Ben’s Reviews > Cat Sense: How the New Feline Science Can Make You a Better Friend to Your Pet > Status Update
Ben
is on page 290 of 307
Pet cats don't range very widely when let out to roam. Pet cats raised indoors from birth don't have very strong hunting instincts. Pet cats fed nutritionally complete diets (i.e., any diet comprised of modern cat food, as opposed to scraps) tend not to hunt much or with much vigour. Cats've been linked to dozens of species extinctions. Cats predate animals, such as rats, that've been linked to even more extinctions.
— Sep 08, 2024 12:42AM
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Ben
is on page 290 of 307
Cats have very long and very short-term memories. Their memories are long because their early-life experiences set their personalities for the rest of their lives. On the other hand, their working memory apparently lasts for a mere 7 seconds. One practical consequence of this is that cats need to be disciplined & rewarded immediately after doing something. Scolding them for gifting a dead mouse is totally pointless.
— Sep 09, 2024 04:04AM
Ben
is on page 290 of 307
Widespread microchipping of pet cats can help ensure that they aren't euthanised when captured. To ensure that microchipping is widespread, governments should make the process cheap and easy. I work for local government, and currently the process is anything but: lots of pensioners can't afford it at all. These processes should be streamlined to reduce the collateral murder of pet cats when trying to reign in ferals.
— Sep 08, 2024 12:47AM
Ben
is on page 130 of 307
For cats, play is a hunting simulator. They play more eagerly when hungry (they hunt more intensely when hungry). They play more eagerly with toys that resemble prey (feathers, fur, legs). They play more eagerly with smaller toys (the size of low-risk prey). They attack small vs large prey differently & play in similar ways with small & large toys. & they keep playing if the toy falls apart, as maimed prey does.
— Sep 06, 2024 07:40PM
Ben
is on page 29 of 307
The first known word that was created to refer to cats was an Egyptian hieroglyph from the Middle Kingdom which translates as "miw". How very close to the contemporary "meow"!
— Sep 05, 2024 12:24AM
Ben
is on page 29 of 307
The spaying and neutering of pet cats has had perverse unintended consequences. Only pet cats are spayed and neutered; ferals cats almost all escape this fate. This means that the cats least suited to human coexistence are virtually the only ones that breed. I wonder if there are deliberate attempts to breed human-compatible cats on the scale of similar operations for dogs that led to, e.g., hypoallergenic poodles.
— Sep 05, 2024 12:22AM
