Building a home for your Cat is not easy. But building a whole balcony for your more-than-50 Cats? Maribelle Navarro-Laude knows how to do it.
THE HOUSEMATES
Maribelle had always been fond of felines, but she became a Cat mother only when she and her husband, a Dog lover, moved from Cebu to Cainta.
She started rescuing Cats after the move and opened their doors to them. The Cats stayed on the second floor of their house.
As time passed, she ended up having 50 Cats in her home. The couple decided to sacrifice their big bedroom to make more space for them.
Aside from Cats, they also have 20 Dogs delegated to the first floor.
CAT SANCTUARY
Maribelle then found herself in a conundrum: While the Cats and Dogs lived in harmony, the house had a clear divide. She didn’t let her Cats go down to the first floor, because she was afraid that her Dogs might attack them.
She enlisted the help of her husband’s cousin who dabbled in construction. With the help of YouTube tutorials, a Cat patio was made.
“We were lucky that we already have a balcony, which we decided to cover up and wrap in grids or steel matting. Those YouTube have more details because it looked like they were building from scratch while we were just enclosing our balcony,” Maribelle noted.
Her husband suggested adding movable ledges for the Cats to jump or lounge on. The ledges could be adjusted, depending on how their Cats liked to use them.
They also extended the balcony roof so that the felines wouldn’t get wet whenever it rained.
And what was the Cats’ reaction to the patio? “They loved it!” Maribelle said. “They like to climb and stay on top, so that’s what they did right away!”
The balcony roof was extended to shelter the Cats from rain.
The second-floor balcony was converted into a Cat patio where the felines can chill. They have an unobstructed view of the garden and of the Dogs down below.
The Cats form some sort of hierarchy: Some prefer higher spots, while others like to stay nearer the ground.
Maribelle is bringing all of her Cats back to Cebu. At her new residence there, she hopes to apply the lessons she learned while building the first balcony.
COMING BACK HOME
The first Cat patio was built in 2018.
Now that Maribelle is moving back to Cebu, she’s bringing all of their 50 Cats and 20 Dogs and the lessons she learned when they built the Cat patio.
The first thing she had in mind for a new patio was to build safe spaces for the Cats. She noticed that they formed some hierarchy. “So, there are [C]ats on top, some are at the bottom[…] we’re going to give them safe spaces in Cebu.”
In addition to the bigger room, the new patio would have a dedicated “isolation area” for sick Cats to avoid spreading disease.
Maribelle hopes that her Cats will also enjoy their new space as much as their old one.
