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Protecting cat ears from fire alarm

Rgarner

Android Expert
May 9, 2017
2,231
390
This one's a doozy. Tomorrow we have to put up with a fire alarm which could be on from 8 am to 5 pm (please no). I got us some HDX adjustable earmuffs from The Home Depot for about 30 bucks total. They're supposed to cut off 23 decibels. Meanwhile, the cat has no earmuffs. He probably wouldn't wear that anyway. Taking him elsewhere is not an option. He busted out of his carrier last time and had to be chased down and grabbed, greatly enlarged tail and all. The carrier has not been replaced. How do we keep him from going deaf?
 
or this:
catmuffs.jpg


LOL!!!!!!!
 
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Poor kitty. I bet he will be freaked out. I like the idea of isolating the cat in a room furthest from the alarm. Try to insulate the room with towels or blankets to help lessen the noise. If your apartment has only one known sound source for the alarm, perhaps a few socks around it will help mute the noise. A day out with the cat would be best of all but it sounds like it might be too difficult to accomplish.
 
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Cats have extremely sensitive hearing.
Definitely.

Buy some welding gloves, and take kitty out to the car.
NO!!!! Do NOT do this. Even if the outside temperature is only in the 80s, a car gets TOO HOT to be safe for any living being. And, heaven forbid, the temps are in the 100s like they are here, a parked car is a death trap!

Stay with kitty as long as possible.
Yes, absolutely. :)
 
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This one's a doozy. Tomorrow we have to put up with a fire alarm which could be on from 8 am to 5 pm (please no). I got us some HDX adjustable earmuffs from The Home Depot for about 30 bucks total. They're supposed to cut off 23 decibels. Meanwhile, the cat has no earmuffs. He probably wouldn't wear that anyway. Taking him elsewhere is not an option. He busted out of his carrier last time and had to be chased down and grabbed, greatly enlarged tail and all. The carrier has not been replaced. How do we keep him from going deaf?
Why on earth will there be a NINE HOUR fire alarm?!! :eek:

I can barely stand the ONE MINUTE it takes when ADT comes out to test and/or work on my security system, and the alarm has to sound. NINE HOURS? Insane.

I agree with several of the suggestions you've gotten, and disagree STRONGLY with one. :mad:

At least try to put him in a room with a closed door, as far from the source of the noise as possible. Do you have any Ace bandages? You could try rigging some kind of helmet-looking thing, with a folded hand-towel covering his ears, wrapped with Ace bandages. But odds are he'd get out of it pretty quickly. Check in with him often, talk to him in a calming/soothing manner, pet him, try to reassure him. I wish you had an option for letting him stay elsewhere for the day.
 
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I'd grab a cheap, foam egg crate thing like for a mattress and make a little kitty fort and put it in the bathroom (or furthest from the source of the sound). Make the opening only large enough for the kitty and point it away from the sound (the foam will absorb the sound where the opening will let it through). Leave food, water, and litter in the room with the little sound proof room and check in throughout the day.
 
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Definitely.


NO!!!! Do NOT do this. Even if the outside temperature is only in the 80s, a car gets TOO HOT to be safe for any living being. And, heaven forbid, the temps are in the 100s like they are here, a parked car is a death trap!


Yes, absolutely. :)

Who's car doesn't have an air conditioner?

Surely the car could be parked in the shade, tajen to the park, whatever.

Benjamen, my cat, was quite tge escape artist, and did not like to be picked up or held.
He also was large, strong, and had a full set of razor sharp claws.
(He sent the neighbor's Chow to the vet for stiches, lmao.)
He was ferel when I got him, so he did what he wanted.
Kitty wanted out, you let him out.

Anyway, why not cover the stupid alarm with something to muffle it?
It will still be obvious whether or not it is working.

Either it works or it doesn't- there is no need to blast the damn thing for hours.

Even then, there will most likely be frequencies that hunans cannot hear that your cat can, and these could be excruciating at worst, and disturbing at best.

It is unlikely, but there could be lasting effects that we cannot predict.

How big is kitty?
Welding gloves go up to the elbows with thick rawhide leather, and were great for when the vet had to examine Benjamen.
Although he was usually gentile with us, he was a real handful if you had to make him do anything.

Luckily, he was great with verbal commands, would walk with us and come when his name was called.

A nice set of welding gloves can be had for less than $10 and are a great investment anyway.

Take kitty for a ride with someone else, and enjoy the day.
You will have no enjoyment at home, even if the alarm gets muffled anyway.

In my dad's house, the dolts that put the fire alarms in put them in the wrong places (one is right in the kitchen!) and they tend to go off for un-fire events.

Once, an alarm went off in the middle of the night when I was not home, and Benjamen went from room to room and woke everyone up one at a time.

Never figured out if he knew that the alarm meant something was wrong, or (more likely) that it was annoying him and he wanted someone to make it stop, lol.

Just one of the many stories that endeared that cat to all of us.
(He is my avatar, btw.)
 
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Who's car doesn't have an air conditioner?

I believe in most cars, the A/C is only on when the engine is running. Because the A/C compressor usually runs from a belt.

Surely the car could be parked in the shade, tajen to the park, whatever.

I guess as long as you're in the car with the animal, then you can be sure of its well-being. But I would certainly never leave a cat or a dog in a car unattended.
 
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@puppykickr I don't know of anyone whose AC can run for nine straight hours without issue. And parking in the shade does not help, nor does cracking the windows. EVERY year, there are numerous deaths across the US that I hear about, some are children, others are pets. Their brains literally boiled in their skulls.

And EVERY single time that happens, the news warns how dangerous a parked car is, even in relatively low temps (70s to 80s).
 
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@puppykickr I don't know of anyone whose AC can run for nine straight hours without issue. And parking in the shade does not help, nor does cracking the windows. EVERY year, there are numerous deaths across the US that I hear about, some are children, others are pets. Their brains literally boiled in their skulls.

And EVERY single time that happens, the news warns how dangerous a parked car is, even in relatively low temps (70s to 80s).

I used to take Benjamen with me in my car, and he had the run of the whole vehicle.

I would camp in my buddy's yard, and set up a tent.
Benjamen had the car to himself at night, food on the floorboard on one side in the rear and litterbox on the other side. This is how it was set up going down the road as well.
(I was afraid that Benjamen would tear a hole/holes in the tent if he wanted out. Plus, it was a very small tent, and would have no room for the food or litterbox inside.)

We did that during hot, humid summers without any issues.
In a loud, beat up 1970 Oldsmobile with no AC.
We are talking 90+°F with 70%+ humidity.
Often the heat index was 100°F+

Cats have a natural body temperature that is higher than a humans.
One of the main reasons that the rumor of 'cats don't like baths' is because we tend to adjust the temperature for us and not for them.
What feels hot to us is warm to them.
So if you make Kitty's bath water warm to your touch, it is downright cold to them.
No wonder they 'don't like it'!

Of course, he was extremely well behaved and not afraid of anything.

If he was in an area he didn't know well, he would stick with me or near/in the car.

I had a leash and a chain for him, a collar and a harness, but he hated all of that, and would fight you to put it on him- then pout afterwards.

I didn't want him to not want to go with me, so I didn't force these things onto him unless it was completely necessary.

I don't see how if you love your fuzzy buddy you couldn't spend the day with him doing whatever it takes.

I have a friend that was an over the road truck driver, and on some of his last few runs he took his cat with him.

He seemed to really like riding in the truck, even sleeping on the dashboard.

If I can find some pictures I will post them.
 
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The key is to get them used to it while young, and to continue to do it throughout their lives.

Then it is just another thing to do in their lives- instead of new, strange, and scary.

We tried to, when they were both young, same as the pups, though not at the same time. I knew that would be the next comment.
They just never took to riding in the car.
"Dash" got his name for gettin' lost...you guessed it, under the dash. I'd love to have been able to travel with Earl, my cat that my daughter gave me about 4 years ago.
IMG_20181110_142818.jpg
 
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We tried to, when they were both young, same as the pups, though not at the same time. I knew that would be the next comment.
They just never took to riding in the car.
"Dash" got his name for gettin' lost...you guessed it, under the dash. I'd love to have been able to travel with Earl, my cat that my daughter gave me about 4 years ago.
View attachment 158892

Benjamen found a path over the kick panel on the passenger side, over the inside of the fender, and would plop down onto the top of the front tire.

Whereever I would stop, I had to be vary of him doing this, abd he thought it was a game.

I became quite good at anticipating his next nove as he ran, and will never forget the look on his face the first time I caught him while in a full run.
Yes, he was definitely surprised, lol.

He really never ran from me again after that.

Eventually he grew to big (16 lbs.) to fit through the opening, so the problem fixed itself, lol.
 
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@puppykickr you were VERY lucky. Here's what the American Veterinary Medical Assn has to say:

"Every year, hundreds of pets die from heat exhaustion because they are left in parked vehicles. We've all heard the explanations: "Oh, it will just be a few minutes while I go into the store," or "But I cracked the windows..." These explanations don't amount to much if your pet becomes seriously ill or dies from being left in a vehicle..."

You can find lots more data by doing a quick search for 'hot car deaths' or similar.

Thankfully, here in science-believing California, we have a law that allows any person to break into a vehicle to rescue any living thing left alone in it, without facing legal repercussions. I've seen case after case on the news where a Good Samaritan did just that, called 911, paramedics and police worked on the child or pet, the adult came out of a [bar/store/supermarket/friend's house/hair salon/mall/etc.] and was promptly arrested for neglect and/or cruelty.
 
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I guess most of them don't live in greenhouses. Also, they would probably be able to move, seek shade, warmth, etc. Animals in a locked vehicle probably wouldn't have as many options. People being there to monitor and assist them would make a world of difference.

My bet would be that more than 90% of the animals that die locked inside closed cars are dogs.

This is very telling about the sort of people that have dogs.

They can't leave the thing at home because
A. it will destroy the house if left alone and/or
B. the owner is deranged and just HAS to take it everywhere.

Coupled with these is the fact that it happens so often, yet they never seem to learn.
 
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