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.
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?
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 family life. I am afraid that this is more superstition and a variation on the devil lives inside black cats from the Middle Ages. It is rubbish.
Yes, black cats are affectionate like all domestic cats provided they are well socialised to people and are treated with kindness and respect.
Rare?
No, black cat are not rare. In fact, they are commonplace among the pantheon of cat coat colours and patterns. FYI - grey cats are black cats carrying the dilution gene.
Hypoallergenic?
No, all domestic cats have the allergen called Fel D1 which is mainly in their saliva and which they deposit on their coat when grooming. It dries and flies off around the home. Don't believe the stories on the internet that some cat breeds e.g. the Siberian, are hypoallergenic meaning that they won't cause an allergic reaction. They will.
A dry cat food called Purina LiveClear is pretty effective in containing the allergen and preventing it causing an allergic reaction in people allergic to cats. Try it and tell me how it went in a comment please!
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.
'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 development of the embryo.
Where there are no melanocytes there is no melanin in the hair strands. White fur does not contain pigment namely melanin.
It is white because the light from sun or room light passes through it. White light is a mixture of all the colours of the rainbow.
Melanin is a brown/black. If it is diluted, black becomes blue grey and red becomes cream and so on.
The experts rate bicolor cats from 1 to 10 depending on the amount of white fur. Level 1 is black and no white fur while level 10 is all-white. The cat in the picture is about level 4.
If you have a question, ask in a comment and I'll be pleased to respond. I always check comments as I get so few! :)
Level 9 bicolor Cornish Rex. Image in the public domain.
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 cat's owner is Trish and she said: “By six months old Kit Kat was jumping rope in front of huge crowds of people at the farm, helping to bust myths that cats can’t be trained.”
Comment: I don't think that she is busting myths because you can train a cat to do more or less anything with sufficient patience.
I’ve never seen another cat work as hard and long as he does. He gives it his all no matter what he is doing! He purrs non-stop and loves to please others! - Trish
Trish runs a leading talent agency of animals and has been working as a professional animal trainer for years. I suspect that she wanted to promote her business which is fantastic and she achieved it by getting this record with her cat.
Her cat can do around 20 different tricks including giving high fives, waving, meowing on command and spinning. Trish says that jumping a rope is the most impressive trick that she has trained her cat to do.
I almost forgot; her cat's name is Kit Kat. Trish says that he loves to learn. Trish uses his favourite reward which is Tiki Cat Stix as it's sure to motivate him! He is the most affectionate cat Trish says and he is everyone's best friend.
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 spoke to a dog in human adult language the dog would respond less well as their brain would be activated to a lower level that it would be if a woman spoke to the same dog in baby language.
It is the way women emphasise certain parts of their speech, the rhythms and patterns and intonation of their speech when communicating with their young child and the family dog which triggers the dog's brain better than standard adult speech.
Although the emphasis is on women speaking to dogs in an infant language, one can imply from the research that cats would also respond to infant or cat-directed speech using a certain 'prosody'.
Dog studies
In fact, it is certain that millions of women talk to their cats in exactly the same way that women talk to their dogs. The reason why the research is about dogs is because dogs are much easier to deal with in a research study. It's a typical problem: that there are far more scientific studies about dogs than there are about cats for this reason.
Prosody
The word "prosody" means speaking in a certain way in which there are certain emphases on certain words and there is a certain pattern and intonation in the language.
Comment: it doesn't surprise me that dogs' brains showed more activity when women spoke to them in dog-directed baby talk because women talk to their babies all the time and more so than men normally.
They become better skilled at communicating with infants and babies. As they are better skilled in communicating with infants and babies, they are more likely to speak in a way which is understood by the family dog. Dogs are better able to understand commands and requests in infant-directed speech. This is the domain of women normally.
More information: Anna Gergely et al, Dog brains are sensitive to infant- and dog-directed prosody, Communications Biology (2023). DOI: 10.1038/s42003-023-05217-y
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 countryside where they are meant to be. This most often happens in places such as the UK were there are no wild cats (except feral cats!).
Big cat sightings have to be fuzzy images. This makes them mysterious. It creates a discussion about what the animal is. The reason why there are no sharp images and high-quality videos of mysterious big cats captured by the general public is because there are no mysterious big cats in places where they're not meant to be.
It must be quite difficult for the television presenters to talk about these cat sightings. It is quite embarrassing to do it because the video is so obviously a video of a domestic cat. As usual it must have been a very bad news day. News media outlets like any other content producer can sometimes struggle to find reasonable content to fill their programs and this is a good example.
Poor quality images and poor-quality videos are synonymous with big cat sightings. The two go together like apple pie and custard. On this page is yet another version of the so-called big cat sighting and as ever it is a domestic cat minding his own business.
If the video maker had zoomed in a little or taken a still image when zooming in the smart phone camera (and all smartphones these days have a facility to zoom in) they would have seen quickly that the cat is a domestic cat. And that would have been that.
They would not have been able to send the video to a news media outlet because it would be a straightforward video of a domestic cat wandering around someone's backyard or on the edge of the countryside.
As you can see, there has to be an element of mystery about it and you get that by creating a poor-quality image or video. I have said enough about this.
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 research.
Benevo Adult dry
This is the fact sheet from the Pet Express website:
Benevo Adult Original Complete Vegetarian & Vegan Cat Food is a delicious meat free recipe that with provide your cat with all of the nutrients they require to thrive.
This tasty dish is complete and balanced, having been approved by the Vegetarian and Vegan Society. It contains taurine and spirulina to boost the immune system, without the addition of any GM ingredients. With 28% protein, this is a great vegetarian meal that your cat will love to savour.
Nutritionally complete and balanced recipe
28% protein
Not tested on animals
With Prebiotic FOS to help digestion
Added Yucca extract helps reduce toilet odour
Contains Spirulina to boost immune system
Omega 3 and 6 oils for healthy skin, fur, joints, vision and brain function
A study conducted at the Vienna Institute for Food Nutrition and Functional Plant Compounds published in 2014 assessed the nutritional value of vegan cat and dog food, both wet and dry. The assessment included Benevo and another brand Yarrah. The focused on Benevo Duo.
Benevo Duo - for cats & dogs (same food)
Benevo Duo cats was found to meet most of the minimum fulfilment requirements the cats consuming this vegan pet food. They say that the majority of daily nutrient requirements were met with the exception of energy, kilocalories and crude protein. It is suggested to meet the total of these requirements to help with the vegan cat food supplements to ensure the health of their cat.
This food is both a dog and cat food (hence 'duo') which is very strange because normally cat food is too rich for dogs and dog food is not rich enough cats. That's possibly why this study found that this particular version of vegan cat food was not quite up to scratch in terms of energy and crude protein.
But the Benevo Adult Original Complete Vegetarian and Vegan Cat Food mentioned above appears to be as balanced as any other dry cat food.
