"I Love the Smell of Cat Pooh in the Morning"

I am starting a new series called "Old Wives Tales" where I will be trying out different items that work for other, sometimes, more environmentally friendly purposes.

This is how we will rate things:
1-A complete and utter failure in ever single way possible
2-Some SERIOUS issues but we can see how it might work...in some far off land
3-Downsides still outweigh upsides
4-Pretty sweet deal...HOWEVER (fill in the blank)
5-Perfect in every way

First item up for grabs are coffee grinds! What will they supposedly do? Stop cats from pooping in your flowers beds.

While I love our neighborhood, I despise our neighbors cats. Yes cats plural because there are about 8 of them roaming around. Inchie does a good job of keeping them away from the door but they do seem to like pooping in our flower bed. The smell is a little pungent at times.

I started testing the coffee grind theory about 2 months ago and I am just now really starting to notice a difference. I have been emptying our french press pot-o-grinds in the flower bed at least three times a week and also dumped a container of old coffee grinds in there as well. Honestly, I can't tell if the cats are not pooping in that area because it smells like coffee when you walk up to the front porch. Oh...and there might have been a few weeks were it vaguely smelled like a Starbucks filled with pooping cats. But not now! It is soooo much better than before!

Old Wives Tale:Coffee grinds repels cats
Our ruling: 4/5 Pretty sweet deal...HOWEVER I am not quite sure that there is nothing going on in the flower beds any more...I just can't smell it. Also takes a fair amount of reoccurring coffee grind coverage to get the job done. But hey, it beats dumping them in the trash and it is good for your plants too!

(In all fairness, our kitten is very well-trained and would never use our planter for such a vile thing.)