Cat Supplies
Buy and sell cat supplies in Costa Rica.
A cat that lives indoors gets through a surprising amount of kit: a cat tower to climb instead of the curtains, a wand toy whose feathers were chewed off in a week, a harness for its first nervous walk round the garden, a feeder that keeps breakfast on time while you are at work. The gear is listed new and second-hand, by owners whose cat ignored or outgrew something and by pet shops clearing stock. Plenty of the smart gear in Costa Rica was shipped in from abroad through a parcel-forwarding service rather than bought from a local shop, so ask what filters and spare parts come with it before you arrange to collect.
Cat towers, wall shelves and window perches for a cat that stays in:
somewhere to climb is what saves the sofa from an indoor cat. A cat tower, a floor-standing frame of posts and platforms, is where most people start. Wall shelves take no floor space but must be screwed into solid wall, not a hollow partition, because a cat lands on them hard. Suction-cup window perches are the cheapest view you can give a cat. Wand toys and puzzle feeders give it the hunt; put the wand away afterwards, since a bored cat chews the string. Going outside changes the kit. A cat on a lead needs a harness cut for cats so it cannot back out, and a vest style is harder to wriggle free of than a strap H. A collar should have a breakaway clasp that opens if the cat snags on a branch, and an ID tag that helps if it ever turns up in animals lost and found. For a cat coming from adopt a cat, buy the harness once you can measure it.
Automatic feeders, and cat flaps that read a microchip:
both suit an owner who is out all day or away at the beach for a weekend. A tray feeder with a lid per meal handles wet food, best with an ice-pack compartment. A hopper feeder portions dry food on a timer and should take batteries as well as mains; Wi-Fi models add an app and sometimes a camera. A gravity feeder only suits a cat that stops when it is full. Where one of several cats eats different food, a microchip feeder opens for that cat alone. A microchip flap does the same at the door: your cat comes in, the neighbour’s tom stays out, and so does the opossum that visits a house backing onto a ravine in Sabanilla at night for the kibble. A cheaper flap opened by a magnet on the collar works if your cat will wear one.
A cat tower or an automatic feeder, new against used:
a tower of about a metre and a half with sisal posts costs around ₡25,000 to ₡45,000 new, tall solid-wood ones several times that. A used one that size goes for roughly ₡10,000 to ₡20,000, and a sturdy one holds its price well, because nobody wants to ship something that bulky in from abroad. Automatic feeders start near ₡30,000 for a timed model and pass ₡100,000 for Wi-Fi ones with a camera, and they lose value faster: a feeder without its bowl or adapter, or still tied to the last owner’s app, may never work properly again.
A FURminator, a smart feeder or a microchip flap from another home:
each has its own trap. Deshedding tools are among the most copied pet products, and a fake tends to be lighter, with an edge that feels sharp under a fingertip and can nick the coat, so ask where it was bought before paying brand money. Have the seller unlink a Wi-Fi feeder and reset it in front of you, pair it to your phone, then run a portion through and look for old food packed into the mechanism. Gear shipped in from abroad may use filters or spare bowls nobody sells in Costa Rica, so ask where the seller got them. Tug a breakaway clasp too: once it goes stiff it stops opening when it should.
Listing a harness, a cat flap or a feeder:
give what decides whether it fits. For a harness, the size and the chest range. For a flap, whether it went into wood, glass or a wall, and whether the outer frame comes with it, since the buyer has to cut a hole to suit. For a feeder, whether the adapter, bowls and ice pack are there and the battery backup still works. Clear the flap’s memory and unlink the feeder before handing them over. Someone driving in from Guápiles for a microchip flap will want a photo of the model label first, to check their cat’s chip will read before making the trip.