Ever since I’ve had balconies I’ve always put plastic mesh across them to keep the cats from jumping or accidently falling to their deaths. Of course this didn’t used to stop Sunny from jumping up and perching on the balcony railing (which always gave me a mild heart attack) so when I got Loki I put up even more protection to make sure he wouldn’t go over the top chasing a bird or a fly.

I left all that stuff when I moved because I have different sized balconies in the new casa az. Instead of six narrow ones I have two wider double balconies (it’s like having four, but they’re joined – as you can see here). You can also see that it would be quite a fall. But my question is… do you think I need so much protection here? I’ve put some mesh up on the sides of the balconies because there are small ledges leading off them that might be tempting to a certain orange stripey cat. But the bars are a bit closer together than at the old place and they have all that squiggly doodad stuff going on, which would make it very difficult for them to accidently fall off. I know I don’t need to put that angled stuff up again, but do you think I should extend the plastic mesh to cover the entire balcony?

My friend Flor thinks I’m not giving my cats enough credit for being intelligent enough not to leap into the unknown, but since both Lua and Sunny fell off my terrace when I first came to Sevilla – and also my vet told me that cats fall off rooftops and balconies all the time – I tend to err on the side of caution. I’m not that concerned about Azar because I think his leaping days are long over, but Loki is far too curious and also far from clever. I can imagine him going “what the…?” before plummeting to his death. Anyhow, just thinking about balcony safety at the moment. The terraza will pose a whole other set of safety issues, but that is something to think about at a later date.