My advice would be that they're terribly expensive to buy and incredibly cheap and easy to make. Carpet retailers even tend to give you free remnants when you tell them it's all for kitty. If you go the DIY route and want tips, feel free to send me an e-mail.

I agree with shane.

We have a huge (7' tall, 4 ledges) super-sturdy cat tree that we got for $100 at Costco, I've seen the same one at PetsmartCo for +$350. I'm happy with it, it usually has at least 3 cats on it. Costco online also carries this one, which I covet, for $300 delivered, $100 cheaper than anywhere else.

Ledges are where it's at. Look for ones where each ledge is offset from the ledge above/below: makes it a lot easier for less agile kitties to travel up and down.

Don't get one made by Armarkat. They are all over Amazon and are often the first several hits on Google for "cat tree" but the one I ordered was really shoddy: thin fabric, barely padded, and it couldn't handle the weight of our smallest cat (6#) without falling over. The bigger cats avoided it after testing it out once. I returned it to the manufacturer; it took forever and many phone calls to issue a refund.

For cheaps + minimal effort, it's pretty easy to refresh a used Craigslist cat tree: flea bomb the heck out of it, let it sit outside until the insecticide outgasses and then either tack on new carpet or (my preference) wind sisal rope tightly over the worn out areas of the existing carpet. I do the sisal wrap on the vertical parts of new trees too, the cats like to scratch the rope more than then like scratching carpeting and the rope prevents little stray tufts of carpet yarn from drifting across the floor.

Under no circumstances should you get (or make) one that has plush fabric on it, no matter how cute it looks. It's just not good enough to sink kitty claws into. I had one that a friend gave me and it was crap. As soon as we swapped it for one that had loop carpet ledges and uprights wrapped in sisal rope, The Moggett was all over it. She's actually worn through one lot of rope on her favourite upright and we're about to unwind it and replace it. Best money I ever spent - she simply doesn't want to scratch anywhere else.

I have a very small cheapo thing that I bought in a supermarket and which Lucy likes. I got it really for an extra scratching area rather than anything to climb on, it's not terribly sturdy. But she particularly loves the mice hanging off it and plays with them all the time. So maybe a toy or two hanging off it?

≡ Click to see image ≡

Some kinds of carpet unravel (and then shed) pretty badly. I haven't had enough caffeine to tell you which kinds of carpet those are, but I am awake enough to warn you away from them.

Thanks, all!

I was definitely noticing that some of the towers online had plush or "faux sheepskin," which did seem weird. Good to know that I wasn't being weirdly picky.

The cat's loved scratching on both the white shag carpeting we had in the previous place and the Home Depot faux-oriental rugs we had in the place before that, so I'm definitely thinking carpet of some sort. I guess I'll go through and check for carpet shedding, though.

As for the DIY, y'all are certainly right, but I would much rather spend money than time on this. And ikkyu2 has cat allergies, so I don't want to introduce other cat's dander into the house if we can avoid it, so I'd rather do new than used.

I think I'm most worried about finding something sturdy. Zoe's not particularly courageous about that sort of thing.

I got one at PetCo in 1996 that is still going strong. It has a rectangular base, a left-aligned wooden log/column (about 8-10 inches wide) and a rectangular shelf on top of it that is window height. The cat sleeps on the top shelf and scratches at the wooden column (I do have to sweep/vaccuum up little bits of woods). There is also a circle shaped (open in the middle, covered in carpet) hanging structure to the right of the wooden column that swings that she has no interest in at all.) The wood log/column is her favorite thing in the world.

When she went to stay with my aunt when I was working on an extended stay project; my aunt's kittens loved the swinging O.

We bought our kitties the Dr Foster & Smith (drfostersmith.com) Amusement Park model 3 years ago. It was an instant hit and is still going strong.

Oooh, bearwife, I'm going to bookmark that one in case the one I got doesn't work, because that one looks like pretty much exactly what I was actually looking for, if a bit more expensive.

I ended up with this, which is totally not exciting but, like I said, Zoe's not much of a jumper and everything else I saw seemed like it would require a lot of jumping to get to the top levels, and/or had very sheddy carpet.

Thank you, mudpuppie, for alerting me that I should be checking for carpet shedding. I scratched and scritched and eliminated a number of models because of the amount of dust and carpet fibers they gave off. And I don't even have claws.

I haven't brought it home yet, so we'll see if that cat goes for it. The platform and condo areas seem to be the same material as her current bed, which she loves, so I think it'll be ok.

Despite my failure to link, it looks as if you found it, occhiblu. Here it is anyway, because I am sorry I didn't link in my last message.

We got this one because we have 4 cats . . . they all use it to scratch, and one uses it as her home within our home. (The others like it too, but she established possessory rights about a year in.)

You didn't ask about this, but if you decide to spend more money on kitties, this item is even more favorited by mine.