Cat Chit Chat

Note the word 'cat' in caterpillar. Very appropriate in this instance as this cutey's head looks a like a cat's head with the big 'ears' and tabby markings on the forehead 😎. It is the caterpillar of the brown Chinese bush butterfly or Mycalesis gotama  which has a snout that is familiar to the whole world in the shape of the Hello Kitty logo. Please click on the play button twice.

Instinctively, I spend quite a lot of time observing my cat and finding out what he likes me to do. Yes, I know, it is a form of cat-training-human, but I like it. I feel that it is my duty to try and please him and it is no hardship to me. And you do this by interacting with your cat and observing the effect. Of course, it helps to understand domestic cats generally. Gabs on top of the Sky television box which emits quite a lot of heat. Like many domestic cats he loves warmth. Click it for a large image. Image by MikeB. My cat likes the back of his head to be stroked. He likes my hand to be placed on the back of his head. I think that he likes both the contact and the warmth. It has got to the point where he asks for it not by meowing but by looking up at me in a certain way which I now understand. And this request always happens when he is on my lap, when I'm in bed, as is the case right now. It's about cause and effect. You do something with your cat, and you can tell if he

This is nothing to do with cats, but I feel that I have to try and get this great tip out there. It really is good, and I don't see anyone mentioning it on the internet.  It is based on personal first-hand experience, and I feel confident that it will work a lot of the time. Tickly coughs are common after an upper respiratory viral disease: a cold or Covid Omicron for example. I had a tickly cough for weeks and it was driving me mad. I also felt under the weather with a headache. I don't know if the source of the cough was the same as for the headache, but I think it was. It may have been Covid Omicron which is like a cold. TCP can cure a persistent tickly cough. Image in the public domain. I got rid of the cough by gargling with diluted TCP at about 1 part TCP with 3 parts of water, which is a liquid antiseptic based on halogenated phenols .  Make the concentration as strong as you can take, even 1:1 and you might drink a little of it at the end. But only a little bit . If yo

Google offers the world Google Trends. It's a useful service to see what people are thinking what they are doing in real time. It provides background information as to what is bubbling under the surface of the news and what we see happening around us. And today, Google search trends 2022 indicates that the searches are driven by heightened emotions. This applies to people across Europe, the Middle East and Africa. This implies that people in America are not suffering from heightened emotions.  This is probably because the major source of heightened emotions is the Ukraine war which is a long way away from America and I sense that Americans feel distanced from the Ukraine war whereas it is on the doorstep of Europe. And I say "suffering" because it seems that these emotions are anxiety or apprehension. Peoples of Europe are apprehensive. Cuddle your cat. Image: Image by Prettysleepy Art from Pixabay. And a reason why this exists is because of issues with personal finances

In human terms, this is an extremely rare example of a gang of domestic cats "murdering" a young kitten because they were starving, and they were starving because they were neglected to the point of starvation by their callously negligent owner who has subsequently been convicted and punished. This is also a case of cat cannibalism.  I have found 9 reasons for domestic cat cannibalism . The story comes from Bradford, UK. Four members of the same family, all women between the ages of 23 and 49, neglected seven cats to the point where some of these adult cats bit to death a kitten who was in poor health in order to eat that kitten to survive. The kitten was probably one of the offspring of one of the adult cats. One of the starving adult cats who decided to attack and eat one of their kittens in order to survive. Photo: RSPCA vet. I don't know whether you have heard of that happening before, but I certainly haven't, and it is an example of cannibalism. I have written ab

Well, it is the first time I have seen a fence like this, and I am impressed. It is uncomplicated. It weathers nicely and in fact the weathering of the fence makes it look better. The slats are staggered which makes them more distinct and I like the way the slats are separated slightly so each one becomes a cat. It's an ideal fence for a cat lover obviously. Cat head backyard fence is delightful. Image: Twitter. You just have to make sure that you don't live next door to a cat hater! Because if you did it would irritate them tremendously. I don't think it would cost that much for a carpenter to create this and add real character to your backyard or back garden. Or perhaps it would be better in the front yard so the world could see it more easily. Here is a closeup:

This is a photograph taken in Japan by Kenichi Morinaga of one white cat and one ginger tabby cat who appear to be "conjoined". They are sitting on a fence. The photograph won first prize in the 2022 Comedy Pet Photo Awards. 'Conjoined cat' won a photo prize but is it photo-edited? Photo: Kenichi Morinaga. My immediate reaction when I saw it was to ask if the photograph has been created with photo-editing because it very much looks like it. I just don't think that you can get this appearance by two cats being in close contact with their heads facing away from the camera. Anatomically it is impossible to achieve this,  I would say. But it beat the judges! Perhaps they accept photo-edited images? The news media say that the "cats are pressing their necks together to give the appearance of being conjoined". It just doesn't look right to me. And I know how to photo-edit photographs and it would not be that difficult to photo edit this image as follows. H

A social media user asked: "Does my cat understand when I pick him up and hug him, or is he just waiting to be moved/put down?" Does my cat understand when I pick him up and hug him, or is he just waiting to be moved/put down? Image: MikeB based on image in the public domain. The answer to the question depends on the circumstances. However, if you have the habit of picking up your cat gently and gently talking to him and gently loving him and you do this as an expression of love and friendship, your cat will understand what it means and respond accordingly.  However, if you regularly pick up your cat and transport them to another place under certain circumstances and you do it over and over again then your cat will understand that picking them up and transporting them means just that and it is not an expression of love towards your cat.  Like I said it's a question of circumstances and how a cat links your behaviour with those circumstances to deduce what is going on. The

USA: This is about a new neighbour from hell and how to deal with him. It is not an uncommon problem, but it is an almost intractable one and my advice based on a lifetime of experience is to move home. A social media user is desperate for advice. They say that they bought a house five years ago after much effort and he is pleased that he has managed to secure a safe haven for himself and his family. It has a large backyard and a forested area beyond. Therefore, there is lots of wildlife including possums, foxes, raccoons, deer and groundhogs and even an otter. He enjoys this. How do you combat neighbours from hell who want to kill stray cats that you feed, and this is in the country. Image: MikeB And there are two neighbourhood stray cats hanging around his carport, so he feeds them every night at the same time that he feeds his three indoor cats. "At a loss about animal hating new neighbors" - social media user desperate for help . A new neighbour bought the house next door

Nicolas Cage, the iconic American actor who has made some super films and many flops 😒 says that his cat Merlin loves him and is very affectionate. Merlin loves contact and jumps into bed with Nick and hugs him and he thinks it is his wife but 'Nope, it's Merlin!' Cage and Merlin. Is this really Merlin. The cat in the video looks like a blue purebred British Shorthair but 'Merlin' is a 4-year-old Maine Coon. The cat in the video is not a Maine Coon. Image: Screenshot. Merlin shows Nick Cage a lot of affectionate energy and he calls him a 'real sweetheart'. And he means it. And I am sure all of us who have been loved by their cat companion know what he means.  When a cat loves you and shows it in their behaviour it is special. We are privileged to experience cat love 😊💓✔️. Note : This is an embedded video from another website. Sometimes they are deleted at source, or the video is turned into a link which would stop it working here. I have no control ov

Every day on the online news media - every damned day (yes, I am annoyed) - we see hundreds of articles on local, state and federal newspapers and from other countries particularly Australia, about feral cats and the nuisance that they cause. The biggest complaint about feral cats is that they kill birds. But of course, they kill other animals too, sometimes native species, which really irritates local authorities and going higher up to federal authorities. This sort of picture annoys millions of people, and they blame the feral cat. Let's go one back and blame the people who are careless cat owners. Image in the public domain. They moan and moan and they criticise feral cats over and over again. The dreaded feral cat is a constant concern to the authorities. They speak of feral cats as if they are monsters from another planet. They just arrived out of the ether, and they are a damned nuisance. The old saying 'don't shoot the messenger' comes to mind. The feral cat is t

The picture is called 'copycats'. And the person who uploaded it to Twitter has the handle: 'cats being weird little guys'. Being a grumpy old man, I don't see cats being weird but humans being weird. They get a kick out of placing a real tuxedo cat (black-and-white) in bed with a bunch of plush toy look-a-likes. Then they take a photo and upload it to social media. I mean, I don't get it.  'Copycats' a cat picture I don't like. Image: Twitter. I suppose it is all about human entertainment, but it is at the expense of cats. But then no one gives a damn except grumpy old fools like me who complains. Why don't we celebrate the cat or simply stop using the cat to make funny cat pics for social media? Let's just end the funny cat pic and video era. It has gone on long enough. Way too long actually. I don't think it helps with cat welfare as it uses cats as objects of entertainment. Someone out there will take a different message from the imag

Until September 17, 2022, you would have to answer the question in the title with a very positive NO because the same subspecies of cheetah that is found in Iran in very small numbers, was also present in India in the 1940s but the last cheetah in the wild in India was recorded in 1948 and they were declared extinct in that country in 1952.  Image: ANI/Unsplash The last cheetahs were shot in the Sal forests of Koriya District, Chhattisgarh, which seems incredibly careless of the authorities and the individual person who shot them because they were the last ones in the country! An example of anti-conservation of the highest calibre. But you may have heard that the authorities have taken the bold step of relocating cheetahs from Namibia, Africa, which is essentially the home of the cheetah in the world. A special cargo flight bringing eight cheetahs landed at the Indian Air Force Station in Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh. India's Prime Minister, Miranda Modi, will release them into Kuno Nat

You might know the 2 reasons why your domestic cat - if she is allowed to go outside - 'plays' with the mouse she catches but I'd like to play with the topic for a while. Sorry about the pun.  2 reasons why domestic cats 'play' with prey (and it is not because they are psychopathic). Image: MikeB. The first reason is that most domestic cats don't really get enough hunting time. Hunting is in their DNA, and they need to express this desire. For indoor cats it is in the form of play-hunting. When a cat is able to successfully catch a mouse, they want to extend the fun as long as possible and so they toy with the poor animal both before they die and after death. It looks horrible, callous and psychopathic to some humans, but we can't measure cats by reference to human characteristics.  Cats are insensitive to the pain they cause. They are insensitive to the emotions of the prey animals that they terrorise. We must avoid anthropomorphising cats. So, the first re

"What breed is this stray neighbourhood cat?" asks a Reddit.com user and the answer is that this is a bobcat. This is not a breed of cat but a species of medium-sized wild cat ubiquitous in North America wandering around suburbia looking for a domestic cat to feed on! 😢 It looks like a 'purebred' bobcat (i.e., not a hybrid) who has wandered into the neighbourhood as they sometimes do as they often become habituated to suburbia which is not great for the cat as sometimes residents panic and grab their guns of which there is a copious number in the US. What breed is this stray neighbourhood cat? It is not a breed of cat but an American bobcat wandering around American suburbia probably looking for a domestic cat to feed on. Image: Reddit.com (u/Gimme_More_Cats) You'll see a lot of bobcats in American suburbia and the big problem is that in some places such as Florida bobcats acquire a taste for outside domestic cats. They attack, kill and eat them. Domestic cat own

An animal clinic worker, Kaylnn, decided to tell us that there are four "cat breeds" that she would never own, and she has decided that she has the authority to tell us this. But her "advice" is hopelessly inaccurate and there are some glaring errors. It is all bollocks. She implies that in handling them at her clinic these cats have been very difficult. "Cat breeds I will never own" by an animal clinic worker. It is all pure bollocks She has produced a TikTok video which, I'm sorry to say, is hopeless as well. For example, she says that domestic longhaired cats are very badly behaved. "Domestic longhaired cats" are not a breed of cat. And therefore, she's got that wrong completely. And she's branding all longhaired domestic cats as being "a$$holes". This cannot be correct. It's impossible to state that and it is completely stupid. It goes against logic and the views of hundreds of millions of longhaired cat owners. Plea

This wise, elegant dog breaks up a feline fight within the home. In fact, you can hear her barking before she arrives as if to say "stop it!". It is a nice little video and one that we have seen before. The sad part about the video is that I suspect that these two cats will go on fighting for as long as they live in the same home.  Sometimes cats in multi-cat homes simply do not get along and their home ranges overlap because they are living so close together inside the home. This is not ideal.  Wise, elegant dog breaks up feline fight. Screenshot. They adapt to it but unless they are friendly with each other it is liable to end up like this with a stand-off fight.  The dog clearly recognises the animosity between the cats. This dog is no doubt friendly with both cats and he dislike seeing them fighting each other.  She wants peace and harmony in the home. It is an incredibly wise decision by the dog. And it tells us that dogs are very sensitive to this kind of situation.  It

On social media, a cat owner tells us that she has lived with her cat for about a year.  During the summer months, her cat is very much an indoor/outdoor cat. She spends all day, every day outside and prefers to sleep outside under a certain plant in her back garden. She says that "during summer she was out all day barely eating her food". She's not sure but she says "maybe she was catching mice". Indoor/outdoor cat. This is not the cat referred to in the article. Image: by Sa Ka from Pixabay. RELATED:  Are indoor or indoor/outdoor cats healthier ? Since the weather has turned and become much less agreeable for an indoor/outdoor cat she's become more "homely". She does not like the rain very much. And "she is suddenly so hungry!" Whatever she feeds her, she demands more. She says that "some days I break and give her another tiny bit of biscuits or another day one of the kids got excited and fed her another packet". Well, the wom

Boris Johnson gave his farewell speech early this morning before flying up to Balmoral. He's been booted out of his job as the leader of the Conservative party and therefore the Prime Minister of the UK. And there has been some discord within the Conservative party.  Government Chief Mouser Larry the Cat questioned over Partygate. Screenshot. And also, there's been discord between his rescue dog, Dilyn, and the resident Downing Street cat, Larry. Larry is a celebrity cat and he's been at No 10 for some time as a mouser. He was adopted from Battersea Dogs & Cats Home. In fact, he was specially selected as a proficient mouser. I don't think he has caught many mice though! Larry and Dilyn. Photo credit: Deposit Photos | BBC Dilyn was fairly recently adopted by Boris Johnson and his wife Carrie, also as a rescue animal and there were reports of them not getting along very well but Boris Johnson hints in passing in his farewell speech that Larry and Dilyn have made frien

NEWS AND COMMENT-SASKATCHEWAN PROVINCE, CANADA: The world has heard about one of Canada's deadliest mass killings on record leaving 11 people dead and at least 18 injured. Two attackers went on a stabbing spree in the rural heart of the country murdering people at random, one of whom was Wes Petterson, 77, a widower. He was stabbed at the same location as Lana head, 49, a mother of two and a 14-year-old boy and an emergency responder. Damien and Myles Sanderson, the suspects. Image: Associated Press. Ruby Works, a resident of Weldon, with a population of about 200, many of whom are retired people, said that Petterson was like an uncle to her. She said: "I collapsed and hit the ground. I've known him since I was just a little girl." She said that Wes loved his cats and that he was proud of his home-made Saskatoon berry jam. He frequently helped his neighbours. She said that "He didn't deserve this. He was a good, kind-hearted man. No one in this town is ever g

There is a classic cat caregiving problem on the Reddit.com website from a woman who is at the end of their tether. They have 2 cats and the boy was neutered recently (and therefore is young) but he is stopping them from sleeping. They tried ignoring him. They allowed him to come into the bedroom but then they stopped him coming into the bedroom.  I just want to sleep! My full-time indoor cat keeps me awake all night. Image: MikeB. But he continues to wake them up at least twice between 3 AM and 6 PM every night. He chews "and destroys everything on our bedside tables, knocks things over, and steals things and runs away with them". They have given him a lot of toys which he happily plays with but it isn't enough. His owners want to sleep more than four hours a night. I'm sure that they are describing a not untypical situation in any home with any full-time indoor cat. Male cats tend to be more of a problem because they have bigger home ranges than females and therefor

I'm going to refer to a test carried out at Kyoto University to see whether domestic cats can experience the emotion of jealousy. They describe jealousy as a "second-order emotion". I take that to mean a higher emotion which humans experience but there is a question mark as to whether animals experience it although a basic form of jealousy has been detected in domestic dogs. RELATED: in a previous post the conclusion was that cats feel jealousy but not grief:  Cats feel jealousy but not grief . In this test with cats there were 52 participants taken from Japanese households or cat cafés. They conducted a simple test by recording the behaviour of the cats while they saw their owner petting a social object which might be a rival and which in this instance was a realistic-looking soft toy cat. They compared the cats' reaction when a non-cat object was petted by the cats' owner (a cushion) and when a non-cat owner petted the toy-cat. I wonder whether that was a wise d

Like many others, I despair at the news stories emanating from China about the cat meat market. The latest story actually has a good ending which is very pleasing. It is also very pleasing to be told that the Chinese police rescued 150 cats headed for the dinner tables. On my experience reading about these stories, it is nearly always animal welfare volunteers who stop lorries travelling to the south with stolen cats and dogs for the meat markets.  Domestic cats lured with live sparrows and caged for shipping to the south for the cat meat market. Image: Yahoo News! But here we have the police being involved which may hint at a change in attitude by law enforcement. It also tells me that it is illegal to steal domestic cats and ship them off to the south to be eaten. It may surprise people to read that but because there are no real animal welfare laws in China there is no law to enforce when there is animal cruelty. Perhaps the country has introduced some laws that I have not heard abou