Disabled cats have special talents

 

Minty, National Cat of the Year 2021 c. Cats Protection

At last! 

Disabled cats are being recognised, not just for their disabilities, but for their virtues and strengths. Cats with disabilities have something special to offer in the way of caring for humans. 

This is Minty, who was honoured by the human charity Cats Protection, for her valuable work caring for Connor, a boy with learning difficulties and cerebral palsy. Minty has only three legs but has nevertheless helped Connor learn to climb stairs. His empathy and calmness aids Connor when he suffers an emotional meltdown.

His adult female human says: "Having only three legs never stops Minty enjoying life, and I think that rubs off on Connor. Together they are unstoppable, whatever comes their way.  Minty's a really inspirational cat and we love him to bits."

Cats with disabilities in cat shelters are just waiting to adopt a suitable human. Don't pass them by.

Save a life for International Cat Day

It's International Cat Day and I have a message for all humans from my friend, Tilly. If you are lucky enough to have a cat in your life, celebrate this special day by doing one of four things:

• Donate some money to your local cat shelter
• Volunteer at your local cat shelter.
• Adopt a homeless adult cat - preferably an old one .
• Foster a homeless cat.

I am lucky enough to be a pedigree cat, but there are literally millions of cats, some of them starving and desperate, who need human help. 

Take my friend, Tilly. She was miserable and terrified  in a cat shelter where nobody had adopted her for almost a year. She had given up hope.

Now, eleven years later, she is happy and loved.

You can change a cat's life by doing just one of those four things today.

PS. Tilly was rescued by Sunshine Cat Rescue, a small charity in Oxfordshire, which is always short of money. If you can spare a pound or a dollar, please do. Click here

Human litterbox hygeine is pants.

Large clean litterbox

Which would you prefer? It's obvious, isn't it?

The bottom one is small, full of pee and poo, not very much litter and a horrible plastic sheet at the bottom that will interfere with digging.

Yet humans are still expecting us to use this kind of litterbox. They would be disgusted at a lavatory full of pee and poo. 

They think we will manage somehow! And many of us do, putting up with trying not to get our feet wet. Ugghhh. But it is not good enough. 

Box with deposits

Why are they so lazy? They are far better at getting rid of their own bowel and bladder deposits? Most of them flush regularly. Why be so idle about ours? 

Alas, the only way to get your human to be less slovenly is to pee or poo outside the box.  That'll show them.

Roads.... danger ahead

 I don't understand roads, so my human keeps me indoors, but many cats are allowed to roam free. They don't understand roads and cars either.

Cars are useful to them to shelter under in bad weather. But when they hurtle down the road,we can't judge their speed, so we usually just make a run for it. And that's dangerous.

Road traffic accidents are the number 1 reason for cat injuries, according to Agria insurance and it is the younger more confident cats exploring their territory who are most likely to be hurt.

It's time humans learned this. The most useful thing they can do is to make sure the cat flap is closed at night. That protects us quite a lot. Then there is the garden possibility, if we have a garden. Good fencing (details at www.icatcare.org) will keep us in but we still can have fun outside. It also keeps intruding cats out, which is a plus.

Some humans use reflective collars (though I don't like collars as they sometimes get caught and hurt cats). Others like me are kept indoors all the time and next week I will tell you how to make indoor life more enjoyable.

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.