Many cat lovers like collecting multiple cats under the theory that cats can keep each other company when their owners are away. However, Dr. Sarah Ellis claims that multiple cat households have led to a “crisis situation” for the species causing unacceptable levels of territorial disputes and even resulting in psychological harm.
“As humans, the more we love something, the more we want it and the greater the number of it we want. We love cats therefore we’re not content with one – we want two or three or four and if our neighbour feels the same and his neighbour feels the same, we suddenly have a huge problem – three households with nine cats,” she said.
“Although we feel really happy because we’ve rescued them and given them a home, we’ve actually created a situation where they’re not happy at all.”
Dr. Ellis claims that cats need lots of room to roam so the more cats you cram into a typical house, the less room each cat will have, which can cause territorial problems. Her recommendation is that you keep your household cat population to a reasonable number, but if you like cats, that reasonable number might be 100 cats.
Still, you don’t want to hoard cats so no cats have enough room, and you don’t want to have just one or two cats if they’ll be bored. As long as you have enough room for all your cats, then the cats can be happy.
To learn more about whether you should limit the number of cats in your household, click here.
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