I had to hang it from the edge of the roof to keep him from trying to eat the whole thing. Now don't get me wrong, I was growing it for him, so I would pick leaves off of it and give him some when the plant got big enough, but Darom though he needed it ALL THE TIME! He would meow at every human he saw, and would walk in circles under the plant looking at it longingly, hoping we would give him more. He meowed at me, my brother, my mother, my brother's girlfriend, my friends, the neighbors, the mail carrier, even at the UPS and Fed Ex carriers, as if he was saying, "You there! With the opposable thumbs! Make yourself useful and get me the nip! Be quick about it before mother sees you!" Any human he saw was fodder for his obscession! Then fate was on his side one windy day, and a gust of wind blew his precious catnip plant down, and it landed on the ground. Unfortunately for him, I heard it fall from in the livingroom, and I was able to intercept him from eating it.
Since catnip is a mint, and it was about 15 inches tall at this point, it survived the fall, and I planted it in a larger planter, and put a bird basket around it. The idea was that as the plant grew, the leaves would grow through the cage, and Darom could nibble away without killing the plant. Sounds like a solid plan doesn't it? Well, not if you are in a battle with a psychoticly obscessed, infernally intellient, black siamese cat. It lasted about a month, and then I came home, to find a pot of nothing but twigs sticking out of the dirt, and the basket force field, lying on the ground a few feet away, and a rotten drug fiend cat that was too stoned to even move.
That was when I gave up trying to grow catnip, and just won't bother anymore, LOL
