Fifty years ago in a small German village, cats weren’t family. They caught mice, ate what was left over from dinner, and slept under the front staircase in winter. Nobody took them to the vet, and nobody spayed or neutered them. When unwanted kittens were born, they “went to heaven” in the water barrel behind the house.
In Episode 141 of Diary of a Cat Mom, host Dagmar shares her memories of growing up with cats in 1970s Germany. That includes one moment she will never forget. She also traces the big shifts in cat care since then and what they mean for how we love our cats today.
What is Diary of a Cat Mom?
Diary of a Cat Mom is a gentle, diary-style cat podcast about everyday life with cats, created especially for cat moms 35+ and pet parents in multi‑cat households who see their cats as family.
Quick Summary
In 1970s rural Germany, cats were valued for rodent control on farms (Bauernhöfe), not as pets. They lived outdoors and ate table scraps like leftover meat, vegetables, and potatoes. In winter, their only shelter was the space under the front staircase, warmed by heat leaking from the potato cellar. There was no veterinary care, no vaccinations, and no parasite control, so sick or injured cats had to survive on their own. Spaying and neutering were unknown. Dagmar witnessed this at age five, when her father told her the kittens “went to heaven.” Today, spay and neuter, TNR, routine vet care, and indoor living are standard, and cats are widely treated as family members.
Watch This Episode
If you’d like to experience this diary entry as a video, press play below. Sometimes seeing the quiet moments adds another layer to the reflection. You can also browse all episodes on Vimeo.
Table of Contents
What You’ll Learn
- How rural German families cared for cats in the 1970s
- Why cats were once seen as working animals rather than companions
- How unwanted kittens were dealt with before spay and neuter was common
- What drove the shift: animal welfare movements, TNR, accessible vet care, economic growth, and urbanization
- How cats moved from the barn to our beds and family photos
- How to look at past generations’ choices with honesty and compassion
Key Takeaways
- Cats used to be about function, not family. On farms and in villages, cats were rodent control, and families rarely formed emotional bonds with them.
- Care was minimal. Food was whatever would otherwise be thrown away, shelter was improvised, and vet visits didn’t happen.
- Spay and neuter changed everything. Without it, unwanted litters were a regular, expected event, often handled cruelly by today’s standards.
- Children absorb what adults tell them. Telling kids kittens “went to heaven” protected both the children and the adults from facing what really happened.
- Culture and economics shape how we treat animals. Money worries made spending on an animal that “might disappear tomorrow” seem pointless. More income, cheaper vet care, and city living changed that.
- Today, vet care is the default. Checkups, vaccines, dental care, and spaying or neutering are standard, and shelter cats are often already fixed before adoption.
- Life is precious. Dagmar’s early experience taught her how close life and death are, and to take time to stop and pet her cat.
Timestamps & Chapters
Timestamps & Chapters (10:03)
- (00:00) Introduction: kittens, heaven, and the water barrel
- (00:30) Cats as function, not family
- (01:25) Table scraps and winter shelter under the stairs
- (02:40) No vets, no vaccines, no parasite control
- (03:35) Short lives that nobody noticed
- (03:55) The water barrel memory
- (05:00) Two little girls looking for heaven
- (05:50) Why adults called it “heaven”
- (06:30) Life and death, right next to each other
- (07:05) What changed: spay/neuter, TNR, and animal welfare
- (07:35) Economy, urbanization, and cats moving indoors
- (08:10) Vet care is now the default
- (08:35) Then vs. now: from part of the scenery to family
- (09:15) What I’d tell my younger self
- (09:40) Share your then-vs-now pet story and goodbye
Thank you for listening.
And thank you for caring about cats the way you do.
Resources for Cat Parents
Everything I use and trust for my cats is here: https://diaryofacatmom.com/cat-care-resources/
Gentle Note
Diary of a Cat Mom is a personal storytelling and reflection podcast. Everything shared is based on my own life and experiences with my cats.
This podcast is created for connection, comfort, and companionship. This content is not veterinary advice and not meant to replace professional veterinary advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Every cat is unique. If you have concerns about your pet’s health or wellbeing, please contact your trusted veterinarian.
Most of all, please remember:
You’re not alone on this journey. We’re learning, loving, and growing together — one paw print at a time.
Frequently Asked Questions
How were cats cared for in Germany in the 1970s?
In rural Germany, most cats lived outdoors and were kept for rodent control on farms. They were fed leftover table scraps rather than cat food, had no dedicated shelter, and rarely or never received veterinary care, vaccinations, or parasite treatment.
Were cats spayed or neutered in the 1970s?
In many rural areas, including the small German villages where Dagmar grew up, spaying and neutering were not practiced or even known about. Unwanted litters were a regular occurrence.
Why did people treat cats differently fifty years ago?
Cats were seen as working animals. Money was tight, vet care was not easy to get, and people had little reason to invest in an animal that might not be there the next day. Knowledge of animal welfare was also limited.
What changed cat care over the last 50 years?
The main drivers were the spread of spay and neuter programs, trap-neuter-return (TNR), the animal welfare movement, more affordable and accessible veterinary medicine, higher household incomes, urbanization, and a cultural shift toward seeing cats as family members.
What is TNR?
TNR stands for trap-neuter-return. Community and feral cats are humanely trapped, spayed or neutered, and returned to their outdoor home. This reduces unwanted litters over time.
Is it fair to judge past generations for how they treated cats?
Dagmar’s view is that the adults of her childhood did the best they could with the knowledge they had. They followed practices taught by the generations before them. Understanding that context doesn’t excuse the cruelty, but it helps explain it.
Conclusion
The distance between a 1970s German water barrel and a cat curled up in a family bed today is enormous, and it happened within one lifetime. Dagmar’s story is a reminder of how much cat care has improved through education, veterinary medicine, and a change in how we see animals. It is also a reminder that life can change in a day, so the small moments count. Listen to Episode 141 of Diary of a Cat Mom, then share your own then-vs-now pet story. There’s always another story, another insight, ready to be shared right around the corner.
Show Notes
- Who this episode is about: Dagmar, host of Diary of a Cat Mom, looking back at growing up with cats in small German villages in the 1970s and how different cat care was fifty years ago.
- The setup: A personal solo episode that moves from childhood memories to reflection, comparing how cats lived then with how they live now, and what changed in between.
- Cats as function, not family: On farms (Bauernhöfe) and in rural areas, cats were rodent control rather than pets. Dagmar never knew an indoor cat as a child, and only one or two cats got real names. The rest were just “kitty kitty.”
- What they ate: No cat food, only leftovers from cooking (meat, vegetables, and potatoes) given to the cats instead of being thrown away.
- Winter shelter: Cats slept under the front staircase, warmed by heat coming through the mesh window of the potato cellar. The adults’ view was that the cats had winter fur and didn’t need more.
- No medical care: No vets, no vaccinations, no parasite control. Vomiting, limping, or injuries went untreated, so cats either recovered on their own or didn’t survive, and their lives were short.
- The water barrel: With no spaying or neutering, unwanted litters were expected. At age five, Dagmar and her younger sister watched their father and uncle put newborn kittens in the garden water barrel, and were told the kittens “went to heaven.”
- Looking for heaven: The next day, the two girls climbed onto a box and lifted the lid to see what heaven looked like. In the dark green water they imagined another world.
- Why adults said “heaven”: Looking back, Dagmar sees the story as a way to protect children from facing death and adults from facing their own cruelty, following practices passed down for generations.
- What changed: Spay and neuter education, TNR (trap-neuter-return), the animal welfare movement, and more accessible vet care, along with economic growth, urbanization, and cats moving indoors into our beds and family photos.
- Cat care today: Checkups, vaccines, dental care, and spaying or neutering are standard, and shelter cats are often already fixed before adoption.
- Then vs. now: Dagmar’s relationship with cats went from taking them for granted to treating them as family she’s responsible for, giving them the best life possible as a “happy servant.”
- Episode takeaway: The adults of her childhood did the best they could with what they knew. That early memory taught Dagmar how close life and death are and how precious each day is. It’s why she stops to pet her cat today.
- Listener prompt: What was normal for pets when you were growing up that you’d never accept today? Dagmar wants to hear your then-vs-now pet stories and how you think about them now.
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Full Podcast Transcription – How Has Cat Care Changed Since the 1970s? A German Childhood Perspective
Dagmar (00:01)
How has cat care changed since the 1970s? A German childhood perspective. Welcome to Diary of a Cat Mom. When I was a kid in Germany, kittens didn’t go to the shelter. They went to heaven in the water barrel behind the house. Nobody thought that was cruel. Let me tell you what it was like to grow up with cats fifty years ago.
Cats they were mostly seen as function, not as family. If you lived on a farm or in rural areas, they were mostly rodent control. In Germany it was Bauernhoefe. They were not seen as pets. I never knew an indoor cat then.
The cats we had as I grew up, they existed mostly outside. And my parents barely bonded with them. Was more we kids, but it was mostly when we were outside they were there, so we petted them. So we just took it for granted that they were part of the environment. But we had no real emotional connection to them. And we had only I think one or two main kitties we named. Or the other kitties who came and left. They had just generic names like kitty kitty.
And we didn’t have cat food, that we fed them. It was mostly leftover food from cooking meat mixed with vegetables and with potatoes. There was no real care. There was more like before you would throw it away, why not giving it the cats outside? And in the winter time there was no shelter specifically for the cats.
It was in many areas that the German houses they had staircases going up to the front door and underneath the staircase there was an opening. And so in our case, the kitties we had outside, they went into the opening. There was normally a metal mesh window to the
room where the potatoes were stored. And so the indoor heat, if we want to name it like that, went into this staircase and my parents always thought the kitties don’t need more, they have fur and they have the winter fur, so they are fine. Don’t worry about it. And that’s really how I explored in my childhood how the cats lived.
Although there was no medical relationship. I don’t remember once hearing about a vet for cats. And my parents, they never went to a vet if any of the kitties seemed to throw up or to limp or they explored any issues and for us kids we just didn’t know better. And also I don’t remember once that they got vaccinations or parasite control in any way.
They were just outside cats and they were really left to defend for themselves from that perspective, except the food scraps my parents gave them and illness and injuries there really meant the cats had to handle it on their own or they didn’t survive. I assume I never saw it. They was put down informally.
So the life expectancy of the kitties they were pretty short but we as kids we never realized that. They were always coming and going and we just enjoyed playing with the kittens or the mama cats. And there was one experience what I remember clearly and I don’t think I will forget that my whole life.
Because spay and neuter, there was no concept or practice at the time, as I was a child, living in small German villages. And unwanted litter there were a recurring expected event. And one time, I think I was around five and perhaps my younger sister, she was like three and a half.
We were outside playing in the garden and my father and uncle, they took the newborn kittens and put them into the water barrel and closed the lid. And we looked at it and we didn’t know what they were doing.
And as my father went to another part in the garden, we followed him and we asked him what he was doing with the newborn kittens. And he said, you know, they went to heaven. So it was at the time in Germany whereas kids you were just naive. And from that minute on, my sister and I we looked totally different at this water barrel. And we thought how people go to heaven.
So the next day we climbed up on a box and opened the lid slowly to see how heaven looks. And there was just water. And you know, when you look to the ground in a green, dark green water barrel, it looks like you could envision there’s another world. So as a young child, we were amazed that this is the way how you go to heaven.
And it was really now that I look back, it was really belief of that was protecting adults from being confronted about the cruelty they did and kids being confronted with death but protecting it in this way.
But it really has stayed with me my whole life.
And whenever I think of it and have this memory and the perspective as a child, at the point as my father said it, when I was like around five, I thought it was true. I was little, I was seeing my parents as an authority and as the one I could trust.
So I never questioned as I was little and then later on I realised what really happened.
I could not believe that humans were able to do that. And it was hard for me to understand why they chose this way. But now today looking back it was just they didn’t know better. And they followed and that was taught from generations before them that this was the way to do it.
But it totally gave me a different perspective of heaven at the time and that life and heaven is right next to each other.
And how fast it can go. Today you’re alive and tomorrow you’re gone.And that really never left me.
So what then changed over the years as I got older. I realized that they had have more options, but not available then. But now, we get educated all the time about spay and neuter. And TNR trap neuter and release and the rise of animal welfare movement. And the vet medicine has become so much more accessible and normalized for companion animals.
And I think there’s also a cultural shift because since then cats they moved indoors. They moved into our beds, into our family photos. They become part of our family. And maybe it’s the economy too, like 50 years ago, the economy was not great in Germany.
And people didn’t have the mindset to spend money for an animal that could disappear the next day. Now we have so much cheaper medical care, more disposable income, and the urbanization changed totally to a human-animal relationship.
And the cats today, the vet care is a default, not an exception. And checkups for your cat vaccines, dental care, it’s like standard. Same as spay neuter is standard practice. And a lot of times if you adopt a cat at the shelter, they already spayed and neutered.
So it’s totally a normal mindset to have compared to fifty years ago. And also how we feel about cats today, they’re not only our companion, but they are our furry babies. Like cat mum.
So my own relationship with cats from then fifty years ago as I was a child to now is like day and night. Because fifty years ago it was more something that was part of the environment was there, perhaps not there the next day.
And you took it for granted to have. It was more like a toy, today, they’re my family. All my cats, they’re part of my family. I’m responsible for them. I make sure they have the best life quality possible. And I live in coexistence of them. I let them live their lives. They really don’t let me live my life because I’m more a servant, but I’m a happy servant.
But I see them as living beings of the same needs, the same desires, the same seeking of living the best they can. What I would want to know my younger selves and the adults around me as a child is they did the best of the knowledge they had.
And for me as a child as cruel as it seems now, what happened made me early aware of that life and death are right next to each other and that it can happen in a day and how precious it is.
Today I stop and pet my cat.
I would love to hear from you your own then versus now pet stories, what you experienced and how you dealt with it and how you think about it today. So thank you so much for joining me for this Diary of a Cat Mom episode. There’s always another story, another insight, ready to be shared right around the corner. I will see you in the next entry.
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