Hi, fellow cat lovers! I’m a mom to two little girls and a “cat mom” to a little boy named Boo Radley.
I’ve bought a few scratching posts in my (almost 30) years, and while they usually last for a while, I can never justify spending more than 10 dollars for one. It’s just a pole with some carpet and twine on it! So last weekend, I decided to make my own for my sweet boy; I was inspired by this one.
I think I did a pretty good “budget-friendly” version.
It was a relatively pain-free process and I learned something interesting about carpet: it can be stapled! So follow along with me and I’ll walk you through a super easy, super thrifty DIY scratching post.
What you’ll need:
2×4 (which you’ll cut to size)
Something wooden and long; I chose a post from the lumber section of a hardware store
Carpet (I got some cut for about 5 dollars)
Sisal rope (you don’t NEED this, it’s kind of expensive, but kitties love it)
Staple gun
1. First, cut your 2×4 to size. You can get it cut at the hardware store if you’re super nice and they’re not busy. They cut mine down to about a foot long. Wrap it in your carpet and start stapling. You’ll have to hold down the carpet as close to the board as you can. The staples will go through, you just have to press firmly.
2. Attach the post to your base however you want; I chose to nail it in from the bottom of the base. Wrap the top part of the post with carpet, as you’ll want the bottom to be wrapped in sisal rope. If your post is round, you can staple the carpet on. If it’s rectangular, like mine was, you may have to nail the carpet onto the post. I did a combination of the two.
3. Start wrapping the base with sisal rope. I kept tying it up the length of the post, because I didn’t think the carpet would give Boo enough resistance as the rope. Looking back, if I had more sisal rope I probably would have wrapped the entire post with it.
Here’s the finished result! I haven’t tested it out on Boo yet because I still want to add some kind of “chill” spot on top. I think I did a pretty good job, especially compared to the one I was trying to copy.
Thank you, Olivia, for an excellent tutorial.
For more about training good scratching behavior, see Scratching: Redirect the Need. For another DIY tip, see how this reader uses cardboard as a cat toy.
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