I need some help. My cat’s been stuck in a tree for at least three days now. She’s up too high to be rescued by a ladder, and when a guy from Bellsouth (friend of a friend’s dad) who had a bucket ladder (those things like firemen have on their firetrucks) tried to get her, she became scared and climbed higher.
She’s really thirsty, hasn’t had anything to eat or drink for days, and doesn’t have the sense to climb down.
Any suggestions?
That can be bad. How high up are we talking?
(For the record, she doesn’t “not” have enough sense to climb down. Their claws work a certain way where they can go up only, then jump down. Sounds like she’s too high up to jump though.)
Wow, I didn’t know that. Well it’s pretty far up. My dad says 30 feet or so. And yeah, she might be too far to jump, but she’s jumped before from trees, and been fine (other than being angry with us for a while… my dad had to spray her with the water hose to get her down…)
Maybe you can use the ladder and bring up some food. She might be able to get down a few branches if they aren’t too thin. Then you can grab her. (be sure it’s a thick smelling food, like chicken or something) It’ll probably be better if it’s you or someone close to her. If she hasn’t eaten for this long, it might not matter too much.
Hope this helps! 
Yeah, good idea… only problem is, there aren’t any branches on the tree until like 20 feet up… but I’ll try that, and see if our ladder’s long enough. On another note, my mom said that some tree surgeons (I think they cut down trees) have a cat-rescuing service that would be able to get her out, so maybe if the ladder doesn’t work, we can get one of those.
Thanks!
No prob. 
I hope one of those things work!
I’ll try tomorrow; as for now, I’m going to bed, have to wake up at 6:45 in the morning. Ack!
Bleh- me too! 
let us know when she’s safely down again.
You could try cutting the top of the tree where the cat is. They can usually survive great falls. If you are concerned about it being hurt just get a large blanket and stretch it out beneath. Beware of falling branches. You could also send a small child, or light person up the tree and have them shake the top of the tree. If you frighten it enough it may jump. Again employ a blanket. These should only be used if you are desperate to get it down.
I was thinking of the blanket too. Dunno about that little kid idea though, it’s pretty high up.
stick a dog higher up the tree, that usually works.
Cats are very agile. She will likely get down herself when she is hungry enough.
Failing that you could always go round to the fire department and see if they can think of some alternative means.
There is one possibility if it comes to drastic measures. Goto the vets and get a tranqulisier than can be added to some food. Lace the food and put it on one of the lowest branches - she should be able to climb down. If she’s hungry she will eat it, give it a few minutes for the tranq to set in then use the bucket ladder thing to retrieve a rather groggy, sleepy cat.
A long hose 
She’ll come down when she’s hungry and tired. She might fall for most of the trip down but she’ll come down. She must be crying a lot the poor thing.
Please tell us how it goes. What about the fire dept. They used to do stuff like that and their ladders are long enough.
These are all pretty good ideas. She’s still up there, doing fine, although she’s still pretty thirsty.
The biggest problem standing in our way is that the lowest branch is still like twenty feet up, too far for our ladder. And even with our longest hose, the water won’t reach the branch she’s on. She’s trying to find her way down, though. If she gets to the lowest branch again, we can likely get her down with the water hose. If all else fails, my mom’s going to call a tree surgeon company to get her down–some of them do cat rescues.
And Dark Matter, calling the fire department was one of my first ideas–but our FD doesn’t do animal rescue anymore 
.
Have you tried calling the Animal Control people?
Hmm…
I should try that. Thanks!
FD doesn’t do animal rescue anymore
Well that sucks. If it’s near by, you should go round and visit. They might not do rescues anymore, but if they aren’t too busy one of the (look for an animal lover) might talk with you for 5/10mins give you some suggestions.
Good idea, Dark Matter, but that might not be neccessary now.
She’s down to the second branch from the bottom. While that’s still pretty high, she’s making a lot of progress and is trying to find a way down. As I said before, she managed to get to the bottom branch a day or two ago, so I know she can do it.
She’s fallen from this height before and was okay, so if she can’t get down herself, we might try to get her to fall. She might get a little mad at us, but as long as she’s okay, I’m alright with that.
We had a bit of a storm yesterday, so there was plenty of water on the leaves for her to drink. She’s pretty refreshed, and is walking up and down the branch.
She gave us a scare last night. She was all the way out on the edge of a small branch. The problem was, the branch was really high up, and looked out over the driveway. We managed to guide her waway from the edge, though.
Thanks, guys. I’ll keep you updated as she makes progress.
here’s a thought. Do you have anything high and flat you could move out to the tree?
My cat jumps off the extention roof to the shed, it’s a good ten foot jump. (scares the hell outta me everytime) but if there’s something solid you could put there to make the distance for her a little shorter she is more likely to jump.