I've never been a cat person, but after a year of having some on my property I've become a fan. My wife convinced me to adopt some barn cats from a relative. We got three 6 month old kittens. Right off the bat one of them caught a mouse within 30 minutes of being here.
This is a weekend house for us so we struggled with how to keep them fed during the week. We tried all sorts of contraptions, but nothing seemed to work to keep the possums n coons out. Finally we came up with the cat house, see attached. This too needed lots of tweaking to keep the raccoons out but we finally got it right. It's high enough that the coons can't jump up into it and it keeps the food dry.
The cats are very friendly and follow the kids around the property. On more than one occasion they have alerted us to snakes (cotton mouths) in the yard and around the pond. They see everything before you do. Once you figure out the feeding station they are super low maintenance and a joy to have.
