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Until recently, my cats have been indoor-outdoor cats, who were mostly indoors, but allowed to go outdoors during the day. When night approached, the cat door would be set so that it would allow cats to come inside but not to go back outdoors. Still, I have always had to worry when one of them decided to do an all-nighter. Yes, I have also lost two cats, probably to a fox. One of them was a feral cat that I had taken in many years before, and who would go absolutely nuts if she were restricted to the house. I miss her very much, and I blame myself but, at the same time, she lived to be twenty-two years old. She had a good life, and a happy one.
Depending on where I was living, there have been times when I have restricted my cats to the house. When I have lived within a city, for example, it wasn't safe for cats to be allowed outdoors. During that time, I lost another cat, but for just the opposite reasons. Because she was not allowed outdoors, she was not familiar with her surroundings outside of the house. She escaped one day when a friend opened the door, apparently panicked, and I never saw her again. Had she been permitted outside from time to time, she would have known her way around, and maybe this wouldn't have happened.
Currently, I have three cats. Two of them (sisters) are twenty-four years old, so they are no longer so interested in going outdoors, although they probably would from time to time, if I allowed them to. But because being restricted to the house isn't driving them crazy, I am not giving them that option. The third cat is just over a year old, and she has never been outdoors. But she wants to, and tries for the door every now and then.
It seems to me that the safest course of action for her is for me to take her outdoors from time to time, under my supervision, so that she is familiar with the property, knows which doors lead to our house, and can locate a couple of safe spots, such as our second-floor fire escape and a shed that I have in the back yard, in the event that she might one day find herself outdoors.
I don't think that the question is one that can be easily answered. Yes, there are dangers outdoors. At the same time, there is the question of whether the cat's quality of life is enhanced by the added stimulus. I have raised four cats into their 20s as indoor-outdoor cats, and that's longer than most people have with their cats. If you have children, do you restrict them to your home, or do you allow them to play in the back yard sometimes, or in the park? Do you educate them at home or do you allow them to leave the safety of their home in order to attend school? Do you think that a child would be healthy and happy if he or she were never allowed to go outdoors?
The answers are not so easy. If we assume that children need fresh air and outside stimulus, could this not be true of cats as well?
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