingcat.html)? If yes, and they’re _still_ bugging you, you need to stop giving them an incentive to wake you (food), and give them a gentle reminder that you are not to be messed wih in the pre-dawn hours. I’ve used a squirt gun for that purpose, and it doesn’t take many shots before they get the point. ---
**Author:** ![sleestak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/919ad9/32.png) [@sleestak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sleestak)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 8:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/6 "2004-12-10T08:55:32Z")
When I saw the thread title my first response was: “BWAHAHAHAHHA…HAHAHAHAHHA! Make a _CAT_ do SOMETHING!!! BWAHAHAHA” about five minutes later I stopped laughing. But seriously, tiring them out before bed and keeping them up during the day time might help. Slee ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 8:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/7 "2004-12-10T08:59:53Z")
I just started closing off my bedroom from my cat when I went to sleep. She gets to stay in the kitchen, which has everything she needs. She complained for a month and then she adapted. I sleep fine now. Only took me 12 years of cat ownership to figure this out. ---
**Author:** ![blowero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/41988e/32.png) [@blowero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blowero)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/8 "2004-12-10T09:48:41Z")
You probably don’t want to hear this, but once you put food in their bowl in reaction to their meowing, it’s going to be extremely difficult to reverse that behavior, because you have reinforced it. Even if you stop doing it now, it will take a long time for them to lose the mental connection that “meowing 2 hours before sunrise equals food”. I remember from psych class that experiments have been done where animals received food from pushing on a lever. After the animal learned the behavior, the people running the experiment would make the food appear very sporadically, maybe only every 10th or 100th time (or whatever) the animal pushed the lever. But once the animals learned the behavior, they wouldn’t quit. They would sit there an push that lever 100s of times until they finally got a treat. ---
**Author:** ![blowero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/41988e/32.png) [@blowero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blowero)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/9 "2004-12-10T09:50:21Z")
Oh, and I see from BobT’s post that one month is the approximate time it takes to unlearn a behavior. ---
**Author:** ![LorieSmurf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a587f6/32.png) [@LorieSmurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LorieSmurf)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 9:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/10 "2004-12-10T09:53:03Z")
My cats would do this, until one day i bought a squirt gun, filled it with water, and kept it at my bedside. When they would meow and scratch, I would open the bedroom door a bit, squirt 'em good until they ran, and closed the door. At first it took them about three squirts (as in, they would run away, then come back in a few minutes, get squirted, run away, come back and get squirted…). Then it would taper off to one squirt occasionally. Now they don’t do it at all. They hate to be squirted in the face with water. ---
**Author:** ![tremorviolet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e47774/32.png) [@tremorviolet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tremorviolet)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/11 "2004-12-10T17:09:57Z")
> [@Loopydude](#): > > Boy am I going to be watching this thread closely. > > I know it won’t encourage you, but my remedy is to cave in completely to my cat’s every demand; because he is relentless, and ignoring him only incites him. Hey! That’s _my_ technique! 🙂 Yeah, I don’t have any answers either. My inability to tolerate incessant cat whining is the reason my big guy is aroudn 20 pounds… ---
**Author:** ![plnnr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@plnnr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/plnnr)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/12 "2004-12-10T17:15:02Z")
Cats tend to be soft and furry, which makes kicking them out the door and into the great wide open where they belong easy on the foot. ---
**Author:** ![MikeS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MikeS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MikeS)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/13 "2004-12-10T18:14:38Z")
I seem to recall this problem coming up on this board in the past, and one of the more intriguing solutions I remember was the following: place your vacuum cleaner outside the bedroom door. Turn it on, but leave it unplugged. Run the cord under the (closed) door and into your room. When the cats start meowing outside your door in the morning, plug in the vacuum cleaner. Repeat as necessary. Ah, [here we go.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=135460) This technique was pioneered by the inimitable **Una Persson**. ---
**Author:** ![Scruloose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e68b1a/32.png) [@Scruloose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scruloose)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/14 "2004-12-10T18:19:44Z")
[Tough love.](http://www.colortoy.com/Front/Productos/Fotos/H99610.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![TellMeI\_mNotCrazy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tellmei_mnotcrazy/32/3419_2.png) [@TellMeI\_mNotCrazy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TellMeI_mNotCrazy)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/15 "2004-12-10T18:24:01Z")
> [@Squink](#): > > Do they each have a proper [little kitty bed with blanket and teddybear](http://catkiss.tripod.com/cat_contest/sleepingcat.html)? Whoa, I think I broke my cuteness bone on that one. ---
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/16 "2004-12-10T18:32:56Z")
I’ve learned to feed the cat in my sleep. I get up and stumble around a bit. The cat avoids getting stepped on. I give the cat her food, and stumble back to bed. Sometimes I remember doing this, somethims I don’t, but she always has fresh food when I get up. ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/17 "2004-12-10T19:01:34Z")
I wouldn’t say that my one month guideline on having a cat “unlearn” a behavior is representative of all cats. I think we need a control group… ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/18 "2004-12-10T19:08:25Z")
::scribbles down: “squirtgun…vacuum”:: ---
**Author:** ![blowero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/41988e/32.png) [@blowero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blowero)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2004, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/19 "2004-12-10T21:09:32Z")
Have you tried using evil robots? [http://www.hosstyle.com/kittens.htm](http://www.hosstyle.com/kittens.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Bob55](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e9c0ed/32.png) [@Bob55](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bob55)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2004, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073/20 "2004-12-11T03:26:29Z")
I think this came up on SDMB before and my favorite was someone who said “put the great eater of kitties (vaccuum) in the on position but unplugged inside your door, when they start meowing or scraping on the door plug the vaccuum in.” My cats like to play at night, and only after a few months of what I call the “Pillow Monster” - me running down the hall after them with my pillow - has the playing subsided. That or I just sleep through it now (the latter is more likely). [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-cats-sleep-through-the-night/279073.md?page=2)