Mau Mew

I think it's true that if you feed a stray cat you are very close to the moment of adopting the cat. Even if you don't actually take the cat in and treat that cat as your own, you are adopting the cat, aren't you? A journalist, Tim Kreider, writing for the New York Times made a good point. He said that people have “a reservoir of affection". People need to express their affection and in the absence of a person, perhaps child or a lover, they give their affection to a companion animal. I'm thinking of Sarah Hartwell (of Messybeast.com) who says that cats just happen. They are just there and I'm fairly certain that Sarah Hartwell a well-known cat lover and author has never purposefully adopted a cat because it just happened. People with this reservoir of affection see in a vulnerable kitten or cat a receptacle for their affection although they probably don't realise it. I think it happened to me when I adopted Charlie. My mother had just died and I was a

Angelique Meunier, an Australian celebrity singer/dancer took the name of a cat for her stage name. She must have hijacked the name of a fairly rare purebred pedigree cat, the Havana Brown, which is the name of a chocolate coloured fine looking cat breed. The origin of the name is unclear. It ultimately has its origin in Havana cigars and has been linked with Swiss chocolate or a rabbit! I don't know of any other celebrity who has taken the name of a cat! It is quite neat in one way but I guess only a few people know it is the name of a cat. I am slightly peeved because when you Google " Havana Brown " you are presented with a pile of information about this female celebrity. You have to add "cat" to the search.  There are many examples of the names of wild cats being used by people. Tiger Woods, the golfer, is the standout example but many teams also use wild cat names such as "cougar" and "lion" etc. It is a shame that none of this tra

We are told that the cat genome has been sequenced. The impression given is that this is a major step. What is genome sequencing? I don't exactly know to be honest but what I do know is that it does allow people to better understand the building blocks of the animal of which the genome has been sequenced and it also allows scientists to better understand the genetics of the animal, as I understand it. In this instance an Abyssinian cat living at the University of Missoula in Colombia was the subject chosen to represent her species.  A 25 man multinational scientific team was pulled together to sequence the cat genome. It is stated on the website that provides the source of this information that one reason for sequencing the genes of the cat is to better understand disease, at least in theory. Although cats and humans don't infect each other with their respective diseases except on rare occasions, domestic cats are known to suffer from about 250 conditions which are “analogou

Let's restore a greater percentage of semi-feral cats to their rightful place in society: the working cat. Wasn't that meant to be what they were at the beginning, when first domesticated? Not all feral cats run a mile at the sight of people. There is a wide spectrum of types of feral cat and some are quite domesticated but live outside. For instance, there is a lady in the UK who looks after " allotment cats " (allotments in the UK are gardens in a different place to where you live). These are semi-feral cats. Cats Protection in the UK ask people to contact them if they know of cats that would suit the working cat environment such as farms, stables, smallholdings etc. In America, the Arizona Humane Society have a page on their website where they say cats will work for mice. I like that. They ask people to give them their stray and feral cats. They say there is a waiting list of potential homes for working-cat candidates. I presume this to mean there are more peopl

Note: the video of the one-eyed jaguar from The Daily Mail stopped working so I have another jaguar attack on a caiman. Sorry. A caiman is a fairly small crocodile living in South America. The jaguar is one of the big cats and a roaring cat. The interesting fact about the jaguar is that it has the strongest bite of any of the wild cat species and substantially harder than the tiger. The tiger's bite is also harder than the lion's. Judging by the images it seems that the jaguar used its impressive bite force to kill the caiman by biting the back of its neck somewhere near the nape of the neck in the same way that a domestic cat kills a mouse by biting the nape of the neck which splits open the vertebrae. Cats do this very accurately by feeling where the vertebrae are and where they meet. I think this is the interesting aspect of this story; the way the jaguar kills this South American crocodile It is an example of a superior predator using its inherent attributes to kill

The video above is all over the Internet including screenshots from it. We are told that experts are mystified as to what species this animal is. There's lots of speculation that the animal is a mountain lion or even a lion. But this animal's shape does not resemble a mountain lion or a lion or for that matter any large wild cat species. The torso is too short for a start off.  Of course the pictures are indistinct because the images are grainy and there are strong shadows which appear to alter the shape of the animal. My distinct impression is that people are too eager to look for a mystery where there is none and look for danger where there is none.  People are fearful of the dark and of dangerous large animals. I believe this is a throwback to the early days of homo sapiens when indeed there were dangerous predators and when lions roamed Europe and when sabre-tooth tigers roamed North America. I think people are hardwired with a fear of large predators and that fear

It was totally expected. Very recently, Freya has been hit by car because she wanders all over Central London in one of the areas where the traffic is at its heaviest and let's not forget that traffic is heavy anywhere in London a lot of the time. Freya So we have to conclude that George Osborne, the current chancellor of the exchequer, and his wife are irresponsible cat owners because they let their cat wander all over the most dangerous place for a cat on earth, practically. Let's also not forget that trauma - and by trauma I mean being hit by a car on a road - is one of the major causes of death of the domestic cat in the world today . Any decent cat caretaker knows that they must supervise their cat if he or she goes outside in an area where there is traffic. That's common sense. Anybody knows that but apparently George Osborne and his wife who are both highly educated don't realise it or they have some sort of intransigent, unreasonably idea that a domest

The words in the title come from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PeTA). I like the words. What they say to me is that the legislators in a country, let's say the USA, do not believe it is wrong to exploit animals otherwise they would have legislated against it and made it illegal. Some people believe that animal exploitation is immoral but some people don't. If something is immoral it can also become illegal if it is immoral enough and if enough people believe it is immoral. Clearly not enough people believe that the exploitation of animals is immoral. Indeed, there are lots of questions about what is and what isn't the exploitation of animals. I recently wrote an article about Acro Cats ; these are cats trained by a lady to perform circus style tricks and stunts. Some people will say this is exploitation but a lady commented that she thought it was perfectly acceptable. With such difference of opinion about exploitation it is impossible for there t

The short answer is no in my opinion because Benadryl® is an antihistamine used in treating people and pets. It counteracts histamine which causes inflammation and itchiness whereas flea meds might poison a cat because they contain poisonous substances - active ingredients: Pyrethrin and Pyrethroids. An adverse reaction by the cat to these toxins affects the cat's nervous system. This is a poisoning as opposed to simply an allergic reaction. However, the adverse reaction to flea meds may also be an allergic reaction causing hives and itching and worse - even death. I suppose Benadryl may alleviate the affects of the allergic reaction but there may other adverse reactions such as vomiting and diarrhoea and as mentioned nervous system damage. The point is that if there is an allergic reaction by a cat to flea meds, simply administering Benadryl cannot be guaranteed to be a complete treatment and it would be far too risky to assume it was. There is only one course of action: