Is coffee addictive for cats? Is it safe?

Dear George,
Last time I wrote you (if you recall) my female human tried to match her hair color to my eyes color. It didn’t work very well since she …naturally has blue eyes and having her hair in shades of blue…it wasn’t the best choice. So, this time she did her hair to match my …..hair! Aha! That’s right; her hair is beige with darker/brownish points! She really impressed me! To show my appreciation I start keeping her company while she was having her morning coffee!
Soon enough I was very much interested in WHAT was in her cup and she let me inspect! That’s how we started sharing a cup of coffee in the morning as you can see in the picture! I start drinking her coffee and I can tell she was worried but…I LOVE COFFEE! George, coffee has the same effect on me as catnip has on other cats – see the second picture! The other day I knocked-off the coffee maker trying to get to some coffee. George, I CAN KILL for an ESPRESSO! Do you think I’m coffee addict?
Is this serious? Should I check in a rehab? What do you think? Should I stop?
Tom


Dear Tom
Please retrain your owner! Coffee isn't good for cats. The caffeine in it can make them hyperactive. A very useful article on dangers to cats from human food is available from Sarah Hartwell, an expert veterinarian, on http://www.messybeast.com/bad-foods.htm There's another article about home poisons (without mentioning coffee) on www.fabcats.org
We cats are attracted to milk but even on its own that isn't good for many of us. We get diarrhoea from it. Pusskin, the fat cat who wrote in earlier this year, had a really dirty bottom due not just being too fat to reach it but, we think, probably from being given milk. Milk and fish diets were only given to cats because in the nineteenth century they were cheap. A diet of either on its own is not good for cats. But a century ago most cats went out mousing and supplemented the food given by humans anyway.
We cats are obligate carnivores, meaning that our whole digestive system is geared towards not meat, but the flesh, bone, skin and gut contents in the full carcases of mice, rats, small birds and a few insects such as locusts. (Not many of those here in Oxfordshire, alas, even in a good summer. Just a few tiny grasshoppers. I rather fancy trying the crunch of a locust - like pork crackling without the salt.) Unlike dogs, who are designed to be scavengers and eat decaying meat, or humans who are omnibores designed for meat and veg, we cats are designed for whole mice/birds only. We lack one of the liver enzymes which helps dogs and humans cope with getting rid of difficult substances from the body. We can be poisoned by aspirin, for instance, or other drugs that are safe for humans.
Recreational drugs? Yes, do catnip. Cats enjoy it and (with more sense than humans) are moderate users who know when to stop. So do catnip all you like. But don't do coffee. And stop your human enabling you by offfering it.
Tell her to buy some nice cat milk, specially formulated without the ingredient which causes tummy upsets, and give you some of that at breakfast. Of course, it's nice for humans to share breakfast with a cat. Humans have some sort of need to share, a need that we cats don't have. If she wants to share, she can drink some of the cat milk. Why not?
Love George.
PS. Tell her with purrs rather than claws. Any owner who dyes her hair to match her cat is a gem. And thank her for allowing me to use this letter. It is so helpful to get the message out there.

Am I the cat from outer space?

Dear George,

I’m the cat from nowhere and my name is CAT!

I simply appeared one sunny day in some people’s garden. I have no memories of my life before this occasion. They think I was few months old when I showed up in this tree in their garden.

However, I must have excellent training skills since my new human pets really behave.

If, in the beginning they were somehow afraid of me and debating if they should adopt me (ha! they were lucky I adopted them) now, after few months, they don’t talk or care about anything else but me!

George, could I possible be an extra-terrestrial cat? Am I an alien?

CAT

Dear CAT,

We cats all have the ability to appear from nowhere. One moment we are not there. The next moment we are there. The right kind of humans marvel at this feline ability. We can disappear within seconds and none of them know where we went or how we did it. This just one of our everlasting mysteries.

Are we aliens? Not really. Unlike them, we are embedded in nature. We are at one with the fields and the gardens and the shrubs and the trees. We can survive without humans (unlike dogs that are completely dependant on them) on uninhabited islands. We don't need human trash or human food to thrive. We are part of the mysterious animal world, that lives in the balance between species and between prey and predator.

Human kind are the alien species. They fight each other to the death (very rare in nature and very rare indeed among adult cats). They exterminate species from the face of the earth - the big cats of the new world, mammoths, giant sloths, the dodo and the passenger pigeon. They killed them all. And they blame us cats for killing birds when they are slaughtering thousands not one at a time, by concreting over the habitat, draining marshes and cutting down forests.

We do our best to civilise humans by adopting them. We hope, if they learn to love a small carnivore like us, they may become more tender hearted to the rest of nature. We try to educate them into the world of balance. We show them how to do less, notice more, and stop rushing, hurrying, and becoming slaves to money and status.

Thank you for adopting your humans, CAT. If they are beginning to love you, then you are bringing out the best in them. This species needs to learn to love. And we can help teach them.

Love George.

Save a black kitten today.

Dear George,
I am a Cats Protection kitten with no name yet, though my mother is called Angel. She was picked up in the street heavily pregnant and gave birth to me and my four black brothers. I am writing to ask you why I have had an offer of a home, while none of my brothers have been so lucky. It seems so unfair. They have lovely blue eyes like me and are just as friendly, but somehow they don't seem to appeal. What can we do to stop colour prejudice among cat lovers?
Love
Kitten.
Adopt Angel and her black kittens at West Oxfordshire CP

Dear Kitten,
You are right. It is very unfair. We black cats in Britain are often the last to find homes because somehow people don't find us as appealing as the other colours. We also get thrown out on the street more - so that there are more black cats out there trying to survive. Moreover, we are the last to be taken in (apart from Cats Protection who take in all cats that need a home). So the number of stray black cats increases while the number of coloured ones decreases.
It's even worse in the USA where black cats are thought to be unlucky. At Halloween stray black cats are handed in to protect them from being burned alive by Satanists - only to be put down in their thousands in shelters. If your human is going to rescue a black cat, make sure that it is handed into a no-kill shelter. Otherwise it might as well take its chances in the street. At least that is a life of sorts.
Here in the UK they are thought to be lucky - though it doesn't help much. There's also a theory that black cats are wilder by nature, though I think it is just that they get less cuddles as kittens. The prettier ones are picked up more - which makes them tamer.
We can't do much on our own. This is a problem where we need to educate humans. They can be educated. It takes time to get through to this dumb species but it is possible. In the 1990s US shelters were euthanasing about 70% of the cats handed in - the same proportion that were being euthanased in the UK in the 1970's. Nowadays all but about 10 are rehomed in the UK. No-kill shelters have changed the situation. For once, we can help the Americans by setting a good example.
Save a black kitten today.
Love George
Help stop the sick movies that show animals being crushed by signing the petition - there is a link on www.theanimalrescuesite.com

How to dazzle a human being

Dear George,

My name is Marti and I think I’m a gorgeous cat! I LOVE glamour! I love to be pampered and cared for.

I love “fame & glory”. I love sleeping on my human’s chest!

Hope no one will find this weird.

I’m a rescue from a local shelter. I was rescued by my human along with other two cats but, I’m the only one loving glamour. I’m the only one loving caviar and a sniff of champagne! I love shaggy covers

But I don’t think my human understands this. The other day I tried to shred my cover (see picture) into a “fluffier” one. It was taken as a bad thing.

George, only you, as a human behavior specialist can tell me how can I razzle-dazzle my human?

In awe

Marti

Dear Marti,

Wow. Champagne, caviar, you really do do the luxury life. You surely razzle dazzle me - and you are the right colour too. We black cats should stick together. I am a cat who is into huntin', rattin', and rabbitin' (sorry Harve), and if it wasn't for that I would ask you to come over some time - snip, or not!
Shredding. We all do it. We all love it. Personally I think Celia's curtains look all the better for their frilly ends. This very day she lunched with a fashionista who was wearing a shawl full of shredded bits. Just like the effect that I put the bed valance so successfully, when I wake her up with a well timed morning scratch.
I have to admit that the business of beautifully shredded furniture is something that we cats find instinctively and artistically satisfying. But I don't think any of us, no matter how good we are at communicating with humans, this simple minded species, has ever been able to explain the sheer beauty of it - the almost musical sound of the material tearing, and the aesthetically pleasing movement of the graceful downward strop, followed by the sheer exaggerated fluffiness of the resulting fabric. Wonderfully pleasing to the feline ear, paw and eye.
But they don't get it, Marti. They just don't understand it at all. Sometimes I think that they don't really have artistic natures. They are blind to beauty, impervious to scent, unable to distinguish the subtleties of body language, the minute alterations of the tail that mean so much...
I have also been unable to persuade Celia to pay attention to the zen patterns I draw on the litter inside the litter tray. I did a beautiful Japanese garden effect this morning. What did she do? Just scooped it out. But I love the stupid species. Somehow the sheer pathos of their limited abilities makes me fond of them.
Love
George
P. S. I haven't really answered your question on how to razzle dazzle humans, I suppose. Just be yourself, Marti. You are so purrrrfectly beautiful.

Victor Meldrew? Not any more now I am loved. Well, less grumpy!

Dear George
A few years ago your wretched secretary described me as a Victor Meldrew sort of cat (after the British TV series about a grumpy oldie). Maybe I was rather grumpy. I had spent a lot of time in catteries and then in rescue, so it was quite understandable that I used to swipe my claws at interfering humans. Yes, I admit it. I growled a lot too. It got them out of my space.
But, George, and this is the point of this letter, I am now a happy relaxed cat thanks to Louise who adopted me. Somehow when she came to Battersea Cat and Dog Home, she looked a sort of OK human - not something you can say about all of them. With a huge effort of self control, I refrained from biting her. And she took me home - forever.
It was rather a strain for me and I spent a few days under the bed. When I emerged I began to settle in and occasionally - just to please them - I will even sit on their lap. Do I bite and claw? Of course, I do, when I think they deserve it. But Louise is a sensible human who has learned to obey me. She occasionally has issues about how much space I leave for her in my bed (why doesn't she use one of the other 4 beds?) but otherwise has become a really good pet. And I am now training her mother in law, who doesn't like cats. I am working on her and she is coming round.
Regards, Louis

Dear Louis,
I remember the article in the Daily Telegraph and I recall thinking that Celia had perhaps been rather unfair on you. After all why shouldn't a cat in rescue be rather grumpy? It's no fun being banged up in a prison cell. Besides some of us cats just don't like humans very much and, alas, we have good reason for it. They abandon us in rescue centres and the worst ones just turn us out to starve on the streets.
I am glad that Louise has shaped up to become a good pet for you, Louis. Obviously, you were always going to be the sort of owner who demands a lot from their human, which probably meant that you spent more time than you ought in rescue. A word to all cats out there currently up for adoption, PRETEND to be nice. Deception pays off with these simple minded humans.
However, there are good humans like Louise who will take home difficult (in their eyes) cats. We need them.
Love George
PS. One of your fans says: "He looks a bit like a grumpy general with his white moustache and long whiskers and he leans on one elbow when he lies down or stretches out his front legs and crosses his paws over in front of him in what we call posh paws."