Careers for cats - archeology.

Want a career in archeology? Felines can apply in Italy. These are jobs for cats that earn their food by rat catching. Not just strays, but cats with a career.

Take Augusto of the Coliseum, for instance. Augusto is so popular that he got too fat. Visitors would forget the ruins and start photographing and feeding him too many treats. His fat photo (taken by guide Carmelo Carubba) can be seen here.

Then there is the tabby and white cat of Pompeii. Much photographed near the restaurant, where she finds her daily cat food. And of course the cats in the Torre Argentina cat sanctuary.

Among Temples A, B, and D they can be found snoozing in the sunlight, or getting visitor attention on the walkways. They are the cats that have special needs which make adoption difficult and they can be "adopted" at a distance here.

As a much loved cat with a pet human, I don't fancy archeology. Though the rats sound great, and the visitors show proper admiration, I prefer lying under a radiator than lying under a Roman column!

Not for me the marble floors of a ruined temple. Give me the carpets of a human home! It's a pity that there are rarely rats, but the armchairs and beds make up for it.

Purring and its meanings

 

 

Hear Tilly purring here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMH0Q-3hEcw

 

We purr, therefore we are. Yet the purr means different things, depending on what is happening around us. 

An example of the happy relaxed purr can be found here It is my friend, Tilly, being stroked. Yet we also purr (with a tiny cry inside the purr) when we want something. Purrhaps when we want food from our humans.

And finally, some of us purr when we are at the veterinary surgery. It's a way of trying to soothe our anxiety and it may even help our pain.

But how do we make this low noise? We are only small animals and small animals make high rather than low noises? Scientists used to think we were moving the muscles of our voicebox or larynx.

Now they think it may be because we have pads on our vocal chords which press together and then start vibrating automatically, making this low noise.

Aren't we wonderful?

 

• To learn more about us buy Being Your Cat here
  
  
  
  

The oldies need you.....

Elderly Maggie waits for someone to love her.

When we get old and our fur becomes tatty, we need kind humans to help us. Especially if we are in a shelter waiting for a home.

We can't look beautiful when we have arthritis and our fur gets a bit rough, in those areas where we can't groom it.

We can't look graceful, if our aches and pains stop us jumping up high or being athletic.

We can't catch the adopters' eye if we are sleeping rather than playing. And we do sleep a lot.

We can give love. But only if a human recognises that we want to be a loving pet, rather than an old cat stuck for weeks and weeks in a pen waiting.

So please adopt the elderly.

I'm a tiger....

 

A domestic Bengal cat not a leopard!

We cats really are tigers -- small ones but nevertheless tigers. Or lions if you prefer. Tiny leopards in your kitchen?

Why?

Because we all have the same body plan and we all do the same thing - prey on other animals and eat them. We are totally carnivorous - "obligate carnivores" is the phrase.Or, you could say, serial killers.s

An evolution expert, Anjali Goswami, has said that we cats are perfect. We may vary in size but we don't change our shape and lifestyle pattern because we don't need to. 

Want to learn more? Read this interview in Scientific American. She says: Cats have nailed this one thing so well that they all do it and just come up with slightly different sizes. That’s why they’re perfect, evolutionarily. They don’t need variation."

There is one difference, however. Bit cats roar. We domestic cats purr. 

Which makes us even more purrfect....

I am not a vegan....

 

Stupid, stupid humans! A ridiculous bit of "scientific" research says cats are healthier on a vegan diet... though the statistics themselves say nothing of the kind.

We are not vegans. We are carnivores. We have to eat meat to stay healthy. What is more we are totally carnivorous - obligate carnivores. Unlike humans who are omnivores and can live on a vegan diet as long as they take supplements.

What do we cats have to do to make humans stop being so silly. We need meat. We enjoy meat. Food matters to us. We will slowly sicken and die if we don't get what our body needs.

Humans, don't believe that nonsense. Feed us proper cat food, which will include meat as protein. And feed us the food that comes from respectable providers, not some jumped-up firm importing bad stuff from China.

If you don't believe me, ask a vet. 

This is a reliable blog. Some are not. Let's say it one more time....

CATS ARE NOT VEGANS.