Cat Chit Chat

Camila Elle, a model with 61,000 Instagram followers says that she spends far more on her three cats and a dog than on herself. She says that she thinks nothing of spending a fortune for their dinner. "I'll think nothing of dropping $500 on something really tasty for their dinner but I’ll only have cheap noodles." Overall, she has spent more than $200,000 on her four companion animals. One of her cats is on Prozac for anxiety. The 3 cats are named Tuumi, Miso and Tigger and her dog is Zed. She says that she earns a seven figure sum annually. She buys them the best of everything. She loves them more than anything in the world and they are her life. Yuumi and Elle. Photo: Elle on Instagram. Two of her cats are purebred, one is a Persian (Misco) who cost her $2000 and the other is a British Longhair (Yuumi) who also cost $2000. These two cat breeds have very similar appearances if you compare the traditional Persian with the British Longhair. Her dog was also bought from

This is a deliberately provoked attack by the kitten's owner on her hand. You can see her offering her hand to the kitten in a way which is bound to provoke an attack, in my view. The owner knows this and expects it. She films the action as it unfolds.  Screenshot. Sorry for the poor quality. This is great and all very well. However, this wouldn't work for an adult cat because she would be hurt. If you have an adult cat clinging onto your arm and hand like that they will rake your arm with their hind legs and bite your hand in their jaws. The prey killing behaviour of a domestic cat. This kitten is killing their owner's hand. 😊 You're going to get injured to a certain extent dependent upon the athleticism and commitment of the individual cat. And of course it depends upon how keen on hunting the cat is. Some domestic cats are quite mild-mannered and not that interested in hunting while others, such as my cat, are very adept hunters and enjoy hunting every day.  I ap

The title comes from a tweet. It's good but of course all cats are adorable and some might be described as 'clingy'. However, I'm not sure that it is fair or reasonable to describe a domestic cat is "clingy". It's a negative or derogative term. It means that they want to be in contact with you all the time and are insecure and nervous. It's a mis-description as far as I am concerned.  She’s painfully adorable and the clingiest cat I’ve ever met. Photo: Twitter. She looks like a Burmese or Burmese-type (non-standard as per the breed standard). I say that because he paws are white. This is not good for a Burmese. She is probably a moggy to be honest. Moggies are great, the best. Some cats will like being with their human caregiver a lot which is beneficial to both parties. That's what you want as a cat owner. I normally see domestic cats been criticised for being too aloof and distant. And then you see people criticising domestic gas because they&

This is a cross post because I think the subject matter is interesting on a number of levels ( see the other post by clicking here ). Perhaps the most outstanding aspect of the video is that it shows quite clearly that domestic cats can have strong and clear facial expressions. A lot of people don't see facial expressions in domestic cats. They consider them as aloof and inscrutable. Or they don't believe they have them. This video should correct this misapprehension. If you weren't sure that cats have facial expressions this will change your mind. Deeply annoyed and irritated cat probably a Burmese. Screenshot. And also the sound of the cat makes is interesting. It's a bit like a dog's bark. Sometimes domestic cats do bark like dogs. It's wrong to pigeonhole their vocalisations into well-defined categories because it doesn't quite work like that. Each individual cat has their own range of sounds which can be categorised but which are far more fluid and v

If anybody is interested, there are 2.3 million unowned (stray and feral) cats in the UK. The figure was worked out by Cats Protection. Is it accurate? They decided that there were 9.3 unowned cats per square kilometre in the UK. As the UK is 248,532 km² there are 9.3×248,532 unowned cats which makes 2.3m. 2.3 million unowned cats in the UK and 70m in the USA. Stray, scavenging cat. Photo in public domain. However, they also said that there are about a quarter of a million stray cats living in UK cities or urban areas. That would mean there are around 2 million unowned cats living away from urban areas, in the countryside. I don't think their calculations are correct, I have got to say. I don't think there are about 2 million unowned cat wandering around the British countryside. There might be but I would doubt it. My distinct impression is that nearly all feral cats in the UK are in urban areas. They used a computer model I think to work out an average of 9.3 unowned cats p

Posted by Gergana Stefanova on Tuesday, October 26, 2021 This is a lovely little cat. Super coat. I am not a great fan of the Exotic Shorthair or contemporary Persian as they both have the extreme face but they are popular. It is nice to see a video.  Note: videos from Facebook sometimes disappear or stop working for one of many reasons, usually because it has been removed at source. The details as per the breeder posting on Facebook:  Exotic shorthair Male Cute Blue mackerel tabby  Birthday 14.06.2021  CFA registration Here is a still picture from the video. I think the breeder lives in Russia or one of the satellite countries. Not sure. Blue mackerel tabby  Exotic Shorthair

NEWS AND COMMENT-VACAVILLE, CALIFORNIA: A qualified doctor (for humans) was facing 21 counts of animal cruelty and one count of child endangerment. However, she has not been charged by the Yolo County District Attorney Office. It is an interesting case because the public does not generally associate doctors (I believe that she is in general practice) and what appears to be animal hoarding resulting in neglect, negligence and abuse. I feel sorry for her. There but for the grace of God go I is what I think when I read these sorts of stories. It's quite easy to get into the situation where you can no longer cope, where you are vulnerable and sinking slightly or greatly. I suspect that she has not been charged because it wouldn't be helpful. She needs help rather than punishment. I am sure that is the reason why the District Attorney decided not to prosecute. It's a shame in some ways because you end up with animals that suffer and in a strict sense there should be some punishm

NEWS AND COMMENT: This is controversial because Baskin inherited millions it is reported on the BBC website ('Carole was left with millions of dollars'). And her former husband Jack 'Don' Lewis disappeared. Joe Exotic, accused animal rights activist Carole Baskin of killing her second husband Don Lewis, who went missing in 1997. It is strenuously denied and there is no evidence to support the allegation. And she has never been charged. But the sheriff's candid and confident statement puts the cat among the pigeons to use an appropriate analogy. Don Lewis' children ex-wife and kids allege that they were cut out of his will and their inheritance went to Baskin (source: BBC). Personally I have a lot of time for Carole Baskin and her fight for big cat welfare in the face of a bevy of private zoo owning men in the USA who abused and abuse big cats for monetary gain. These private zoos were and are an abomination. Baskin inherited Joe Exotic's zoo to settle a s

NEWS AND COMMENT- Sungurlu, a town in central Turkish province of Çorum: A feral cat who appears to be thoroughly unsocialised has been living on a roof for 4 years and her lifestyle is ongoing. It is highly unusual because it appears to be an example of self-isolation but she is being fed regularly. This may, indeed, be partly why she refuses to come down. She is female and most ginger tabbies are males . Female ginger tabby has lived on a roof for 4 years and has no intention of coming down. Photo: IHA Photo. This certainly isn't the case of a cat being stuck up a tree or in a high place. She remains on the roof voluntarily. Locals and firefighters have tried to get her down without success. We don't know the details of those efforts. It would be interesting to hear them. It is certainly possible to get her down by placing a trap on the roof and then bringing the trap down from the roof. So I think we can probably argue without knowing more that efforts to bring her down

This is the first time I have seen this remark from a distinguished institution whose word counts. Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine say that cats are 'at least mildly susceptible to Covid'. Do you find that troubling? Cornell's opinion about Covid comes on the back of a story about 15 lions in Utah, Denver zoos testing positive for Covid's Delta variant. 11 lions at Colorado's Denver Zoo and 4 lions from Utah's Hogle Zoo (UHZ) caught the disease based upon observed symptoms such as coughing, sneezing and acting lethargically. The lions at Denver Zoo are between the ages of 1-9 years old. They were tested using nasal swabs at Colorado State University Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory in Fort Collins. The tests were confirmed as positive by the United States Department of Agriculture's National Veterinary Services Laboratories. ASSOCIATED:  Can captive big cats in zoos get Covid-19 from their food ? The vast majority of the lions recovered wit

Male cat with serious urinary tract disease. Pic: Reddit.com I like this response from a vet tech on the Reddit.com website to the question: "My cat has kidney problem, he is urinating blood, does anyone know how I can help him?" - serious urinary tract disease and they are fiddling around on social media! Can you believe it? A cat owner looking for advice on a social media site/forum on a serious illness suffered by their male cat. It is madness. The only thing to do is to call the vet and by the looks of it they have already delayed doing this. But this either didn't occur to them or they shunned the thought because they wanted to save money at the expense of seriously jeopardising their cat's life. There is a terrible resistance to taking cats to vets. It is not quite the same for dogs. Some cat owners will do all they can to avoid going to the vet. This must lead to unnecessary deaths from time to time.  The post is indicative of a section of cat owners who don

This is a classic stand-off between a resident cat, the orange cat that you see in the video, and an invading cat which is the grey-and-white cat. The resident cat wins the stand-off. It's entirely classic and normal and the intention is to avoid a fight which would harm both of them. Common sense dictates that they don't want to be harmed if it can be avoided.  Apparently these two meet frequently like this and on every occasion the resident ginger wins the argument. This is probably because he is the resident cat. It's his territory and the grey-and-white knows it. If the roles were reversed I would expect the grey-and-white to win the argument.  Although, of course, you get cats who are inherently more dominant and those that are inherently more submissive in the same way you get cats that are more confident and those that are more timid. This would be a factor in who wins this kind of stand-off argument. Note : This is a video from another website. Sometimes they are de

There are calls to exonerate Scotland's forgotten witches. This could be widened to the whole of Europe but at the moment Claire Mitchell QC is campaigning for the exoneration of Scotland's witches who were so deeply and horrendously abused, often with their domestic cat companions, from the mid-16th and early 18th centuries.  If we exonerate Scotland's witches there should be a memorial to their cats. Picture in public domain. ASSOCIATED:  Time to pardon witches and their cats . I wrote this 4 years ago! Scotland has the dubious distinction of being the country which carried out five times more executions of witches per capita than the European average according to a Euro News report. So they were particularly fervent about persecuting ordinary and no doubt decent women who were accused of being witches. Back in the day superstition was more prevalent but it still exists today particularly in developing countries such as on the African continent . Over the course of nearly

In a recent census of the number of stray, feral, indoor domestic, indoor/outdoor domestic and those cats in between, the conclusion was that there are 200,000 cats in the District of Columbia a.k.a. Washington DC or just plain Washington, the capital of the USA. That 200,000 cats is made up of 3000-4000 feral cats, about 96,000 indoor/outdoor domestic cats + strays and 100,000 indoor-only cats. That's my interpretation of the figures as provided online. The conclusion was that cats are at a high density in Washington DC. 4000 feral and 196,000 indoor and indoor/outdoor domestic cats in Washington DC. Photo montage: DC cat count on Instagam. Tyler Flockhart, a conservation biologist and science lead on the District of Columbia Count project, said: "I don't think that you can find another wild mammal—another wild carnivore—that occurs at that density anywhere in the world," he said, of cats and urban environments. I think that this is really sort of an interesting i

I've prefixed the title with the word "unusual". I'm being deliberately low-key to emphasise the extreme behaviour of the man who has been charged with second-degree homicide. His name is Clifton Anthony Bliss Jr.. He has a history of instigating fights with members of the community according to Corporal J Lightle as reported on NBC News. NOTE: THIS IS A STOCK PHOTO -- Unusual. Cat wanders onto neighbor's backyard. Neighbor shoots cat owner dead. The victim is a neighbour of Mr Bliss, 41-year-old James Arland Taylor Jr.. His cat had wandered onto Bliss's backyard. Bliss was so upset by this simple, innocent act that he grabbed his .22 rifle, walked across the street to Mr Taylor's home and shot him twice. Taylor died at the scene it is believed. The usual outcome in this kind of story is that the perpetrator shoots the cat with a .22 rifle not the cat's caregiver. An extreme act as mentioned. Sergeant Paul Bloom of the Marion County Sheriff's D

I am applying the question to domestic cats which can keep cool in summer by staying inside in a cool corner of a room somewhere or the garage or a shed. And they can keep warm using the central heating! Heat pumps and not gas boilers please!! Norwegian Forest Cat. Tabby-and-white. Photo copyright Helmi Flick. Colder climates But at an anatomical level (which is what the question is all about), you'll find that some cat breeds are selectively bred from cats that have adapted to either hot or cold climates. For northern climates you can name the Maine Coon (Boston area and Maine), British Shorthair (UK) and the Norwegian Forest Cat (Norway).  Their coats are dense with insulating down , which, in cold weather, stands up erect and traps a thin layer of air as double glazing traps air in a wall of warm air between the panes of glass.  Under the skin is a layer of fat which retains body heat. Heat is lost one third as fast through fat as through muscle. It is said that in extreme

I am referring to domestic cats and the answer is NO. They all shed fur as it is an entirely natural thing to do. Indoor cats shed all the year round while indoor/outdoor cats shed when there is more light as in spring and summer. Spring light stimulates a heavy spring moult. Hairless cats shed much less - they can have whiskers that shed or break. If you hate hair around the home choose a hairless cat but there are downsides to these breeds which outstrip the downside of non-shedding in my view. Photo in public domain. Associated: The wrinkly skin of hairless cats The only other point worth making is that single coated cats shed less than triple and double coated cats as there's less fur to shed. The hairless cat breeds such as the Sphynx, Don Sphynx and the Elf (as three examples) don't shed except for their broken and short whiskers. Whiskers shed from time to time or they break and snap off for hairless cats. So there is some depositing of hair from hairless cats albeit

The picture is very good if not excellent and the behavior of this young woman was also excellent. She's being rewarded by the love of her elderly cat. You get back what your invest plus more when you adopt unwanted shelter cats. We know that older cats tend to 'stay on the shelf' at shelters. They are just less popular but there are many advantages. They are more domesticated. They know how to live with humans and they are more placid and pliable. They fit in better. And I think they appreciate their new home more as they have managed to escape the shelter sometimes after a long stay. Here is the picture. A nice one. It must be a selfie so the photographer is the lady you see in the pic. Young woman adopted an older kitty who had been returned to the shelter a few times. I took the liberty of improving the image quality slightly but the original was still very good. I recommend adopting the shelter cats that are unwanted. Invest in the cat. Look beyond the appearance. Inve

This chonky fella has become a hit with guests at the Best Western Silver Fox Inn, in Waterville Valley New Hampshire, USA. Well, at least that was the case in 2016. That's five years ago but Logan was eight years old at the time weighing 31 pounds which is about three times the weight of a normal domestic cat. That makes him 13 today and if he maintained that weight I would suspect that he is ill with conditions such as diabetes and arthritis but perhaps I am being too negative. Logan a grey tabby cat weighing 31 pounds. Photo: Jim Cole (AP). His appearance is certainly eye-catching so it is no surprise that he has become a feature in the area. One Facebook video was viewed 29 million times or more. He was adopted by Susan and Tor Brunvand from Meredith, New Hampshire from a shelter. At that time he was a normal-sized cat. Sadly, they allowed him to become obese. It is fun to see a chonky cat like this but on a more serious note it is very unhealthy. Apparently he had a habit

NEWS AND COMMENT: This is not really news but it is all over Bing News. I think I need to report on it and comment. The press is saying that a domestic shorthair cat living in Ingham County, Michigan, USA has tested positive for Covid which makes the cat the first pet to test positive for the disease in that state. And as expected, the cat got the disease from his or her owners because they both had the disease a week before their cat became ill according to the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development. Michigan, USA has its first domestic cat testing positive for Covid. Image: MikeB ASSOCIATED:  Scientists should positively state that pets can't spread coronavirus through a new study The symptoms for a cat when they get the disease are often quite mild and including fever, sneezing, coughing and nasal and eye discharge. In previous reports I have read that domestic cats resolve the disease themselves quite quickly. It appears that their immune systems are superi

NEWS AND COMMENT: The story is a reminder that people who live with glamorous purebred cats really have to keep them indoors all the time. And because of that they should also seriously consider building a catio or a garden enclosure for their full-time indoor cat. The story concerns an 18 months old snow Bengal cat called Meeka. She has been lost since August 21, 2021. This post is dated October 19, 2021. Snow Bengal cat lost for weeks and owner cries every night. Photo: Asia Sattar. It seems that the owner, Asia Sattar, 51, and her family including her 20-year-old daughter Mariyya allowed Meeka to go outside unsupervised. That is quite unusual for a snow Bengal cat because they really are striking in appearance. They are bound to catch the eye of anybody who notices them. You're going to get somebody who perhaps isn't a thief but who is predisposed to being a thief being provoked into stealing this cat. That may be what has happened. Meeka and Mariyya. Photo: the family.

The British Shorthair is shown in all colours and all divisions of the traditional category. The original British Shorthair was grey and was called the British Blue. It was the only colour the cat was shown in. Apparently, even today, some organisations still recognise blue as the only accepted colour. They say that blue British SHs have a thicker coat than black-and-white British Shorthairs, for instance. I have provided details for the 3 premier cat associations. Cinnamon British shorthair. Photo: Pinterest. GCCF (British) Below are the accepted colour colours and types for the British Shorthair under the GCCF (UK cat association). Within these categories there are subdivisions relating to the various colours and types. You can see these in more detail if you click on this link which takes you to the GCCF breed standard for the British Shorthair. Self British Shorthairs (solid colours), tabby, spotted, ticked tabby, tortoiseshell, tortoiseshell and white, bicolour, van-pattern bi

BELLINGHAM USA-NEWS AND COMMENT: This is a classic case of the vulnerable domestic cat becoming a victim at the centre of a domestic dispute. It is annoyingly common for men to either threaten to abuse or abuse a woman's cat companion in domestic disputes as leverage to get her to do something or to emotionally hurt her. Image: MikeB - free to use. In this instance, the Bellingham Police Department booked a guy called Kapier Akana Robinson, 27, who was extremely angry (as is always the case) on suspicion of first-degree animal cruelty (domestic violence), harassment (domestic violence) and third-degree malicious mischief (domestic violence). Quite a catalogue of alleged crimes. It is alleged that during an argument with his presumed girlfriend, Robinson threatened to drown her cat. He held the cat in the bath with the water running. The cat managed to get away which is unsurprising to me because when cats are under those sorts of situations they find a way to escape as they are so

This photograph has been banging around the Internet for a while I think. I picked up on it quite late in the day. I don't know what to make of it to be honest. It looks as though it could be photoshopped but you never know nowadays. It just seems a little bit artificial, to put it mildly. And this is one litter of kittens. I have counted a dozen kittens which is at the very top end of the number of kittens for a domestic cat litter. Anyway, I don't know but it is an interesting image which I think needs to be featured on this website.  The cats are all jet black with gold, luminous eyes. If the kittens are genuine, the photographer has creatively placed them in a pumpkin bed which is a hint of Halloween. Black cats go with Halloween but often in the wrong way. I'm sure you know all about the potential hazards for black cats during that holiday period . It's a ridiculous throwback to witchcraft and it amazes me that witchcraft still has a place in society today. Some pe