Nightshade, the door opener!

Nightshade , my only all black kitty, has a way of attempting to open doors after they have been shut. I have only heard of cats doing this , but he actually jumps at the door knob and attempts to open the door. If I were to put a lever on the door he would have it opened in no time. On Animal Planet last night, they showed a tuxedo cat doing this. It reminded me of Nightshade's attempts at the same thing. I found out about this after he was accidently locked in the service porch room, and I kept hearing a "thund" sound coming from within there. And then I saw his sillouette, landing behind the door on the floor. He was actually jumping up and attempting to open the door by turning the doorknob with his paws! I'd say he is a smart kitty.:)

.....wayne

I know how that is:rolleyes:

Cam can open doors, we have a screen door with a t handle and he jumps on it curls his paw and swings the door open, thankfully he hasn't figured out that once he swings enough he can get outside, so now we try and keep the main door closed so he won't do this.

He also opens our bathroom door. The one bathroom has a sliding door and a Cam likes to help me get ready in the morning but sometimes he thinks that I take to long a shower so he will get his paws under the door and push the door open enough to get out.

He also opens bedroom doors that are not latched quite properly. He will again get his paw under the door and pulls the door towards him.

He is really to smart for his own good sometimes:)

I have seen my cats try to open doors, but, usually, it is by brute force...slowly pushing a big square head through the crack..I am sure they "could" do it...but they don't "need" to since I have now been trained to leave ALL doors open at ALL times. (Not the outside doors..silly).

Tigris can open one of our doors. He has to turn the lever down (and it is a door where the lever stays down). So he turns and looks whether he can force it open by paw. If it does not work, he turns again, tries to force the door open.....until it works. I think this repeated thing is a very intelligent behavior.
I knew another one Minouche, daughter of Grisette who just jumped on the lever until the door was open.

Quote:

---

but they don't "need" to since I have now been trained to leave ALL doors open at ALL times. (Not the outside doors..silly).

---

ditto me...however both boys open cabinet doors though hardly subtley. They are on spring hinges and after a series of thump thump thumps I usually get them before they actually open them completely to get in! Goodness knows what happens when I'm not home:rolleyes:

kitten645, Cam also goes around trying to open cupboards, you can hear them thumping and than every once in awhile he will get in before you can stop him. He also likes to sneak in while we have them open, one time I was searching the whole house for him and I could hear him meowing I finally opened the pantry door and there he was sitting in a box:) Silly cat:rolleyes:

Quote:

---

Originally posted by Cataholic
I have seen my cats try to open doors, but, usually, it is by brute force...slowly pushing a big square head through the crack..I am sure they "could" do it...but they don't "need" to since I have now been trained to leave ALL doors open at ALL times. (Not the outside doors..silly).

---

Same here, but Ritz only wants to open doors that separate her from us....she often "body slams" the bathroom doors so she can get in....then immediately leaves again, as if to say, "Hmmph, you KNOW the rules..now leave that door open!!"

I know, Tuxluvr, this is Tex's routine in the am...first he cat dances on me, to get my attention. If I try to pet him...nope, he slinks away. Then, we 'race' each other to the bathroom...and of course I leave the door open. I turn on the sink, the first of probably 15 times in the am, and then he is happy-for 2 seconds. He immediately leaves. Like he is saying, "Oh, very good Johanna, you are such a smart person, you remember the drill"....:eek:

My cats have a kitty door in the window of the spare room that leads to a small 'balcony' (shelf). When I feed them, Ghost stays inside to eat his carefully rationed meal and the others eat on the balcony. I put the wooden door in the kitty door so he won't steal the others' food.

Guess who figured out how to slide the door up and out? Yup!

No wonder he's still chubby.

Mary

I can't believe I forgot to mention this earlier..but I had my dad cut a hole in my door leading to the basement so the herd would travel freely. I got sick and tired of propping the door open just enough to stay open, but not to much to get in the way of walking past it. It is just a corner of the door...but I did buy trim to paint and glue up there (maybe by next year I will get it done).

The only doors here that have the lever type handle are the screen doors, so whenever I want to leave the storm door open I need to lock the screen for fear that they will be outside. I also needed to put a latch on the cuipboard door that I keep my garbage can behind because they would lay on the floor and paw at the bottom of the door until it would open.

If I close my bedroom door at night, Pepper will knock on the door to let me know that he wants in or out. All 3 of them will also push on a closed door to try to open it up. They also open up cupboard doors to bat at them and play with them. :) If I have my sliding glass door open, Storm can open the screen door. He'll then go out on the balcony and Pepper and Sunny will follow him. This has become a real problem so I keep a spray bottle close by so that when I see him doing this I can spray him. Now if I show him the bottle he'll run. :)