There is a nice symmetry in this relationship. The boy was bullied at school because of his cleft lip and odd-eye colour but he found his soul mate in a bicolour cat - grey tabby and white. The piebald gene causes the bicolor coat and that gene made one of the cat's eyes blue and the other yellow. And as it happens the cat has a cleft lip. Both of these conditions are fairly rare in cats. Heterochromia iridium is the scientific name for on-eye colour. It was probably inherited by the boy although it might have been caused by trauma. For the cat, it was also inherited because the cat inherited the piebald or white spotting gene which gives him his coat and his odd-eye colour. The boy's cleft lip is inherited as well. It may be a genetic mutation and deficiency or it might have been something that the mother came into contact with in her environment or what she ate or drink or the medications that she took during pregnancy. This is obviously a great relationship because both the

Henry Bergh. Image in the public domain. The world and particularly Americans I feel have an obligation to thank, at this time, Henry Bergh, the founder of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA).  Nathan Winograd has reminded me of his birthday as he sent me an email yesterday. I had heard of him so I need no reminder of his history. He was a great man. Many people would agree with me. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote this about him: Among the noblest of the land; Though he may count himself the least; That man I honor and revere; Who, without favor, without fear; In the great city dares to stand; The friend of every friendless beast. Winograd refers to him as 'The Great Meddler'. This is because with great commitment, passion and persistence he meddled in the lives of those people in New York City - and I guess other places - who abused animals. He fearlessly stopped their abuse. He got New York to pass an anti-cruelty law and put a copy of that

Image: in public domain. On the mumsnet.com website a lady asks if cats smell? She says that her cats don't smell which is normal she says if a cat is healthy. She is seeking reassurances from other mumsnet.com users. Actually, domestic cats do smell slightly when they are healthy. It is a subtle, pleasant smell. Most cat caregivers have kissed their cat on various parts of their body and picked up the smell. It is a pleasant experience. New cat owners People who are new to cat ownership might be unsure about how domestic cats smell. This might be because they've read some misinformation on the Internet. Or, they might have a distorted idea about the normal body odour of domestic cats because they have a cat litter tray which is not cleaned enough or, perhaps, their cat is eliminating inappropriately.  This means that they might be peeing outside the litter box or even defecating outside the litter box due to stress. That by the way will be due to an environmental problem which

To the question in the title the answer is YES. I will quote two real experts on this topic: Mel and Fiona Sunquist. They say: Given the nature of its desert habitat, it is not surprising that the sand cat can survive without free-standing water. Indeed, for most of the year, these cats do not drink, but obtain sufficient moisture from their prey. One captive fed on fresh rodents and birds refused all freshwater and did not drink for two months, but another drank freely. Though they can live without water, wild sand cats will drink when water is available; in the eastern Karakum, their tracks have been found around pools of water. Mel and Fiona are the authors of probably the best book on the wild cats: Wild Cats of the World . Their reference for the above information is:  Heptner WG and AA Sludskii 1992 Mammals of the Soviet Union and Roberts TJ 1977 The mammals of Pakistan  Here is a picture of a sand cat by me using Canva.

The question in the title is asking if black cats are healthier than other cats and therefore live longer. The answer is imprecise. You'll see references on the internet to an NIH (National Institutes of Health) article about the genetic mutation causing the black fur to offer some added protection to the cat in terms of health but I can't find that article after a careful search. There are no studies on this. There is nothing but weak anecdotal evidence that black cats live longer. I don't believe that they do until someone pulls a rabbit out of a hat and tells me that I am wrong! Black cats audition for a Hollywood movie. Ralph Crane The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock.

Yes, yes, no, yes, no and no! Black Peterbald cat. Pic is in the public domain. Black cats have a special place in the cat world as they are the subject of continuing and detrimental superstition going all the way back to the Middle Ages many hundreds of years ago. It is this illogical superstition unsupported by science and good sense but supported by fear of the unknown which leads to the great spectrum of beliefs that black cats bring good or bad luck in equal measure! Lucky or unlucky? It depends where you live and your particular beliefs. Take your pick. In general, black cats crossing your path brings bad luck but in some countries, it is good luck! Mad right? RELATED:  15 facts about black cats bringing good luck . Haram? Haram means forbidden and black cats under the rules of the Koran are not haram. In short, if you are a Muslim you can own a black cat. Although some Islam teachers tell their followers that black cats can carry 'jinn' or bad spirits which can disrupt f

Tuxedo cats are bicolor cats. This is my darling deceased female. Image: MikeB Bicolor cats are cats with a coat of two (as in 'bi') colors: white and another colour such as black or ginger. And the 'other colour' can have tabby markings.  They can be moggies (random-bred cats) or purebred, pedigree cats. It does not matter which. They are common and therefore not rare. Neither are they hypoallergenic but they are friendly if they've been socialised properly and treated well. No domestic cat is hypoallergenic as the Fel D1 allergen is produced by all domestic cats . Purina LiveClear works pretty well to make a cat acceptable to a person allergic to cats . 'Hypoallergenic' means not producing an allergic reaction in people. About 10% of people are allergic to cats. The white fur in bicolor cats is caused by the presence of the piebald aka white spotting gene, which affects the migration of pigment producing cells (melanocytes) in the skin during the developme

This is a very peculiar Guinness Record. For the life of me I can't see the point of it. I know I'm being cynical and world-weary but this is really stretching things too far. That said, this cute, dilute ginger tabby, 13-year-old cat has been awarded a Guinness record for the most skips by a cat in one minute! The cat achieved nine. Here is the video.  You can see that the cat's owner rewards her cat every time he skips by putting down a pellet of dry cat food. That is after every single skip she rewards her cat with some food which limits the number of skips per 60 seconds. That wouldn't normally be needed if the cat was fully trained in my view. It seems that she has achieved this record with her cat during the training of her cat. The whole thing is simply about reward-based training (positive reinforcement). There is nothing particularly clever about it although one has to praise the woman for at least making the effort to get into the Guinness World Records. The c

Men should have the courage to speak to dog companions as if they are a woman using baby talk communicating with an infant. In that way the dog will better understand them and understand their commands!  That is the finding of a study (see link below). It found that dogs respond to the kind of intonation and patterns of speech (prosody) employed by women (and of course men sometimes) when communicating with their infant child.  This is a cross post from my main website. I think that it is interesting enough to post this twice but from a different perspective. In this article I am looking at what men might do to improve their communication with the family dog! They might learn from their female partner. The video explains it all better than me as the voice over is by the lead researchers I believe fMRI scans They used fMRI scans to see how the brain reacted to both men and women talking to dogs in various styles such as adult-speak, dog-speak an infant-speak. They found that if a man sp

Every single video of a big cat sightings in locations where the cats are not meant to be are fuzzy. They are unclear. The people operating their smart phone do not zoom in to enlarge the image of the cat. Note: 'big cat sightings' of pumas walking down the road in some American town is entirely different as you can expect mountain lions to be in the urban environment sometimes as these settlements are on mountain lion land. It seems to me that people deliberately create bad quality videos or still images of big cats and then send them off to the news media in the hope and expectation to make a few hundred dollars or pounds. It would be so easy to create a decent quality video but the problem is that you would create a video of a domestic cat! The reason why cat sighting videos are always fuzzy If people created a decent quality video or image of a so-called big cat sighting, they would create a video of a domestic cat wandering through someone's backyard or in the countrys

Benevo wet and dry. Balanced? Well, a lot of people would say that the person asking the question is mad. They remind us that cats are 'obligate carnivores'. Yep, we know that, thanks. But the point is this: it is possible to manufacture dry cat food from plant protein to which you can add nutrients to ensure that the final product is a dry cat food which contains the same nutrients and is as balanced as any other cat food. It comes down to the formula of the nutrients in the food and you can rely on plant protein to provide proteins. Important: is absolutely impossible and dangerous to feed your cat a vegan or vegetarian diet similar to the diet that a human might eat. The diet will not contain the requisite nutrients for cat health. It will not sustain a cat. It should never be attempted. You will have to rely on a commercially prepared cat food to which has been added all the required nutrients. I believe the company mention on this page achieves that but please do your own

Shy cat? Screenshot. The word "shy" is normally used in relation to the emotions and behaviour of humans and it means a person who is nervous or timid in the company of people. On THAT definition domestic cats can certainly be shy because there are two distinct character types for domestic cats namely the confident cat and the timid cat.  A timid cat is more likely to hide when a stranger enters the room for instance. A more confident cat is more able to adjust to the presence of a stranger and perhaps even approach them. This is about nervousness to new events and strange people. It's about confidence really. Video The kitten in the video is called super-shy? I don't think that the kitten is behaving this way because they are shy. It looks that way but I think the looks are misleading. It looks as if this kitten is a little tired and is placing her paws over her eyes in preparation to sleep or snooze. Discussion about cats being shy - same as for humans? But I am not

This is an aspect of looking after an indoor/outdoor cat which genuinely concerns me. Indoor/outdoor cats go to the toilet outside. Normally you never see it happen. I don't see my cat going to the toilet. I sort of know when he is gone to the toilet because he does it at a similar time each day and I can smell actually that he has just been but I don't know where and I don't see his poop. And to be perfectly honest I am failing my cat in this respect because at a very simple level it is useful for a cat caregiver to check their cat's poop from time to time. It is a good diagnostic tool. And of course, if your cat is an indoor cat, you will be looking at your cat's poop every day when you clean out the litter tray. It's an automatic, quick check on your cat's digestive system and general health. A lot of illnesses result in diarrhoea. Diarrhoea, as you no doubt know, is not a disease but a symptom. A common cause is overfeeding because the colon cannot deal

Entirely understandably, American's pet store owners, take a commercial stance when running their business. They have to in order to make a profit. The world is highly competitive. But my argument is that they need to temper that objective with the objective to ensure that they run their businesses along ethical lines. Inherently unhealthy bulldog for sale at Perfect Pets. Image in public domain. And I'm referring to the acquisition of cats and dogs from puppy mills to supply their pet stores. No doubt these animals are quite cheap because they are bred in a cheap fashion. They are bred in facilities where there is poor regard to healthcare and socialisation normally. I don't want to brand all puppy mills with the same criticism but they are called "puppy mills" for a reason. They churn out puppies which means the pet stores can buy them cheaply. It also means that the puppies are going to be popular breeds such as dachshunds and French bulldogs. But both of these

 Come on, this is great story. I think this police officer is a really nice guy. He has a heart. And Penny was brave and smart to pick him! She made it known to him that he was the man for her. And she got him for life. She is a dilute calico - a really nice coat They are nearly always female and I guess that is what the SPCA told him when he was allowed to foster her. Penny was thrown from a window. It must have been a downstairs window. And she was under a couch. The owner must have been a thrown away their couch in the same way they threw away their cat. That's a crime, isn't it? Cat abandonment. Normally is and it is a form of cat cruelty anyway. Why didn't this nice police officer arrest the owner!?  They make a great couple, don't they? The story is proof that the cat picks the person when it comes to selecting a cat at a rescue shelter. If the cat comes to you and jumps onto your shoulders or lap, that's it. Over and out. You have yourself a new cat companion

When you think of the word "obesity" you think of very fat people or sometimes very fat cats (and I don't mean the human fat cat namely the greedy, alpha male smoking a cigar happy in the knowledge that they have ripped off people to make a large profit). Just 15% above the normal But it might surprise people that feline obesity refers to cats with a weight which is 15% above the ideal. That's not much more than 10% above the ideal. You might think that is acceptable. You might not even really notice it and I wouldn't blame you. That's because people, including me, tend to normalise weight gain. You gradually lose your bearings as to what is the correct weight both for yourself and for your companion animal. The problem creeps up on you almost invisibly sometimes. So, a weight gain of 15% in your cat might not be noticed but a veterinarian would describe your cat as obese. And it might not surprise you that the most prevalent nutritional problem for domestic c

This is a very sweet, cat loving couple in America who have a wonderful relationship with domestic cats. That message comes across loud and clear in the video at the end of this article. Note: sometimes these sorts of embedded videos from news media website stop working. If that has happened, I apologise but I have no control over it. When you rescue a shelter cat you save two lives. Screenshot. They've adopted all their cats from shelters and have seven. The lady says that rescue cats are begging to be loved and they will give love if given a chance.  And she made a nice point about adopting a rescue cat at a shelter. She said that when you do that you of course, save the life of the cat that you have adopted because there is a chance that they might be euthanised if they stay at that shelter for too long because nobody wants them; and secondly, you potentially save the life of another rescue cat because you make room for the cat at the shelter.  Often shelters are quite full and

Here is a video of a cat yawn leading to their dog companion yawning due to the contagious nature of this form of behaviour. Yawning contagion crosses the species barrier. Cat yawn is contagious to their dog buddy. Screenshot. RELATED:  Is yawning contagious to cats? Cats can cause a dog to yawn when they yawn. It's called contagious yawning and it is likely that you have heard about it. And, interestingly, contagious yawning also affects dogs when their owner yawns. The point probably is that if the dog is in a close relationship with a sentient being - normally another dog or a cat or a human - who yawns, then they are likely to yawn as well. The University of Tokyo did a study and they found that just over half the dogs monitored yawned after watching their owners yawn. When the dogs watched a stranger yawning the contagion from those people to the dog was about half as powerful and they yawned about half is frequently. And in the video below, we see a cat and dog who are very g

A board of supervisors (BOS) is a group of elected officials responsible for overseeing county government. In Orange County a grand jury investigation of Orange County Animal Care (OCAC) in California has uncovered inhumane conditions but the BOS have rejected the findings. They also revealed the killing of shelter animals despite there being empty cages and turning volunteers and adopters away by refusing to end pandemic-era closures.  The OC Animal Care Shelter located in Tustin, California on June 17, 2023. Image:  Hannah Okamoto / VOICE OF OC That information comes from Nathan Winograd. In addition, I can report from the Voice of Orange County website which states that Orange County officials dispute the grand jury report on increased kill rate at the shelter. The grand jury came to a majority finding that the county-run animal shelter needed to update policies such as increasing visits for residents. And they found that the shelter has been euthanising animals at a higher rate tha

his is a video from Sky News which is a compilation of security camera footage from a railway company. It shows some pretty risky behaviour. Woman risks her life and the life of the dogs in her charge as a dog walker. Screenshot. Security camera footage shows a person risking their lives and the lives of the dogs under their supervision at a railway level crossing as the dog walker encourages two dogs to sit on the tracks while an onlooker takes a photograph of them. And in another section, two dog walkers rushed across the railway tracks eight seconds before a high-speed train arrives. You can hear the train's horn sounding. They look very casual. Network Rail released the video footage showing people risking their lives on a footpath level crossing in Worcestershire, UK. In addition to the above, a teenage boy was filmed doing a one-armed press up on the tracks. Without wishing to preach, the first duty of companion animal caregivers and dog walkers is to keep their animals safe

With this hack you'll save £50 per year and have less limescale in your kettle! Help the cat caregiver to help the cat! Image: MikeB Here is my tip, trick of hack to save money and reduce the amount of limescale build up in your kettle. And it takes less time to make a cup of tea. In the UK, the price of energy is high currently. It'll probably remain pretty high for the foreseeable future and the cost of living has risen. Budgets are tight in many homes. What has this got to do with cats?! Nothing directly. But indirectly, yes. We need to look after the cat caregiver to look after the cat! The 'hack' Rather than taking the kettle to the faucet (tap) to fill it up enough to make a cup of tea, you take the mug to the faucet and fill it up to between 2/3rds to 3/4 full of water depending on how you like you tea (with or without milk). Take the mug to the kettle and pour in the water Boil the kettle and as you do so place a tea bag in the mug Stay by the kettle as it boils

Can cats be trained like dogs? The answer is yes. It just takes a little bit longer because cats are not pack animals unlike dogs. Dogs look to their leader, their caregiver for instructions and therefore learn them quicker. But cats are adaptable and they have adapted to the human environment over thousands of years. And, it is said, that the wildcat hybrids such as the Bengal cat that you see in the video are more suited to being trained. This is because they are, in general, more intelligent thanks to the wildcat element in their makeup. Wild cat species are considered to be slightly more intelligent than domestic cats because they are more challenged. TWO RELATED ARTICLES: Clicker Training Your Cat How does a clicker improve cat and dog training? So, here we have a video of a Bengal cat who has undergone some fundamental behavioural training as you would give to a dog. The woman would have simply trained her Bengal cat just like any other cat or a dog perhaps using a clicker to bri

At the moment the news media is discussing the domestication of the cat. A good moment to present the story in a different light as indicated in the title.  At one time - we are unsure exactly when but perhaps around 10,000 years ago - there was one domestic cat. The first domestic cat in the world. Well, they weren't exactly domesticated, more tamed North African wildcat but for sake of keeping things simple we'll call that first, precious cat 'domesticated'. Image: MikeB Of course, the person with whom the cat resided had no idea that they were making history! But they were. It was entirely novel at the time. But also, at that time the dog had been domesticated for about 10,000 years already! Anyway, 10,000 years later humankind has around 250 million domestic cats living on the planet it is believed. The number is a guess so please don't quote the figure as a fact as it is not. The trouble with the internet is that what starts out as an estimate or even a guess

Iberian lynx in the wild. Highly endangered. Image: Pinterest. No one has mentioned this but it seems to me that the highly endangered Iberian lynx - perhaps the world's most endangered cat species - is now under further threat to its survival in the wild: the massive wildfires in the Algarve region of Portugal which is exactly were the Iberian lynx lives! RELATED:  Climate change and illegal water extraction add to threats against Iberian lynx Even without the fires, the temperatures have been so high in the Algarve and other parts of Portugal and Spain that they present a threat alone it would seem to me. What about water courses drying up and the lynx failing to get enough water or its prey animals such as hares and rabbits dying because of the temperatures and drought? The temperatures have been hitting the mid-to-high 40 degrees Celsius in parts. RELATED:  Iberian lynx – comprehensive treatise focusing on conservation 2022 I have two maps: one of the area of distribution of th

Acinonyx is the first half of the Latin, scientific name for the cheetah. The full name is " Acinonyx jubatus ". Because of its anatomical peculiarities, the cheetah is always placed alone in a separate genus, and sometimes even in a separate sub-family of the Felidae.  Cheetah mom and cubs. Image: Pixabay. According to Dr. Desmond Morris: "There is no specific record as to why the cheetah was given this name in 1828, but it has been assumed that the word was derived from the Greek akaina and onux , meaning 'thorn-claw', referring to the fact that its feet are visible, unsheathed claws." An alternative theory is that it may have been derived from the Greek a and kineo which means without movement. This is another reference to the cheetah's claws which are an exception within the cat family.  Saying the word: The claws not entirely unsheathed but they don't operate like a domestic cat's claws which are retracted and then protracted (extended).

NEWS AND COMMENT -UK: The word "grandmother" conjures up the image of a benign, pleasant elderly lady who loves to be with her grandchildren and provides wise words of wisdom while sitting on her armchair with a loving cat on her lap. In the case of Pamela Mattison, 49, this image could not be further from the truth. Mattison leaving court. It looks like she is enjoying the celebrity. Image: Cavendish Press. She admits to dumping her cat in a neighbour's waste bin before trying to stone the cat to death using a brick. Apparently, she threw the brick four times into the wheelie bin with both hands. None made direct contact sufficient to kill the cat thankfully. She was confronted by her neighbour into who's waste bin she had thrown her cat. The neighbour had heard a loud banging noise from the rear window of his property and he also heard the screams of what sounded like an animal. He went to investigate and he saw Pamela Mattison standing by his waste bin. She was pic