I've seen at least ten pictures of bullfrogs with fish in their mouths and even a video or two on other pond forums. My friend saw one grab and eat a duckling at a golf course. They are blamed for helping native Western Pond Turtles and native frogs to extinction here in the West including BC Canada so I have no problems believing that bullfrogs eat anything. I have had cats my entire life and have had aquariums my entire life and ponds in various forms since 1985 and have seen plenty of cats watch fish but not catch any. Every time their paw gets wet they draw it back and shake it off. I do know that cats would not climb or jump into a pond and get wet enough to disturb plants unless it was an accident and they fell in. I have seen my own cat fall in. once. No plants were harmed though. If plants are disturbed or pots tipped over morning after morning it is raccoons. I have had dogs in my pond that did a lot of damage, more than once. Loose neighborhood dogs. They were leaping and splashing and knocked over lily pots and their claws put holes in a lot of foliage. They weren't after fish or food they were playing in the water. One kept coming back, I'd chase him out and he would circle behind me and jump back in....This has happed three times in twelve years of ponds at this house. The raccoons come pretty much every night. We sit on our couch and watch animals at our front yard wildlife ponds all the time. Cats, raccoons, opossums, squirrels, birds, dragonflies, treefrogs and many insects too from bees to water fleas. It is raccoons who tear up everything and now we have to cover the ponds every night with covers made of copper and chicken wire. Now they are destroying the rock edges and we have to do extensive work when the tadpoles all morph. The cats never hurt anything. They chased the treefrogs but we never saw one eat one or found any corpses or body parts. They seem more confused by them than anything. Mostly they just drink from the ponds. Having a dog should be deterrent enough for cats in your yard, won't work on raccoons though. An electric fence was the only thing that worked for me on the fish pond which is too big too cover and has plants too tall. I tried two ultrasonic noise makers which did bother the cats but not the raccoons. Motion water cannons will deter cats but not all raccoons.

I love that email... i have it saved in my "saved" mail folder. that email came with pictures..soo funny!!! so true if you have a dog and cat!!!! the first time i read it i was laughing so hard...it is great!!!!!! love the video alphaba...my dog and cat would never tolerate that, either way. although i wish they would, but they do get along very nicely most of the time. the cat tortures the dog alot which is hysterical. he is long gone and she is still wondering what the H**L just happened! they make us laugh every day...what a joy they are. thanks again for the video!

I think I gave people the wrong impression when I said solitary and independent. My cat was not your typical cat. She wasn't the kind of cat that liked to be held (unless it was someone she knew VERY well, and even then she didn't always want to be held), cuddle with you or sit on your lap all day. That's not to say she never wanted to do it, but most of the time she preferred to just sit next to us and enjoy our company. She really did love all of us very much. She just showed it in different ways. Much of her time was spent outside. Looking back on it I'm actually REALLY happy she was an outdoor cat because it meant I didn't have to deal with a litter box most of the year (except in winter). She would come and go as she pleased. We would let her outside every day (weather permitting of course) and let her do her thing, and let her in for meals, if it started raining or if she was tired or something. She LOVED to hunt and spent a lot of time doing so. She would catch rodents and birds and would frequently bring us "presents" (sometimes she just ate them though). We NEVER had problems with mice while she was around, and a few years after she died we had mice in our kitchen over the winters. We truly took for granted the service she was doing us, and we didn't realize how much she was helping us until she was gone. I also planted some catnip for her in one of my gardens and she LOVED it. She would chew on it and rub up against it and it was HILARIOUS. I still have a few plants in my garden to remember her by. She would also wander the neighborhood sometimes, frequently visiting our neighbors. These visits got her pregnant at a very young age, and she ended up having four kittens. We actually wanted to get her fixed and prevent this from happening, but the vet insisted that we wait until after she had her first period. So it happened, and we tried to keep a close eye on her, but all it took was one night and she got pregnant. We don't know if she snuck into a neighbor's yard or if a neighbor's cat came into our yard, but either way it happened and that was that. My parents were a little annoyed when they first found out about it, but eventually we just accepted what's done is done. Even though my parents didn't really want her to have kittens, I think deep down all of us were happy they came. They weren't around for very long, but let me tell you those 6-8 weeks or so that we had them were some of the best days of my life. I loved them very much but unfortunately was not allowed to keep any of them. Thankfully though we were able to find loving homes for all 4 of them very quickly. I cried a little bit when they left, but I knew they were going to good homes, so it was a bittersweet goodbye. As she got older, she started to spend less and less time outside. In her older years she was a lot more cuddly, and I cherished every moment of those last few years. I guess my point of this story is that just like people, cats can have very different personalities, and those personalities can sometimes change as they age. My cat may not have been your typical lap cat, but she was affectionate towards me in other ways (headbutting me, rubbing up against me, and sleeping with me). I will admit that when I first got her, I wasn't expecting her to behave the way she did. The only cats I'd ever met were very cuddly indoor cats, but it just goes to show you how different they can be. I think that domesticating cats has caused them to be less independent than their wild ancestors, and that causes them to be more dependent on us. That's precisely the reason why we love them so much in the first place. But even with all the domesticating we've done some cats still have a few 'wild' genes left in them. Anyways, I think there are definitely advantages to indoor and outdoor cats. If you have an indoor cat they will probably be less independent and more cuddly when you're around, but they won't be getting as much exercise and of course you have to deal with the litter box. A lack of exercise can also lead to weight problems, and thankfully my cat never had any thanks to her active lifestyle. Anyways I've rambled on long enough. I didn't mean to bore you with her life story, but I couldn't think of a better way to explain myself.

I have had cats all of my life and now I have none. I don't want anymore because they might outlive me and I am enjoying the freedom of not having them to take care of. I never kept a box for my cats until we came to live in the burbs. My cats mostly wandered in and out at will. Even in the burbs I used to let my cats out and they used the box mainly in the winter time. You know that old adage about how if something sounds too good to be true, then it probably is not true? Apply that to Febreeze. That stuff is scary! Really? It eliminates odors? Scary, scary, scary. I would never buy it, ever, in any form. One of my cats was doing really poorly with lots of hair loss, losing weight, and just all around bad health. I had been feeding him the Costco brand of wet food. Once I quit that, he turned around quite quickly. I think that stuff was bad, bad, bad. One thing about that litter, though, It seems that if this would be happening to enough cats that it would be a known issue. It seems that a vet might warn people about this. There is so much cat litter sold and so very many cats that it has to have happened before. It can't be an isolated experience. Did your vet directly attribute this blockage to the litter? It certainly seems like it plausible. That stuff is very hard to dissolve with water. I think that type of dirt is used to line livestock ponds with. What a lot of money people spend on kitty litter and kitty food! What an industry it is!