Understanding Cats

Understanding cats - This is another fine photograph by probably one of the best cat photographers anywhere (the best, I think, is Helmi Flick). The photograph is copyright (Flickr Name) foturasfelinas. Her real name is Giane Portal. She says in the caption below this picture that in order to understand a cat you must realize that he has his own gifts, his own viewpoint and even his own morality. I read this as saying that cats have their own feelings, which many times are based on the same or similar principles and causes and effect as ours. When you look at this picture do you see an angry cat? If you do you might be frightened of cats. We must never allow cats to falsely reflect our own anxieties.

Understanding cats is something that you would have thought all cat breeders would be good at. This is not the case, I feel. The vast majority will though be well versed in a cat's ways. But do they get into a cat's head?

I wonder if the very nature of cat breeding is an obstacle to understanding cats. In order for a cat breeder of purebred cats to produce cats that are desirable she has to ensure that her cats are as much of the correct "type" (appearance) as possible with reference to the breed standard.

She can only do this if she breeds closely, meaning line breeding or inbreeding. If you breed from a good looking cat you want all the good characteristics from that cat in your cats. This means breeding from a narrow number of fine looking original cats. That kind of breeding is liable to bring out the good and bad of the particular cats concerned. You increase the chances of a recessive gene that carries a negative characteristic making its presence felt when you line breed. Yet all cat breeders must breed this closely.

What happens to the cats that are inevitably produced that are well below standard? Strictly speaking they need to be "culled" to ensure that the poor quality is weeded out thereby gradually eliminating the carriers of the poor genes and strengthening the narrow gene pool in which breeders work. This way you gradually improve the breeding stock.

The problem as you can see is that the breeder has to be ruthless enough to remove cats. Culling in this instance does not necessarily mean killing. I expect, cat breeders find homes for cats that are not desirable but this can't be the case all the time. Some cats get killed I am sure.

When you kill cats it seems that you are beginning to treat animals in your charge in a way that distances you from their feelings. They become objects, a product. It is this which is one of the root problems with cat breeding, which by the way I support, provided breeders see the wider issues.

Cats are driven by the same feelings as humans (remember we are animals in the true sense too - no we were not created by God in the garden of Eden, sorry. Apparently 80% of North Americans believe that God created mankind). When a cat is bad tempered you may think that she is just plain bad tempered. But the common sense reason is that there is some underlying cause. Cats are reactive and natural. Perhaps she doesn't like something in the home she lives in. This may be making her upset, nervous. When we as humans are anxious and nervous we can become aggressive and depressed. This makes us behave less well than we otherwise would. The same applies to cats.

If we want to understand cats we need to understand ourselves and remind ourselves that cats are very similar to humans physiologically and in may areas psychologically. That is why they are used in animal testing experiments but that is another story.

From Understanding Cats to Animal Testing

Bobtail Cats

There are a number of bobtail cats, cats with very short tails or indeed without tails at all. A good example of the former is the American Bobtail or the Pixiebob and the latter the Manx or the Kurilian Bobtail.

We know that human nature drives us to ever develop and explore things, to try and make things better. This applies often to areas such medical research or scientific discoveries. Sometimes we tend to go too far in a particular direction. In other words we are not sure when to stop. The reason for the drive is either commercial reasons and/or shear inquisitiveness, the need to improve and to know. This drive is valuable - most often but it can work against us and against other species on the planet.

Cat breeding has developed a lot it seems over the last 30 years or so. There seems to be a constant desire to create new breeds. Bearing in mind the above this is to be expected. The cat associations or at least some of them control this by disagreeing to register new breeds that are "created" these days by hybridization, taking two existing cat breeds and mating cats from those breeds to form a new cat breed.

I think that it is wise of the CFA for example to put a restraint on this form of development of cat breeds. The CFA disagree with wildcat/domestic cat hybrids. These are popular cats but there are some people who disagree with the direction cat breeders seem to be going in by producing "exotic" cats.

Bobtail cats are another slightly contentious area as the bobtail or lack of a tail is caused by a genetic mutation. The mutated gene that causes the short tail can also cause other "defects". In the Manx is causes "Manx Syndrome", which is a shortening of the spine.

It troubles me a bit then when cat breeders of dwarf cats (another genetic mutation with some potentially secondary problems) consider producing a dwarf cat (the Munchkin, the founding dwarf cat) with a bobtail. In this instance we would be combining two cats with genetic mutations each of which some people would consider detrimental

OK - such a cat would look very cute. But in the interests of cat welfare I believe that the majority of cat lovers and cat fanciers would disagree with such a breeding program as a step too far.

Photo: This cat appears to be a Bobtailed Siamese cat possibly the offspring of a natural mating between a bobtailed cat and a Siamese or simply the emergence of a recessive genetic mutation causing the shortened tail. Photo is copyright KaCey97007 . Siamese do have a kinked tail (very faint). Is this an extension of that "defect"?

Bobtail Cats to Manx Cat

Domestic Wild Cat

Domestic Wild Cat - His name is Jack and he is wild, wild, wild...! He is a great and fine and yes in some people's eyes humble Moggie mixed breed cat but he is wild at heart. Photograph copyright Helmi Flick

So you're thinking of living with a Domestic Cat that is also a wild cat. This breed of cat has gained in popularity over the preceding 20 years or so. The whole thing probably started with the Bengal cat the first domestic cat/wild cat hybrid that set the ball rolling. Jean Mill was responsible for that. I think she has recently retired.

The main points to note about the Domestic Wild Cat are these:

1. The SBT Bengals or 4th generation onwards are only just domestic wild cats with about 12% wild blood. They are really true domestic cats although very athletic and alert.
2. It is the first and second generation fillials that are the domestic cats that have a high percentage of wild cat in them and which will as a consequence behave more like a wild cat. They are big and demand good management. You'll need space, time and money. I wouldn't go down that route unless you're really ready for it and have the means in terms of time and finance. This is for the sake of both you and more importantly the cat. Examples of these cats are the Savannah, Safari and Chausie.
   
3. You can go a step further and live with a true wild cat in the States. These are small to medium sized wild cats such as the Serval. They might be small to medium in the wild but in the home they are big. It is a big step to consider living with such a cat and in addition to the points made a 3 above you've got the legal issues and restrictions surrounding the ownership of a wild cat. That means checking the law of the State concerned and building enclosures on a big plot of land etc. In the UK you just don't even think about these things. It is simply illegal as far as I am aware unless you run some kind of zoo. The Bengal is not uncommon though in the UK (my neighbour lives with a Bengal and I made a video of him, he is called Daniel).
4. One last very important point. The humble mixed breed Moggie so commonly encountered in the world is a Domestic Wild Cat at heart. She is a direct descendant from the wild cat. She decided to live with humans. She is not far from the wild cat still. And you can see that all the time in her instinctive and natural behavior. The way she catches wildlife and eats it despite being fed by you. Her hunting skills are still there. Her eyesight, hearing and sense of smell is very special. She is a killing machine....

Domestic Wild Cat to Mixed Breed Cat the "Household Pet" to use cat association language.

Types of Domestic Cats

Above: this is darling Faolan a Traditional Persian Cat of awesome appearance. He lives with Dani Rozeboom who runs the cattery Yeri Shaes in The Netherlands. Dani's partner is Rick. The photograph in copyright Dani Rozeboom. Dani is a fine cat photographer.

Types of Domestic Cats is another search term sometimes used and it does make me think. On the face of it there is only one type of domestic cat - the domestic cat. But the domestic cat can be categorized in various ways. The method of categorization dictates the type of domestic cat.

For example there are mixed breed and pure bred cats. There is only one mixed breed cat but he or she has an infinitely variable appearance. The number of purebred cats varies. It depends on which association you're talking about. The Cat Fanciers Association say that there are 41 (I think it still is). TICA say there are more. There are more North American cat associations with slightly different views. The Europeans (GCCF and FIFe) categorize differently anyway and have less de-marked cat breeds. It's all very complicated.

If you categorized by origin of a purebred cat, you could subdivide between wildcat/domestic cat hybrid, natural cats and domestic cat hybrids. An example of the first would be the Chausie (Jungle cat/Abyssinian) or the Savannah (Serval/Domestic), an example of the second would be the Norwegian Forest Cat (mankind didn't intervene until about 1930) and the third would be the Exotic Shorthair (Persian/American Shorthair). There many more examples under this categorization. In this form of categorization you are dividing up Types of Domestic Cats into their respective origins.

Another way to find different Types of Domestic Cats is to divide by size and weight. The vast middle area of domestic cats are of average weight, about 9 lbs. But some are larger and heavier such as the Maine Coon, the largest domestic cat registered with the CFA. The wildcat/domestic cat hybrids mentioned above are heavier than the Maine Coon especially at the first generation level. The smallest domestic cat (as a cat breed) is the Singapura. You can see a breakdown of domestic cat by size by clicking on this link.

A third way of categorizing cats is by coat type. Coat types cut across cat breed boundaries. The associations dictate which cat breed can have which type of coat. Sometimes they say that the coat can only be of only one color and texture. In that case it is to preserve the original appearance of a naturally occurring cat such, for example, the Chartreux a grey cat breed.

Sometimes the cat associations are generous in allowing a cat to have an almost infinite number of coat types such as the Maine Coon or Persian. But in both these cases the pointed coat is disallowed in the States. The pointed Persian is called a Himalayan.

So, you've got tabby cats and calico cats and hairless cats etc. These are various Types of Domestic Cats that can be found in a wide range of cat breeds. Of course you can find all these coat types without restriction in mixed breed cats. If you click on this link you'll see a list of postings on the cat coat types.

These probably are the main methods of categorization that come to mind.

Update 11th Jan 2010: Another way to categorise domestic cats into "type" is by reference to say:

• Dwarf Cats
• Exotic Cats (such as the Savannah cat)
• Hybrid Cats

I discuss this kind of categorisation on this page: Different Cat Breeds.

Yet another way is to categorise by cat body types or head shape.

Types of Domestic Cats to Home Page

How Old is My Cat

Old Cat. The photographer "Steve took it" (photograph copyright "Steve took it") says he is 20 years old making him 93 in human age. A long life.

How Old is My Cat is a question that cat owners ask themselves sometimes. I actually don't know the exact age of my cat because she came to me from under a stationary car on a cold street in west London in November 1993. At the time I was living in Notting Hill Gate.

I always thought that the method for calculating a cat's age was to multiply by 7. If that was true my cat would be 105 and I don't think that is correct because she is pretty fit, eats well, likes her prawns and tells me what to do.

So I guess the formula of times 7 is a bit unsophisticated. A more accurate method is provided by the Cornell University of Veterinarian Medicine (who could be better qualified?).

The author on the Cornell site says this. Old age starts to show itself at about 7-10 years of age.

Here's a chart based on the Cornell advice:

Cat Age	Human Age
1	16
2	21
3	25
4	29
5	33
6	37
7	41
8	45
9	49
10	53
11	57
12 free bus pass	61
13 retirement and pension	65
14	69
15	73
16	77
17	81
18	85
19	89
20	93
21	97
22 letter from the Queen	101

That makes my girl about 73 or so. She may be 77 or even more are she was at least, I believe, one year old when she found me.

When I write this post I think of a concerned cat lover who had bought some Modern Siamese cats from a breeder and all her cats died before the cat age of 10. I think some vets in the USA (am I wrong? - tell me please) consider 10 a reasonable age for a cat. I always thought late teens was the target. You can now answer the question, How Old is My Cat....... Your cat should live to the human equivalent of old age, which is about mid 80s these days or 18 in cat time. I wonder if female cats live longer than male cats as is the case for humans?

 Old cat - beautiful but sad photo - by by YanivG (Flickr)

How Old is My Cat to Senior Cat Care