Reasons why the family cat prefers the husband over the wife

Bearing in mind that domestic cats rely on their sense of smell to identify objects and people, one reason why a family cat might prefer the husband over the wife is because the wife wears perfume and the husband does not wear aftershave. 

Wife feels like she is a 'side chick' to her husband because the family cat prefers him. Photo: Imgur.

I would argue that it is far more common for a woman to mask their body odour compared to men. This may be having an important impact on the relationship between domestic cats and family members. 

I am speculating, of course, and I am not saying that domestic cats prefer husbands to wives. Far from it because when you research this point you will find that people are looking to Google for answers as to why a domestic cat prefers their girlfriend, or their roommate, or somebody else and it is always gender unspecific. 

This is not about human gender; it is, I believe, more about body odour! But there are many other factors why a cat prefers somebody over another person. It is about chemistry and we know that the word "chemistry" in relation to affection for a significant other is a very vague term. It means a bundle of factors that we can't necessarily specify.

But this 'chemistry' will be different the cats compared to people. The lives of people are dominated by what they see, for cats their sense of smell is certainly as important as their eyesight or perhaps more so. This is why you will see domestic cats constantly sniffing the legs of their human companion even when they know full well who that person is. They seem to be constantly reaffirming that this is the person they know. And they like the scent of that person. It's a reassurance.

Just this morning when I fed my cat with a treat after I came in from buying a newspaper, he sniffed at my leg on more than one occasion. I know that he loves the way I smell. It is just the way it is. And I don't wear aftershave. I never have. 

The range of factors which make up the chemistry between cat and person will include such things as: the sound of the person's voice, the way they handle their cat, whether they genuinely like their cat or not, whether they have raised their cat from a newborn kitten and so on. But I believe, to return to the beginning, that perhaps the most dominant factor is the scent of a person.

And the fact that cats can have chemistry with a human once again reaffirms that they are sentient beings. There are still people who believe that cats are not. But a recognition that domestic cats are sentient is so vitally important to their welfare. Once you accept that they are sentient beings with feelings it changes your perception of animals and it should make us more sensitive towards their needs and welfare.

Food freshness is important to a domestic cat

 I ran a little tests today to see how critically important food freshness is to a domestic cat. My cat likes king prawns. I treat him with them from time to time. I have one packet which has three days left on its sell by date so they are perfectly fresh and edible.

Food freshness is important to a domestic cat. Image: MikB based on image from Pixabay.

Today I bought a fresh packet, straight off the shelves of Sainsbury's. I gave him some prawns from the older packet and he rejected them. I gave him some prawns from the fresh packet and he gobbled them up.

Both were highly edible but he entirely rejected one and loved the other. And of course he checked them out with his nose. The first thing that a domestic cat does when eating food is to smell it. The cat's nose is the arbiter of whether food is good or bad, edible or inedible.

This is why they will pick up the smell of a pill inside food and reject all the food or just the pill. I don't think humans have yet fully grasped the importance of smell to the domestic cat. It's like an extra pair of eyes in the human world.

I wonder sometimes whether they rely more on their sense of smell than they do on their sight. As I dictate this my cat has discovered some dry cat food inside a toy. The toy is designed to make getting at the food difficult. It's meant to simulate hunting. The food has been there for about a year. He is eating it with gusto.

That is another story. Dry cat food can smell perfectly edible and attractive to a domestic cat even though it is quite old and beyond its sell by date. Does dry cat food go off? They say it does and it does have a sell by date but I'm sure that 99.9% of purchasers ignore the sell by date. It is as good as meaningless because the lifespan of dry cat food is so long in practice.

The point of this post is that cats rely on their sense of smell to decide whether the food is edible or not. It's appearance is probably neither here nor there.