Early last year, somebody posted a thread in, I believe it was the General Modeling forum, titled "Can Cats and Models Get Along?" I recounted how when I was a kid, the cats we had while I was growing up would get into my bedroom and knock the models to the floor. It almost became a routine--I would build a model and a feline would knock it off the shelf!
Nowadays, the cat that I have is starting to get up there in years, so mostly she sleeps and doesn't bother my workbench. The only time it's a problem is when she wants to sit in my lap while I'm trying to model. The tools and chemicals we use in our hobby are not good for cats, so when I'm fooling with knives, glue or paint, the last thing I need is a cat in my lap. As for completed models, I keep them in clear acrylic containers like you used to be able to find at Kmart and place a few glass telephone pole insulators on top so the cat can't use the box as a perch.
Even more than my models, my insulator collection is the one place in my house that is strictly forbidden to my cat. I remember years before I rediscovered modeling when I had two cats, one of them jumped onto the light box where I keep my insulators and knocked a small telephone-line insulator on top of a much larger high-voltage power insulator. It was the middle of the night and I was only half-aware that the cats were chasing each other around the house until I heard the CRASH! That certainly woke me up! Even as I was sitting up in bed, the younger cat dashed into the bedroom and DIVED under the dresser--I didn't think she could even fit, but she went under it with no problem. Much to my dismay, both insulators were broken; one of them so badly I had to replace it--fortunately it was a common one that was easily obtainable the next time I saw a fellow insulator collector.