Purrlease... give oldies a home

 

Out there in cat pens there are hundreds of older cats that need homes. Brutally left without their humans, they will wait for months for a compassionate human to adopt them.

Fergus is a good example. He was brought into  an Oxford vet surgery by a kindly local woman. He was so thin that every single vertebra on his back was sticking out. He was starving to death.

He has lost his home when his owner died and was living rough at the age of about 11, definitely a geriatric age for cats. He could not have lasted much longer in the English winter.

The vets examined him, thought he was probably ill as well as starving and that the kindest thing to do would be to put him out of his suffering. Fergus gave deep throated purrs, rubbed himself against the staff, and generally showed he was a loving cat that wanted to live.

Sunshine Cat rescue in West Oxfordshire stepped in and paid for medical treatment - tests for diseases and dental work to pull out an infected tooth. Fergus meanwhile was eating as much as he possibly could!

Now he needs an adopter. He is eating three meals a day, and some extra dry food, putting on weight, and growing a glossy coat.

But he is in my spare room. And he's bored. And I don't want to live with another cat...

 

• If you can help find a home, share his photo from the website here - https://www.sunshinecatrescue.org.uk/adopt-cat/?catID=6190
  

 

Are you microchipped?

 

Are you microchipped? Of course you are. We feline bloggers are the lucky ones - up to date with our vaccinations, given regular vet care, and microchipped just in case.

Here in the UK about a third of cats are not. So if or when they get lost, there is no way of identifying their humans. If they are lucky enough to be picked up by a cat rescue organisation they just have to stay in a pen just hoping their humans will find out where they are.

Microchips also allow us to have a cat flap that closes against any feline intruders. This is so important for our mental health and feelings of security.

From June this summer it will be a legal requirement for all pet cats in the UK to be microchipped. All of them, whatever age and whatever their circumstances. There will be a fine of £500 for the humans who don't get this done.

I had my microchip put in when I was neutered - easily done and as I was out cold I didn't feel a thing. But even if I had been fully conscious it would have been no worse than what I feel with an injection.

If I could, I would microchip my human so I knew where she goes when she leaves the house. And then she could have her own security cat door to keep out burglars. But she is so stupid she won't do this.

Get yourself microchipped, if you don't already have one. Spread the word to dumb humans.

Are snowdrops dangerous?

My uncle George scratching

Are snowdrops dangerous to cats? My human was asked this last week and she didn't know the answer. One of her friends had read it in a news outlet - so it must be true.

Well, it was true... but only in theory. Do not let your human believe everything they read online.

Yes, snowdrop are potentially poisonous - the bulbs, that is. And what kind of cat is going to dig up snowdrop bulbs and eat them? A dog - well maybe. A cat - no.

When I go into the garden, I enjoy a good scratch on a tree; I enjoy sniffing where other cats have been; I look out just in case there is a mouse; I laze in the sun if there is any; but what I don't do is dig up things with my claws.

The only digging I might do is for toilet purposes. And I would never eat what I had dug!!

News outlets love bad news and scare stories. This is just one of the latest. 

Sometimes I think the human race has gone completely mad. Or perhaps they always were.

 

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/
  

Signs of stress in the shelter

 Many of my feline friends have found their forever homes after a spell in a cat shelter. Otherwise they would have continued to live rough on the street.

So shelters are good - but they are also very stressful for some of us. Most of us cats settle in fairly well and start to feel at home once we have rubbed our scent on the shelter surroundings and got used to strange noises, strange people and strange smells.

Most but not all. Some of us cats are particularly prone to stress and for us stressy cats time in a shelter can be hell - unless we have somewhere to hide.

So we do the best we can to hide. We close our eyes and pretend to sleep. Most humans think we are sleeping.

But the most intelligent humans can see that we are not - our bodies are tense and uptight, not relaxed and spread out, our feet are under our shoulders and firmly on the ground ready to run away, our ears are pointing downwards from anxiety, and every now and again we open an eye.

Here is a video of a cat pretending to sleep. Show it to your human, so that they can spot the signs. If they work in shelter, a cat who copes by pretending to sleep needs a hiding box.

Signs that I am stressed ... ears and eyes

 

This cat is stressed and fearful.

When I am stressed and a bit frightened, I lower my ears towards the side of my head. So there is a bigger space at the top of my head, between each ear. 

I might swivel them back a little too - if I think I might need to defend myself. That puts them out of the way of an attack from the front.

And my pupils grow large as I need to see exactly what is going on. The photo shows a cat that is crouched low too. 

All these signs should be noted by our humans, but some of them are very bad at reading what we are saying. Or they think that stroking us will calm us down when we are frightened. 

Just the reverse usually. If we are scared at a human who is looking at us, we might even nip them if they put out a hand to grope us.

Respect for our feelings is what we want from humans. We don't always get it because they are so ignorant.

• They might learn a bit more if they read the book I have written under a joint pseudonym!
  
  
  
  

Signs that I am stressed - the quick head shake

I need a quick head shake when I feel stressed - often when my human has stroked me too much and I need to regain my serenity. 

It's such a quick head shake that often humans don't notice it. Or they just think I am rearranging my fur.

But it's like the way humans sometimes wriggle their shoulders or do a quick sigh.  Or fiddle with their hair.

A sign that I want to get back to equilibrium. It makes me feel a little  bit better. 

I can't show this in a still photo - my human has tried and it is just too difficult. So she is posting a video at the end of this post. 

 

Signs that I am stressed - the tongue flick

 When I am stressed, I lick my nose - a quick flick of the tongue upwards. This is another example of our body language that humans cannot seem notice. They are very unobservant.

It's not the licking of lips, when I am finishing up a meal. When I lick my lips after a meal, I do several licks in succession or my tongue goes right round my mouth into the sides of the mouth to pick up any food fragments that have been left behind.

This kind of mouth licking takes much longer and is more thorough. The stress tongue flick is a single flicking move and quick. So quick that humans usually miss it. So quick that it only takes about two seconds or even less.

If you have a really good human pet, they will learn about the quick tongue flick. They will begin to notice it. And they will be on the way to understanding  you.

Signs that I'm stressed - the quick lick

Humans often miss what we are telling them. They don't understand our body language. Indeed, they often just don't even see it.

Many of us have humans that just don't understand us.

This is the shoulder lick, which we all do when we are feeling a bit uneasy, or a bit fearful, or we want to calm ourselves down a little. It's a quick turn to the shoulder, and a quick lick on the fur.

It's like the "phew" noise that humans make when they are getting to the end of something stressful.

It's quick. So quick that humans usually miss it. They just don't understand what we are saying. So quick that it only takes about five seconds or even less.

If you have a really good human pet, they will learn about the quick shoulder lick. They will begin to notice it. And they will be on the way to understanding  you.

How I survive New Year

I've put up with a lot from my humans lately - disrupted routine, strange humans coming into my house, cracker pulling noises, lap time ruined by too much human catnip drinking, and a Christmas tree that smelled of dog urine from being put outside on the pavement.

Now another "festive" time threatens -- New Year. There are two major horrors for cats - firework bangs and cracks, and humans drinking too much of their liquid catnip. It's a dire time for cats.

And some humans make it worse - they try to fish me out from under the bed where I am hiding from the noise. Or they stop me seeking my safe place high up in the wardrobe.

Just leave us cats alone, if we are hiding. That is the way we cope with firework noises or drunk humans.  

Oh yes, and tempt us in early so that we are safely inside the house when it all starts up. Close the cat flap. Keep us safe.

One bit of fun to get revenge.... The morning after New Year's Eve, wake your hungover humans early by purring noisily in their ear. It never fails to upset them.

Cat video travels from outer space.

 

A cat video (my human is a cat video addict) have now been beamed to the earth from outer space... well, why not? What other video would be sent?

It's another first for cats. We get everywhere. Every single place on Earth has cats - even above the arctic circle or on uninhabited islands. So space is not that new for us. We are natural explorers.

The spacecraft Psyche, currently 19 million miles away from Earth, sent the video starring Tater the cat. Psyche was launched in October and is on her way to metallic asteroid, circling the sun between Mars and Jupiter. You can read the whole story here.

And you can see the cat video here. Or, if for some odd human reason, you are more interested in space travel than cats, you can read about the mission here.

Think about this, when your human is being particularly annoying, refusing to let you put your nose into the Christmas cake basin or not giving you a single bit of the raw turkey innards. 

The first ever video from outer space showed Tater the cat. So we can afford to feel smug this Christmas.

Seven ways to enjoy the Christmas tree

Here are some ideas of how to have fun with the Christmas tree.

• Climbing. We indoor cats don't have much chance to climb. Make the most of this opportunity. 
• Aim high. Get to the summit. It's fun when the tree topples over.
  
• Baubles. They are small and light and shiny. Such fun to poke.  If you are lucky one will fall off and you can bat it round the room.
• Twinkly lights on the tree. If you poke one of these, the others often start to move. Have fun. 
• Electric wires on the little lights. There's something intriguing about wires and string.  Grip with your teeth and pull.
  
• That pine odour stirs your instincts... will it make you want to mark the tree? Purrhaps....
  
• Some trees have been left on the pavement and have been marked by passing dogs. You MUST spray your own scent to get rid of theirs.

And when it all crashes to the ground, you have had a happy Christmas. Your devoted human will simply put everything back and you can start again.

• Still time to order this from Amazon. I like to help my human! Scroll down here and you can buy two different books by her in a package.