When all else fails - try a fly.

Hunting is what I like best but as an indoor-only cat I don't have many chances. I have been unable to purrsuade my human to supply living mice for me.

She just won't. She used to keep them as pets, and she thinks mice are rather nice.

Instead she plays games with me using a fishing rod toy. Now this is OK, but a fishing rod toy is not a mouse. And when I catch it, there is nothing to kill.

She tried lazer lights too. I quite liked these but I found them even more frustrating than the fishing rod toy. With the toy I could grab it and rake it with my back legs even if I couldn't give the kill bite. But with a lazer there was nothing to grab.

And besides, she never gives me enough play time.d

So I I decided it would have to be flies. Bluebottles, ordinary house flies, are best. They are big enough to see properly and when you catch them they are crunchy.

You can still enjoy being a serial killer, even if your victims are just small insects.

Wasps, those insects that are yellow and stripey, are a mistake. A big mistake. Bite a wasp and you find yourself in the vet's surgery. 

Why play matters....

 I play, therefore I am a cat.

I play when I am relaxed and feeling safe. I DON'T play if I am feeling stressed, or angry, or frightened or just hungry. So play is a way humans can recognise feline happiness.

It's also the way humans can recognise an unhappy cat. A cat that cannot or will not play is not relaxed and may be anxious or stressed.

Play is almost as good as hunting. Yes, I know that we house cats don't need to hunt for food any more. But the hunting instinct is designed to make us feel intensely absorbed and fully alive.

We indoor cats don't have the chance to hunt, but play is the next best thing to hunting. It exercises our body, interests our mind and fulfills the hunting instinct. It's not the social play with another cat: it's playing with a cat toy or some little object.

This is a book which will help your human give you the best chance for happy relaxed play. It's written by one of the best cat researchers in the world.

Get your human to read it.

 

• The author also has a terrific blog at https://whatyourcatwants.com/
  

An annoying human invention

 

My friend Tilly hunting in long grass

Wretched humans are destroying our way of life. We cats like hunting and we enjoy bringing home our prey through the cat flap to show off to our humans.

We would like congratulations from them but we usually get shrieks and dismay. We can live with that. Actually it is quite fun to see their reactions.

But now that fun is about to stop. Some horrible human scientists have come up with a cat flap that stops us from coming into the house with a mouse or a rat. It's so clever that it reads our face and can tell if there is something in our mouth.

What will they come up with next to ruin out lives?

Triumphant Toby brings home a rat to show off

Stop your human now! otherwise it will take an interest and join the early stages of this puritanical invention at kickstarter.

We have the right to  bring out prey home! Stand up for this!

Play is more than just play

This is natural play with a dead mouse

Play isn't just play. It's important for our feline mental health, especially if we are indoor cats. We need it. 

It exercises not just out bodies but also our minds when our humans play fishing rod games with us. We can stalk and pounce and bat the toy on the end as if we were hunting.

I hunt a little bit indoors anyway. I hunt flies on the window pane and any other kind of insects indoors. I pounce on spiders and butterflies when I get the chance. I even eat them occasionally.

This is the same play with a toy indoors

But that's not enough because my human has such a tidy apartment with so few insects in it. I need more. I love chasing toys on the kitchen floor and I absolutely adore fishing rod games. 

So purrlease play with me. It's the theme for International Cat Day which is coming up soon. Find out more https://icatcare.org/international-cat-day/

 

Archeological cats

It's not widely known but we cats have long had an interest in archeology particularly in countries with a feline friendly climate like Italy. There is rarely an archeology site that does not have a resident cat or cats.

Take Herculaneum for instance. A feline guide is available for cat-human encounters. She enjoys human company and is willing to engage in shared meals whenever possible. 

The local human cat lovers have ensured that she is neutered and those employed on the site make sure there is regular cat food and water available.

It's a great lifestyle. Dry shelter in the roofed Roman houses, plenty of lizards on the walls to catch, and of course rodents are available. 

Best of all, there is freedom in being a community cat, not a house cat. Freedom to roam all round the site. Freedom to ignore tourists or to engage with them.

Why I bit you.....

Dear Human, 

Yes, I normally like being stroked by you. Indeed, I choose to sleep on your lap sometimes. But yesterday I bit you. Want to know why? There are several possible reasons. 

•  I bit you, because I am frightened of you.
  

• I bit you because you went on petting me too long. I mean I like to be petted and stroked for a few minutes but not seemed like hours. So I gave you a little warning.

• I bit you because you touched my tummy. You know I don't like my tummy being touched.

• I bit you because you touched my shoulder, where there is a hidden abcess that HURTS. Do something.

• I bit you, because you interfered with a cat fight. That was not a good idea.

• I bit you because I was furious with the neighbour cat that I could see out of the window, and then you picked me up from the window sill. So I bit you instead of that cat.

• I bit you because I am in pain. I am old, cranky and got awful arthritis. No it is not just old age. I need painkillers.

• I bit you because I want to hunt mice and you are the next best thing. I was hunting you and it was good fun. For me.

• I gave you just a teeny weeny nip to remind you that it is time I was fed. See to it.
  
  

Dumb humans call cats psychopaths.

 Humans shoot rabbits:nobody calls them psychopaths.

 All cats are somewhat psychopathic? So say the human newspapers in a gross slur on cats. Read it here. Psychopathic? Ridiculous. A typical example of dumb humans loading their preconceptions on to the feline species.

I am so cross about this that I would like to write a letter to the newspaper. But my paws just won't work correctly. What can I do? Well I could nip, bite or scratch to express my feelings of frustration against the human race.

Their "thinking" (if you can call it that) goes like this. Human psychopaths are 1) predatory: 2) manipulative and 3) without empathy. We cats are all those things because we have to be, living with humans.

Predatory? Yes. I catch mice and rats. This is what we do as cats. It is how we survived before the advent of cat food in a bowl. So we catch birds? They eat birds like chicken and turkey and duck.

Manipulative? Yes. How else am I going to get my human to do what I want? Or how else am I going to stop them doing what i don't want?  So I purr, rub, or nip or bite. It is my only option since I can't use the human language.

Without empathy or callous? Not fair. I try to understand their feelings, but they express them in such an odd way. They just keep blahblahing at me but I can't understand their language. Their vocalisations are too complex: their body language is not at all expressive: and they hide their natural body scent communications by standing under water, adding artificial scents and flushing away the urine and faeces which I could otherwise get a message from.

There are times when I despair of dumb humans. They are so STUPID.

Brian the cricketer cat.

I am not sure I understand cricket, though I think it's like hunting balls rather than mice.

Only cricket balls are very hard indeed. I couldn't pick one up in my mouth: though I could bat it with my paw, I suppose. 

But if you asked me whether the bowler was bowling a dibbly dobbly or bowling a googly, I couldn't tell you. And I'm not sure what is out for a duck, though it sounds quite tasty.

But Brian knows. He understands what is going on.

Brian, the ginger cat, is a regular attender at Somerset County Cricket ground. He enjoys watching the game, taking part in cricket teas, and socialising with the players.

And they love him so much they are going to build a house for him. A local building supplies firm, Bradfords, will do the work. One of their employees explained: "We know how loved Brian is within the Somerset County cricket community, so when we were approached to get involved, the answer was yes." 

Nobody knows where he comes from so now he has a new home.

Meowzat!

 

 

Tossing the mouse - the importance of play

 

This is the sport I like best - mouse tossing, shown in a good photo of the late Toby. The mouse is dead, but Toby is playing with it, tossing it into the air and then pouncing on it.

Why it's such fun is that it is part of our hunting repertoire, hard wired into us so that we carnivores can survive.  Hunting isn't just what we do: it's what we are. And this kind of playing is part of it.

Some of us claim that playing with prey before killing it is "dazing" it, ie tiring it out so that if we make a mistake with the kill bite and don't finish it off, it will be too tired to bite us back. Or that, in the case of unusual prey like rats or snakes, it allows us to assess how to deliver that final bite. Other cats say that only well-fed cats waste time with this sort of thing: wild and feral cats just get on with the important business of killing and eating their next meal.

My uncle George used to hunt live mice and rabbits, but my more scholastic life has meant that I don't have a good hunting field. So I have to put up with small artificial mice, little bits of scrunched paper, or small stuff like a bit of dried pasta or a bean that can be shunted round the kitchen floor.

The point of this play is that the mouse/bean must move. Static prey doesn't do it for us. So we poke and toss to get that movement which sets off our hunting reactions.

Whether it's a real mouse or just a substitute for one, there is nothing cats like better than playing in this way. Purrlease, humans, don't just give us the toys: throw them for us.

 

Ophan kittens - not just milk but mothering.

Mouse and Moley

Orphan kittens are sometimes handed into rescue and people try to bring them up on the bottle. The milk is the easy part: but the mothering is the difficult part. How will they learn to be a cat without having a mother to teach them? We cats need to grow up to be cats, not furry humans. (And who'd want to be a human anyway....)

Special milk

Mother cats teach their babies what to eat, help them to pee and poo, teach them to hunt, and give them the careful mothering they need. They groom the babies until the babies are ready to groom themselves in a way they learn from mother. They give them milk then when it is time to stop, they begin to close the milk bar. This teaches kittens to eat solid food but it also teaches that they don't always get what they want. That way they learn to tolerate frustration.

The best way to bring up orphan kittens is to put them on a lactating female that already has kittens or to keep them with their mother but bottle feed them. If humans can't do this, then they must keep the babies together or even (if they can) find an adult cat who will "mother" them without milk. 

Can't do that? Well make sure that these kittens go to a home where there are no other cats. Bottle fed cats may be more likely to be loners.

•  If you are feeding orphan kittens read this article -
  *Little, S., (2013), “Playing mum: Successful management of orphaned kittens,” Journal of Feline Medicine and Surgery, 15, 201-210.

Whoohoo. The precision strike.

I can jump nine times my own height from a standing start. Beat that, humans! You never will. Even at Olympic games, humans can do nothing as strong and powerful as this.

Why do it?

For hunting in the long grass, of course. If we just pushed through the grass, the mouse would get away. So we leap up and over, with our front paws tucked in to help the jump, then pushed forward at the last minute to grab the mouse. It's called the fore foot strike.

We also use the high jump up, to help us escape on to high places away from dogs and other dangers. 

These photos are blurry because my human was caught by surprise and failed to change her camera settings. But there is a longer video showing my friend Toby on her Youtube channel here.

You will see how carefully we have to shift our weight, poise, and sometimes give a little wiggle just before we launch ourselves into the air. Front legs tucked in on launching, back legs then tuck in, and front push forward just before landing to grab the prey.

It's a precision strike - anything less would lose our prey. 

This is just another example of cats' superiority to humans. Powerful muscles, amazing control, precision and power..... ours, not theirs.

• More examples of feline superiority here.
  
  

 

Human panic and cat freedom.

We outdoor cats are so lucky. Unlike our humans we go outdoors on long hunting expeditions like Sam in this video.
They can't
This week they tried to stop us going out. According to the media, the British Veterinary Association ruled that all cats should stay indoors. We mounted an online feline protest. The BVA website crashed. And then - surprise, surprise - they bowed to feline internet power.
Their advice was modified... You can read it here.
Now they admit that it is only cats in households with Covid 19 that should be kept indoors. 
Purrsonally I think it's a typical human fuss. The chances of picking up the virus from my fur are nil -- I refuse to be picked up or cuddled by strangers.
So humans, listen up. You cannot catch the virus directly from your cat..... 
I am a cat and I go where I choose.

• To learn more about idiotic humans buy my book here.

Rat delivery to the isolated

 This week I did my best to help my isolated human. She has been having difficulties with online food deliveries so I set up my own rat delivery system.
I delivered two delicious rats. I couldn't resist a nibble so one of them was only half a rat. 
I put this one on my human's bed, where she would find it after her boring breakfast of porridge. Better than bacon I thought.
I was wrong. She shouted in anger and threw it away.
Maybe she didn't like being given the lower half, I thought.
So I went and got a second one, a whole one, still half alive, and delivered it to the living room.
Young, tender, still warm - it looked good on the red carpet.
I was proud of my efforts.
Was she pleased? No. This time she screamed, pushed it into a bucket with a stick and threw it in the hedge.
Humans don't do gratitude.

• To learn more about human behaviour get my book here.

Help humans - bring a mouse indoors for them

Cats hunt, humans just stand around doing nothing

Indoor- only humans are finding it difficult to adapt. We need to help them find  more to do. I suggest teaching them to hunt properly.
Till now their idea of hunting has been to go out in the car and bring back not just food but unwanted stuff - clothes, shoes, gadgets etc. Just stuff. There is no fun in it.
Let's teach them to hunt properly. I started last night bringing in a live mouse. I released it in the living room - my human was activated immediately, shooed me out of the room and shut me outside.

So, to make things easier, I brought one in dead. She simply threw it out.
No playing with it. No great interest in it. Just a desire to get rid of it. 
She didn't even nibble at it.
Next I left a rabbit on the steps. Again no interest. She threw it into the hedge. Have I given up? No. 
Next week I am going to see if I can interest her in a something more lively - a rat. 

• Find out more about humans by reading my book here. 

Humans have put out moonlight

The excitement of moonlight nights... the hoot of the owl, the footfall of a passing fox, and the ear twitch of grazing rabbits keeping out of its way. Humans miss all of this. They are blinded to the beauty and the thrill of it.
The songs and poems may talk about moonlight: but they don't practise what they preach.
Their eyes don't work properly in the dark so they fear it. Instead they light up their houses at nightfall and light up the streets, themselves, with street lamps. 
The beauty of the moon disappears under a tide of artificial glare.  
The time that means most to wild animals, and to us cats, is the twilight and the dawn. They cower in their houses at those times, watching TV and ignoring Nature herself.
They have put out the light of the moon. 


For more cats versus humans rule read here....   

Why humans cannot pounce.

Toby demonstrates the high pounce

"Four legs good: two legs bad!" is a slogan invented by a human as a sneer in a work of fiction. Actually, it's a good slogan for all of us quadrupeds. It's actually true....
What do we gain by four legs? For a start,  increased stability, the ability to manage on only three legs if we lose one in an accident and more power to the back legs. We jump high and land so gently that we can grab a mouse at the same time.
If humans do a high jump, they land in a heap. They can't pounce properly.
The only advantage they gain are hands with fingers and thumbs. Good for opening cat food tins and envelopes, I guess. While we can carry only one mouse at a time in our mouths, they could carry two - one in each hand. Only they don't.

 Coming shortly

They don't have our front paw sensitivity. We can feel a small rodent moving in the grass with our front paws and we can feel the texture of surfaces where we walk. We can walk silently. 
Ever seen a human trying to stalk silently? It's pathetic. Their immobile feet plonk down on the earth's surface so heavily that any decent animal can hear or feel this for yards and yards. And because they have to stand on their back legs, they cannot slink properly either.
Hopeless for slinking. Hopeless for pouncing. But good for opening cat food containers.

Dear George,

It’s me, Gizmo, again! I took your advice and left the postman alone but some days can be a real drag! Boooooring! So, I was thinking how could I have some fun? What should I do? Then boom! I got this brilliant idea to catch and bring inside a little mouse – just for entertainment!  Well, it didn’t go as planned because it happened that mummy was home that day!
Her reaction when I left the mouse free in the house? Priceless! I’m “meowing out loud” as you can see in the photo attached. First she jumped up on a chair and then she started “negotiating” with the mouse (with a childish voice): mouse, please don’t jump on me!
Please, go away! Let’s go out – I’ll give you some cheese”! I was speechless (still laughing)! Who has ever heard a human talking to a mouse? Definitely not the mouse! The poor thing got so scared that it run and hid! That’s when my troubles started! Mummy looked at me furious and said: now, you stay here and catch that mouse and take it out! Wow! She meant it!
She was fuming! So, now I have to be up all night and find the mouse! And God forbid to harm it because my mummy is a big animal rights advocate! She’ll never forgive me! George, how the heck am I going to take that damn mouse out without harming it? Any advice please?
In trouble,
Gizmo

Dear Gizmo,
We have all tried to please our humans by giving them a present of a mouse. Or a rat. Or even a bird. We have done our best to please them. It just doesn't work. Ever. So stop trying.
What do you do next? You wait till 3am and then start hunting carefully hoping to sniff out the mouse. Then you settle down to ambush it. When you have caught it, as you will if not the first night then the second or third, do NOT take it to show your human.
Humans react very badly indeed when we jump on the bed with a mouse in our mouth... very badly indeed. They may become violent. And the mouse may escape again.
Admittedly this gives you the pleasure of recatching it for the third time, but your relationship with your human will suffer badly. So dispose of that mouse quietly. Preferably eat it. Or if you want to eat only half, leave the other half outside if possible.
Yours sympathetically
George

Cattack alert... when the postman knocks!

Dear George,
I'm laughing my head off - the story I'm going to tell you. It is too funny.
Recently my human provided me with a cat flap(which was much overdue, by the way.) Coincidentally, we got a new postman too! And, that's how it all started.
I was sunbathing on my porch when I saw the new postman coming with the mail. 
He looked around and saw the cat flap, looked around again and then he bent forward and slipped the mail inside through the cat flap…then he rang twice. Wow! He definitely wasn’t Jack Nicholson nor did Jessica Lange come to open the door!  Why he rang the bell twice I have no idea. Anyway, he did exactly same thing for the next few days. Since it seemed to me that he either hasn’t noticed our mail box or has chosen to ignore it I decided to play a little game with him! Next day I stayed indoor waiting for him. The minute he slipped the mail in I bit his hand! He startled so easily that he forgot to ring the bell. The following day I was again on the porch waiting for him. I saw him coming down the street (he didn’t see me) – this time he was carrying a stick in his hand! I was so curious to see what he’ll do with that stick! OMG! You won’t believe it! He used the stick to open the cat flap and slipped in the mail! Aha, okay! So next day I “clawed” his stick J I don’t know what he thinks but since that day he leaves the mail in front of the door and does not ring the doorbell anymore! George, I know I misbehaved and I’m still laughing about it but how could he not realize that…that was a cat flap? What should I do now? Tell mummy of my misbehaving or should I sit on top of the mail box meowing so I’ll bring it to his attention? Maybe he is a good man who has never seen a mailbox in his life? 
Puzzled but laughing
Gizmo

Dear Gizmo,
The post is good fun. It comes through a cat flap or a letterbox just like a mouse pokes its head out of a hole. Attacking it is almost as good as hunting a mouse. Look how these Youtube cats enjoy it - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5lkucdrVuA Better still attacking the post gets your human's attention. They laugh.
Tempting though they are, postperson's pink fingers should not be attacked. Concentrate on the mail. If you do hurt the postmen they may refuse to deliver - like the case of Bella here 

So have fun.
Cheers
George

Cats and the Easter bunny

Dear George,

I’m in talks with some friends and family (as you can see in the photo attached – I’m the one with the red collar) to form a trade union or a labor union as it is called in the USA! After my humans’ deceiving behaviour last week I decided to protect my group’s members’ interests and improving wages in the form of more treats/steaks per capita, hours of sleeping to be extended to 18 hours per day and better sleeping conditions that absolutely require master bedrooms to be available to us non-stop! 
Even if it really doesn’t matter what we do for a living, there’s a union with members who do the same thing. You might wonder what is our specific “trade” or skills that I want to protect. Well, one thing for sure is hunting. We are born hunters! So why are the humans trying to stop us from doing what comes naturally for us? If I catch a little bird or a little mouse my Mom is screaming out loud as she’s trying to get my prey out of my mouth! Phew! Unbelievable!
And the last deceiving act of my humans? They brought home a chocolate bunny and few chocolate chicks! This is not fair at all! Cats do not eat chocolate yet my Mom is telling me that we should have compassion and only eat fake bunnies! Really? What about the turkey she eats? Or that roasted beef?
You know what George? I’m having second thoughts - I want back that little bunny I hunted few days ago that she made me let go free! Very upsetting!  Anyway, wishing all cats & their humans:

A Happy Easter and a juicy roast!

Tommy

Dear Tommy,

The sheer hypocrisy of humans never fails to astound me! They sit down and gorge themselves on meat - beef, lamb, chicken, turkey, even pheasant. Here in the UK there are human hunters who shoot bunnies.  But when we bring in a simple little mouse for our dinner, they try to take it off us. 

My friend Toby pouncing high

The height of hypocrisy are humans who pursue foxes with a whole pack of dogs. They kill the fox and do not eat it. Yet when we play with mice, they condemn us for doing this before or without eating our prey. They are blind to their own faults and unfailingly critical of us when we behave like they do. They really have no moral compass.

A feline trades union? It probably won't work, Tommy. And don't be tempted by that chocolate bunny. Chocolate can kill cats. Just keep on hunting the real thing and stop bringing them home! I suggest finishing it off and eating it quietly just the other side of the cat flap or underneath a nearby bush in the garden where she cannot see you.
Enjoy your meal.
Yours
George

Cats and birds - yum yum

Dear George,
I have mixed feelings and I don’t know what to do! I need your help!Here is my story: lately my mummy started bringing home people and cats; human guests who stayed for too long (if you care to ask me) and few cats she fostered for a shorter time.
There must be something wrong with mummy! Why does she think she have to help everybody and anybody? What could she possibly be missing in her life if she has me? What? Last night I’ve heard her talking with a friend and promising she’ll look over her two birds if she’ll bring the cage over to our house (while her friend will be travelling overseas). She even promised her friend that I’ll be a good girl and become friends with the birds! Phew! How could I befriend a bird?
George, I love my mummy very much! Should I be honorable and tell her honestly that I’ll never befriend a bird or should I keep quiet and enjoy the “accidental” but juicy dinner? Would she learn her lesson then? What do you think?
Shumba

Dear Shumba,
Aren't humans dumb! Cats do not befriend birds. We hunt them. It is in our DNA. Has she ever seen you looking longingly out of the window at passing birds? I think she ought to take a closer look - your body tense with hunting desire and your eyes in a hard stare. It's not the look of a cat that wants to cuddle up with a bird. 
Here's a photo of one of Celia's foster cats, Boomer, looking at birds on the windowsill. You can't see his eyes but you can perhaps see how (despite being fat) he is craning his body round to get as close to the bird on the left as he can. Believe me, Boomer didn't want to befriend that blue tit. He wanted to grab it!
All in all, Shumba, I would just let her go ahead. Why waste the chance of having some juicy prey put right in your reach! 
Have fun with the birds.
Yours
George