We give Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit Catio a rating of 4.5 out of 5 stars.
*Use code 500FCH on any purchase over $500
What Is Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit Catio? How Does It Work?
The Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit is an outdoor “catio” (cat patio) that cat owners can use to give their cats the freedom to go outside in a safe and controlled environment.
Cats are built to leap, balance, and climb, but they often don’t get the opportunities to do these kinds of acrobatic behaviors inside the house. Outdoor cats have a blast exploring the neighborhood and parkouring, but they can wreak havoc on the environment and get themselves into trouble if they’re not supervised. A catio bridges the gap, allowing your kitty time outdoors in an enclosed environment to get the enrichment it needs to stay happy.
The My Own Den Petit is a four-sided wire enclosure you can assemble in an afternoon or two. This model is compact at 46 inches deep and 46 inches long, but with a 72-inch height, it provides plenty of vertical space for your kitty to explore. In addition, it comes with six adjustable shelves you can place wherever you like and a human-sized door so you can get right into the catio with your kitty.
The catio can be set up any place you have room in your yard as it is a freestanding unit.
*Use code 500FCH on any purchase over $500
Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit Catio – A Quick Look
Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit Catio Pricing
The Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit is currently available for $1,541.94 USD. Any of the company’s pre-configured catio kits will ship for free to customers in the continental United States.
Habitat Haven also offers to ship to most of the rest of the world. However, they do not take orders online from customers outside the United States. Interested international customers must contact the company via phone, email, or live chat to learn more about their purchasing options.
*Use code 500FCH on any purchase over $500
What to Expect From the Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit Catio
The catio arrived quicker than expected given that I’m Canadian and it had to go through the border to get to my home. I had to provide the delivery company with a phone number so we could communicate with the driver when he arrived in my city to unload the enclosure.
The driver called me about half an hour before he showed up at my door. Luckily, I was home and able to accept the delivery. I’m not sure what would have happened if I had been away. It would have been nice to have a little more warning, but that’s no fault of Habitat Haven.
The driver entered my neighborhood with a semi as the catio was packaged on a pallet. I was aware that the catio would arrive on a pallet, but for some reason, I wasn’t prepared for the size of it. The delivery driver couldn’t get the pallet up my steps to place it on my front deck as planned, so I had to clear some space in my garage for him. He said the pallet weighed around 300 pounds, and he was moving it himself, which is probably why he couldn’t bring it onto my front deck. This is important for potential customers to remember, as you will need a fair amount of space to put the pallet when it arrives. I’m not sure it would be feasible for someone living in an apartment unless you unpackaged the pallet in your building’s lobby and brought the pieces up one by one.
Everything was packaged very well on the pallet. It came wrapped in plastic, so the contents were not subject to the elements. I received a box of accessories (e.g., hammock, awning, etc.), which were also boxed well and hidden under the plastic. Though the catio had a long journey from its warehouse to my home, nothing was damaged, and everything remained dry despite the snowy weather.
Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit Catio Contents
*Use code 500FCH on any purchase over $500
Ease of Construction
The My Own Den Petit catio comes partially put together to make assembly easier. Depending on how many people you have working on the catio, the remaining pieces can be assembled in around two or three hours. I highly recommend having a second set of hands to help with the construction process, as I imagine it is impossible, if not very difficult, to set it up alone.
It’s a (mostly) foolproof assembly process requiring the tools that come with the kit and your own personal drill. You’ll use three-prong clips and specialty pliers (both provided for you) to connect the cage edges.
Once you have a freestanding structure, you can install the included shelving wherever you see fit. Habitat Haven provides the saddle clips and wood screws required, but you’ll need to supply your own drill.
Material Quality
The structure is made of UV powder-coated and durable galvanized steel that feels sturdy and strong when assembled on a flat surface. It’s well-made, so you know your cats will be safe as they spend time outside in their new catio.
The shelving and flooring are made from cedar. The top part of the wood is smooth to the touch and doesn’t feel like it could cause splinters. The bottom part is less polished and could potentially cause slivers during the installation process, but it won’t cause any issues once the catio is assembled.
The wood shelves could stand to be a few inches wider as they may be too narrow for larger cats to use comfortably.
Enrichment
Considering just the base kit, the My Own Den Petit catio provides a lot of enrichment for indoor cats. It has six shelves you can configure how you wish to give your kitty plenty of exploration options.
I highly recommend adding a few accessories to your order to maximize the enrichment your cat will receive from its catio. For example, I received the hammocks with my order, and while my cats were tentative to get inside at first, they enjoyed them once they got the hang (pun intended) of it. The company also manufactures corner shelves, steps, and scratching posts.
Is Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit Catio a Good Value?
At its current sale price of $1541.94 USD, the Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit provides great value for cat owners looking to give their kitties a little more outside time. The structure is solidly built and provides plenty of space for activities. While the initial investment may seem high initially, it would cost you more to DIY something as solid and durable, especially if you plan on using cedar wood, as it’s much more expensive than other wood types. Not to mention that Habitat Haven’s catios are nice to look at, which can’t be said about all DIYed home projects.
FAQ
Do the shelves stand up to exposure to water and snow?
The shelves and floors of this product are made of cedar, a wood that’s naturally resistant to water, rot, bugs, and mold.
Do I need to know how to build to put this together?
A basic understanding of assembling furniture is helpful. You’ll probably be okay if you’ve put together a chair or bed frame from Ikea. The enclosure arrives on a pallet partially assembled. The rest of the assembly process is straightforward, especially if you consider yourself handy to begin with. The catio comes with easy-to-follow paper instructions.
Habitat Haven recommends having two people help install the enclosure.
The pictures on the website show hammocks hanging in the catio. Does the My Own Den Petit Catio come with hammocks?
Accessories, like awnings, hammocks, and scratching posts, are not automatically included with your catio kit. Instead, Habitat Haven sells them separately, offering consumers a way to further customize their catio’s look and enrichment level.
What kind of maintenance is required?
Most outdoor items in our yards have some kind of maintenance requirements as they are always outside and exposed to the elements. Habitat Haven’s catios have minimal maintenance requirements because they use cedarwood and a powder-coated metal mesh material in the construction of their catios. These heavy-duty materials can withstand much of what the elements will blow their way. That said, salt air or nearby acidic trees may shorten the catio’s lifespan.
You can grease the door hinge pins annually with bicycle grease. Never use lubricating oils like WD-40.
The My Own Den Petit Catio isn’t quite the right size for my space. What other options are there?
The My Own Den Petit is just one of many of Habitat Haven’s pre-designed catio kits. If you don’t like the look of these pre-designed enclosures, you can design your own custom catio from the company’s many enclosures, tunnels, towers, bridges, and stair pieces.
Our Experience With Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit Catio
*Use code 500FCH on any purchase over $500
Thoughts on Assembly
My husband is pretty handy, but it took us around three or four hours to assemble the catio. We had problems getting the walls to line up as they should and had to remove the clips we put on and start over once. Thankfully, the company provides their phone number in the instruction sheets, so if you have any assembly issues, they’re there to help.
We utilized their call line once to inquire about the flooring. The enclosure has six cedar panels for the flooring, but the panels don’t fit together tightly in the space at the bottom. We weren’t sure if we had installed it incorrectly, so we called to see why we had spaces between the panels, and the company let us know that this was intentional. There is supposed to be a gap of about half an inch between each plank.
One other aspect of the installation that was problematic for us was attaching the lock to the door. The catio has a 2-foot wide by 5-foot-tall access door with a magnetic lock. Unlike the majority of the catio, the lock did not come pre-installed. The hardware for the lock includes self-tapping screws, which we could not get to thread the way they were meant to without fully stripping the screw. Instead, we used a drill to make the hole bigger and put a nut and bolt on. Ultimately, this was not a deal breaker because we had the right tools for this small change, but I felt it is worth mentioning.
Thoughts on Quality of Enrichment
I have six active indoor cats who want nothing more than to go outside, so they love the freedom the My Own Den Petit gives them. The six shelves give them options on where they’d like to perch during their outdoor time, and the hammocks provide a cozy resting spot for naps in the sunshine. My cats were a little iffy about the hammocks at first, but with a little coaxing (read: treat bribery), they took to them soon enough.
As mentioned above, I highly recommend splurging on the extra accessories for your catio. The hammocks don’t come with the base kit, but they’re a great touch to make my cat’s more comfortable in their enclosure. I wish I had ordered a scratching post, but I will add that at another time.
Thoughts on Customer Service
Habitat Haven has the customer service side of things down to a science. They emailed me when my product shipped and after it arrived to see if I had any issues with installation. As mentioned above, their phone number is included with the instruction manual, so if you run into any problems during assembly, you can call them for advice.
Conclusion
The Habitat Haven My Own Den Petit is a fantastic investment for cat owners who want to give their pets the experience and enrichment of going outside without worrying about their pets running away or being targeted by predators.
The structure is made of top-notch materials, and though we ran into some issues during assembly, it was more than worth the effort. Even though I live in the frigid prairies, I have full faith that the catio will stand the test of time (and the extreme cold).
The catio has provided my indoor cats with hours of entertainment and enrichment so far, and I cannot wait to watch them enjoy spring and summer in their new enclosure.
