Have a cat that won't stay off your counters? I do. I finally got fed up with it enough to do something about it: scare the crap out of him with a motion-detecting blender (while recording the results for my own amusement, of course).

Confused at what you're looking at? This is a repeating shot of security camera footage of my cat jumping on the counter - in search of a plant to munch on - and initiating my Blender Defender. Take a look at the following comic (Courtesy of Sarah) to get a better understanding :)

Videos

Sorry, but you're going to have to pretend you can hear an extremely loud blender while you watch these clips

If you want to keep updated on when new videos of my cat are posted, make sure to subscribe to the RSS feed. All new videos that are added to this page will also put in the RSS feed.

Details

If you were to walk in my house, you may see something you dont normally see in a kitchen. On the wall, to the left of my sink is a webcam (network camera). It is plugged into the network jack and screwed into the wall plate cover, supporting itself. It doesnt get it the way, nor do we ever have to think about it. The camera is being monitored for motion by my computer upstairs in our office.

The camera itself is one of the cheapest network cameras out there, the DCS-900. It can be picked up for about $120 or so. There are a couple network cameras that are a little cheaper, but the D-Link one is pretty rugged and makes it easy to get into the raw feeds, something that cant be said for many other cameras.

As you can see from the videos above, the blender and the strobe light are both controlled by an X10 unit. The unit is sent an on or off command from the computer running upstairs by means of an X10 Firecracker. The Firecracker is just a wireless X10 transmitter that plugs into your serial port. I wont get into explaining it much here, but one thing to note is that is happily co-exists with my CM11A unit.

The computer upstairs is running the 'motion' library for linux. As soon as it detects something moving on camera, it starts recording frames. While it is saving frames, it also initiates another Perl script I wrote that sends an X10 command to turn on the blender and strobe, wait 3 seconds, then turn them off. After the script is done detecting motion, it then splices all the JPG frames together using ffmpeg and saves the resulting movie as a SWF file, which you can see above. Finally, after it saves the movie, I have it set up to email me a link to the movie so I can see the results from where ever I'm at (remotely by using my phone).

Is this cruel?

Of course not! To teach a cat not to do something, it has to get the idea that what it is doing is a bad thing. One way to do so is to sternly tell your cat 'NO' when it does something. The cat may learn that it is bad, but more often than not, the cat learns that it's not supposed to it when your around. This is not what you want. The best way to teach the cat not to get on a counter is to take yourself out of the picture. If the cat jumps up on the counter and is greeted with a scare, it will learn that the counter is not a very nice place to be. The cat is never harmed, but it's instincts tell is that this may be something to be feared. Just like a vaccuum. The cat doesn't like it at all, so it stays away.

Some will say that the cat is trying to eat the plant because he needs it for his digestion. In this case, it's just not true. Our cat doesn't simply eat our plants. He sees them as a toy. He plays with the stalks, digs them out, etc. We find leaves in the other rooms half the time. And, yes, he does get grass every once in a while.

Project Cost

The table below shows how much money would normally go into a project like this. This isn't to say that I've spent this much, as I already had everything lying around the place, but if somebody else were to start this project, this may be what they should expect to pay.

Item Notes Price
Strobe Light Bought from Spencer's 20.00
Blender Housewarming present, woot. 50.00
X10 Firecracker Check Ebay and Amazon if you're looking for one 12.00
X10 Appliance Module You wouldnt want a Lamp Module for this. 12.00
Network Camera D-Link DSC-900 120.00
$214.00

Comments

Old Man
Simply to bad you couldn't entice the cat to jump in the blender (minus the cutting blades) . Bet it'd never get near a counter top after the first experience....
YES I dislike cats immensely.
I haven't laughed this hard for months. The videos are hilarious.
Cypher
Also, I got my cats to stop jumping up onto my kitchen counters by laying out a couple strips of tape, sticky side up near the edge. They tried jumping up a couple of times but they don't really do it anymore. The sound they make in the middle of the night after trying it the couple times they did was hilarious!
I just want to let you know that I have not laughed at anything this hard in a damn long time! I have a cat that just straight messes with all my stuff. Claws my office chair, lies on my keyboard and various other computers and hardware and so on.
Also.... Even if you did go out and spend $214.00 on the equipment to do this, GREAT!!! I can think of other things I spend cash on and I don't laugh even nearly as hard as I have been for the last half an hour!
Plasma2002 keep up the awesome work! I love it!!!
Wouldn't it be cheaper/simpler/more humane to just move the plant,or get rid of it all together? Or give the cat away to a KIND home before it develops some sort of heart condition.
Marty how can you be upset about scaring a cat after you've turned yours into a euphonium. My can had to be euthanised not long ago and I think it's in very bad taste to recycle beloved pets as brass instruments(at least a violin would be traditional)
Why is scaring cats so funny? I have just had my cat euphonised at the vets. Obviously this video upset me deeply although the flashy lights were cool and you scaring the bejeezers out of your cat was so Gerbiling funny.
That's Great! This gave me some insight on how to protect my trucks parked in a fenced area. I'd like to electrify the fence given motion.
Can this be used to train kids? Someone could make a mint.
I think it's funny to see the cats fly off the counter. It doesn't hurt them...
someone
this is sooo funny i could use this on my cat!
good post - 'poor kitty' people remember: you prep food on your counters, and kitty walks in litterboxes!
Rachael
kudos to your creative and tinkering talents
and your system really wouldn't need the expensive camera anyway...
James Clayton
Awesome. How do you stop it going off every time you walk into your kitchen? Or do you just have to remember to turn it off?
This is one of the funniest things I have ever seen! We have a kitten who is on the counter/table CONSTANTLY! We have seriously tried everything, but he still goes up there. And the only reason he does it is to mooch for food (which he gets enough of at meal times). I just may have to try something like this... just to see what would happen... although, I have a pretty good idea, hahaha!
Nice
missatena72
Your right cats do not belong on the kitchen counter. For those without an already existing bunch of elaborate equipment this same thing minus the video can be created with a motion sensor from a motion activated light (you can get one at your local hardware) hook it up to an outlet and plug in the strobe and the blender. The cat is getting nothing more than a little startel less invasive then those dog shock colars. not cruel at all.
So what if your kitty climbs up on the sink...kitties love their water fresh from the tap. You're unnecessarily terrorizing your poor kitty. Can't you put your dang plant on top of the fridge or sumthin'?
People it is not cruel. Whoever said that cats will learn to not do it when you are around is true, this is the only way to teach them, and funny too. I wish I could find a way to keep my one cat from playfully chasing the other one around. I just squirt her with water.
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Oh, and hi Jean!