Cats are highly territorial and find travel profoundly stressful, with careful preparation and appropriate equipment significantly reducing the welfare harm of necessary journeys.
Travel stress in cats is genuine and physiologically measurable. Cats confined in carriers in unfamiliar environments cannot perform their normal stress-reduction behaviours of hiding, territory marking, or escape. Carrier training from kittenhood makes the carrier a familiar, positive space rather than a trap associated with veterinary visits. This single investment of training time substantially reduces welfare harm across every necessary journey in a cat's life.