Do cats mourn? The loss of scent harmony

 

Do we mourn, when we lose a feline or a human friend? Of course, we do. Some of us go round the house looking for the missing friend: others sink into depression.

Of course, if it was a cat with whom we were not friendly, we probably go round looking for them - to make sure that they have left forever. Then we can take their place on the bed or under the warmest radiator of the house.

Any change is upsetting, of course. The scent profile of the house, so important to our feelings of security and harmony, changes. This family scent is made up of our signature scent, the scent of all the house occupants and of the house itself. We make it by rubbing ourselves against places, people and other cats - both depositing and picking up scent.

Any change is upsetting. Sometimes it leads to conflict between us remaining cats. The missing signature scent of the departed may have been a bridge between us and an acquaintance we did not care for. Now the bridge is missing, hostilities begin...

So like humans we may experience not just loss but also anger.  And that too is part of mourning.

PS. My blog was omitted last Saturday in respect of the mourning for Queen Elizabeth 11.

Liz, the lastest Larry rescue pet

 

Larry, the Downing Street Prime Cat, has a new rescue human called Liz. It is his latest attempt to find a pet worthy to live in Downing St.

It's been really hard to find one that hasn't got behaviour problems. It started well with Dave, who seemed to understand his role as companion animal to Larry. 

The only problem was that there were three in the relationship - Cleggie being the third. Admittedly even Cleggie seemed to realise this menage a trois wasn't working out so he left for the USA.

Larry and Dave settled down well - until Dave disappeared. So next time Larry tried to find a better rescue and came up with Theresa. She had a taste for leather trousers, and two unfortunate human pals, but she too disappeared.

The worst pet of all was Boris. There were terrible behaviour problems - drinking in number 10, caterwauling in the  Downing St flat, lack of truth in the meows. It was chaos and, to make everything worse, a dog with a personality disorder.

Now Larry is trying again. Will Liz become the purrfect pet? 

I can only cross the digits on my front paws and hope.

What my ears hear....

 

My ears are the amazing. I can hear more from low to high- pitched sounds than any other warm-blooded animal that human scientists have tested. My hearing range is remarkable.

At the low range my hearing is about what would be expected from a small animal. But what is unexpected is the high pitched sounds that I can hear.  I can hear the tiniest little squeaks of small rodents and insects. 

What usually happens to animal hearing is that the higher an animal can hear, the less it can hear at lower pitch.  But that's not happened to us cats. We can hear low and we can hear high.

It's obviously why we need to hear high pitched sounds. These are the sounds in the undergrowth that alert us to mice, rats and other rodents. These are our prey in the wild.

But why do we need to hear the relatively low sounds? That may be because we have a dual role in life. We are hunters and predators but we are also prey to larger animals. We may need to hear the low sounds to keep us safe from animals like coyotes and dogs. 

We are both prey and predator.

 

I think therefore I purr

Human scientists have had the audacity (and stupidity) to say that cats don't think. That we are mindless beings just driven by instinct  and unable to solve problems.

Sometimes it is difficult to grasp the full stupidity of the human mind!

Of course we think. We learn, don't we? We learn how to hunt rabbits. We learn that if we wind ourselves round the human legs and purr loudly, we may get a treat.

We learn to avoid the neighbour's horrible yapping dog. And we work out how to sneak into the cat flap four doors down, where the owner provides ad lib food for their own cat - which we then steal. 

We learn to recognise the name that a human gives us. When they call us, we turn our heads to see why - if we are not too busy. Sometimes, just sometimes, we even come when called.

Do we think? Of course we do. And it humans thought a little better than they do, they'd know that.

 

What could be more beautiful?

What could be more beautiful than a cat? This is Holly, an ordinary black cat. Nothing special about her. No pedigree. No extraordinary colouring. Not particularly long hair. Just an ordinary cat.

But what is ordinary about a cat.? What is ordinary about her? Just look at the grace of her body, the curve of her paw, the gloss of her coat, and the linear loveliness of her tail.

August 6, tomorrow, is National Cat Day. Humans can celebrate it  by celebrating the beauty of all cats. Not just the special ones, not just the ordinary ones, but also the scruffy ones, the elderly ones, the starving ones and the disabled cats. 

So, if you can, give a pound or a dollar to your local cat rescue, and next time you want a cat, adopt a rescue cat. 

We cats say thank you.