Some people have had unexpected visitors enter their homes via their pet door that allows their cats and dogs to roam freely in and out of the house. Many creatures enter the home completely confused about their environment but are happy to explore. Some are dragged in by the family cat. Either way, the home owners are generally not pleased to meet their acquaintance.
Here are some hilarious stories of animals that entered a home via the pet door or another entrance.
#1 Racoon
“I lived in an apartment that backed up to an open field for a while and had a real raccoon issue. Once they figured out that the cat door was occasionally open after I left it open one night when I was out late, they would show up in a gang of 5-7 every night and bang in the slider and try it get in.”
“The apartment was a studio with a slightly lofted bedroom and one evening was sitting on the couch working and saw what thought was my cat wander down into the living room and hop up on to the couch next to me. I reached out to give her a scratch and noticed in my periphery that her body language was off. That was when I turned to look at her and realized it was a raccoon. I screamed and lept off the couch. The raccoon made a quick exit back out the cat door. My cat slept through the whole exchange.”
“I too have a raccoon through the cat door story. For me it was watching a mother raccoon hold open the cat door while her four baby ‘coons tumbled into the house. They went over, ate all the cat’s food (washing their hands in the water dish), then mom held the door open again as they went back outside. I started to lock it up at night after that!”
#2 Monkey
“Not quite a pet door situation but we lived close to the national park in Nairobi. On several occasions monkeys would come into the house through the windows.
They’d raid the pantry and make a mess of it. Once my husband was home alone. He heard a noise downstairs and as he went to investigate met a monkey coming back upstairs. They both froze, then he backed up back into the bedroom and the monkey made its way back out through our child’s bedroom window.”
#3 Peacock
“Came down one morning to find a peacock in the utility room that had got in to eat all the cat food. It stayed on our property for about three years and we called it Wazzock.”
#4 Peahens
“2 peahens appeared in my yard when I was growing up and did the same thing! They adopted us and stuck around a few years, even laid a few eggs, then wandered off. I know they got into the house a few times but our blue healer would gently herd them back out.”
#5 Squirrel
“A squirrel came in through my parents cat flap (they don’t have a cat but didn’t replace the door when they bought the house). I remember walking into the kitchen and having a staring match with this squirrel until he decided he’d had enough and left the way he’d come in. Not very exciting but still.”
“We had a squirrel get in through a hole in the screen door once. She couldn’t figure out how to get back out so she ping ponged around the room for a bit, knocking over a bunch of stuff.”
#6 Chipmunk
“Had a chipmunk get into my house somehow. It freaked out and wreaked havoc at 2 or so in the morning, presumably trying to escape. Couldn’t catch it, but I found it dead in an open toilet the next morning.”
#7 Opossum
“Walked into the kitchen in the evening and there was a possum sitting there happily munching away on the dry cat food. I froze, taking a moment to understand what I was seeing. Possum turn to look at me, look back at the food, then turned and walked out of the kitchen, down a few steps, and back out for the cat door. It was all so matter-of-fact that I’m sure the possum had been doing this regularly.”
“Had an opossum sitting in the laundry room eating dog food. They’re kinda cute normally, but they do this creepy growl thing and have some serious chompers which they show off by opening their mouths big enough to bite your face off.”
“Our cat let in a pregnant opossum. Who then had babies in our bathroom. After that we kept the cat door closed after dark.”
#8 Horse
“I once walked into the kitchen and noticed that our horse had gotten inside. He had opened a cupboard in the mud room and was happily munching away on some chaff we had stored there. The pull down handle to the back door was covered in horse slobber, as was the cubboard door handle. Cheeky bugger.”
#9 Snake
“One of our cats has brought in the odd snake. They are very much alive when she deposits them inside the house. Luckily, she usually chooses to leave them in the bath for some reason.”
“My cat decided to bring in a few garter snakes that were still alive. He jumped on my chest, woke me up and dropped the snakes on me. I had 3 in the bed and a total of 7 that I found in the house. Thankfully, they were garter snakes and totally harmless, but that is one hell of a way to be woken up.”
#10 Bull
“A few years ago my cousin lived next door to us. He had a morning ritual where he’d sit on his back porch and enjoy his coffee to start the day. Well one morning he opens the back door and there is a full grown bull sitting there. Just relaxing. This is one of the calmest guys I know and he just sighed, closed the door and said “early day I guess.”
“This is common where I’m from lol just go about your business. He gone go away eventually.”
#11 Bird
“A hummingbird made its way into my upstairs bedroom by the cat flap left propped open on the second story outside door to my room. He seemed pretty chill and was not too unhappy when I used a large hanky to grab him to check for injuries. He appeared unharmed and flew off happily as soon as I let him go outside. I didn’t think much about it as we were moving in & everything was very chaotic, I can only remember a lot of red feathers.”
#12 The Wrong Dog
“One day my brother opened the door to let the dog in and a completely different husky traipsed through without him realizing it. It proceeded to stroll into the bathroom and get in our bathtub.”
#13 Badger
“There was also the one late summer evening when the door was open and I suddenly heard crunching sounds. I walked over to investigate, and a badger was just sitting there, munching on some bug or other about ten feet from the open door.”
#14 Ferret
“In the middle of the night a strange shape appeared in the bedroom. Our 4 cats at the time noticed and did nothing to protect us. Somehow, a neighbor’s ferret had escaped their house and made it into our 2nd floor bedroom.”
#15 Fox
“A family in England had a little boy who used to tell his mother that he had a fox friend that would come sleep with him at night. They didn’t believe him, but the boy was insistent! Finally they put up cameras. Sure enough a little fox would come in the cat door, eat the cat food, then trot upstairs to the boys room and curl up on the end of the bed for a nap. It would stay a few hours, then trot back outside. They nailed the cat door shut!”
#16 Owl
“She was quite young, maybe 5 or so? Goes up to bed, comes down again shortly and says “there’s an owl in my room”. Ok sweetheart go back to bed it’s late etc etc. Cousin is very insistent so eventually my uncle goes up with her and low and behold, there’s an owl perched on the end of her bed. I forget exactly how they got it out but no harm came to the bird.”
A reader asked if the cousin was a wizard.
#17 Duck
“I grew up in a house on a lake with a cat door. One time I was in my room gaming and I heard this loud bang quack wait a few seconds bang quack wait a few seconds. Kept repeating. I walked out and one of our cats had caught a fully grown mallard duck and was trying to bring it through the cat door sideways.”
#18 Chicken
“My chickens constantly try to get in the house. There’s usually a few loose cat or dog food near the door (where the bowls are). But if they get in to eat the cat food, the cats will eat them lol.”
#19 Goose
“One time, about 5 or 6 years ago, a goose came inside our house through our cat door, which was a lot bigger than regular cat/dog doors. It came inside in the early morning and I was the first to wake up to noises of honking downstairs. Our kitchen was trashed, and all the glasses/plates that were on the counter were broken. The goose got even crazier when I showed up, and was trying to escape. It then started chasing me and I took that as an opportunity to run to the front door and open it. Luckily, it chose to fly out instead of attack me.”
#20 Skunk
“My Uncle woke up with a skunk on his chest, while sleeping next to my Auntie. He said time slowed down as he mentally ran through all the possible courses of action. He forced himself to lay there for ten long minutes until it moved along. Because he could get up & jump away, but my Auntie would get the full force of the spray.”
This article was produced by This Mom is On Fire.
This post originally appeared on reddit.
Feature image credit: © TriggerPhoto from Getty Images Signature via canva.com