Tony Buffington : Why do cats act so weird?


 

They're cute, they're lovable, and judging by the 26 billions views of over 2 million YouTube videos of them pouncing, bouncing, climbing, cramming, stalking, clawing, chattering, and purring, one thing is certain: cats are very entertaining. These somewhat strange feline behaviors, both amusing and baffling, leave many of us asking, "Why do cats do that?"

Throughout time, cats were simultaneously solitary predators of smaller animals and prey for larger carnivores. As both predator and prey, survival of their species depended on crucial instinctual behaviors which we still observe in wild and domestic cats today. While the feline actions of your house cat Grizmo might seem perplexing, in the wild, these same behaviors, naturally bred into cats for millions of years, would make Grizmo a super cat.

Enabled by their unique muscular structure and keen balancing abilities, cats climbed to high vantage points to survey their territory and spot prey in the wild. Grizmo doesn't need these particular skills to find and hunt down dinner in her food bowl today, but instinctually, viewing the living room from the top of the bookcase is exactly what she has evolved to do.

As wild predators, cats are opportunistic and hunt whenever prey is available. Since most cat prey are small, cats in the wild needed to eat many times each day, and use a stalk, pounce, kill, eat strategy to stay fed. This is why Grizmo prefers to chase and pounce on little toys and eat small meals over the course of the day and night. Also, small prey tend to hide in tiny spaces in their natural environments, so one explanation for Grizmo's propensity to reach into containers and openings is that she is compelled by the same curiosity that helped ensure the continuation of her species for millions of years before.

In the wild, cats needed sharp claws for climbing, hunting, and self-defense. Sharpening their claws on nearby surfaces kept them conditioned and ready, helped stretch their back and leg muscles, and relieve some stress, too. So, it's not that Grizmo hates your couch, chair, ottoman, pillows, curtains, and everything else you put in her environment. She's ripping these things to shreds and keeping her claws in tip-top shape because this is exactly what her ancestors did in order to survive.

As animals that were preyed upon, cats evolved to not get caught, and in the wild, the cats that were the best at avoiding predators thrived. So at your house today, Grizmo is an expert at squeezing into small spaces and seeking out and hiding in unconventional spots. It also explains why she prefers a clean and odor-free litter box. That's less likely to give away her location to any predators that may be sniffing around nearby.

Considering everything we do know about cats, it seems that one of their most predominate behaviors is still one of the most mysterious. Cats may purr for any number of reasons, such as happiness, stress, and hunger. But curiously, the frequency of their purrs, between 25 and 150 hertz, is within a range that can promote tissue regeneration. So while her purring makes Grizmo an excellent nap companion, it is also possible that her purr is healing her muscles and bones, and maybe even yours, too.

They developed through time as both solitary predators that hunted and killed to eat, and stealthy prey that hid and escaped to survive. So cats today retain many of the same instincts that allowed them to thrive in the wild for millions of years. This explains some of their seemingly strange behaviors. To them, our homes are their jungles. But if this is the case, in our own cat's eyes, who are we? Big, dumb, hairless cats competing with them for resources? Terribly stupid predators they're able to outsmart every day? Or maybe they think we're the prey.

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On May 27th, 1941, the German battleship Bismarck sank in a fierce firefight, leaving only 118 of her 2,200 crew members alive. But when a British destroyer came to collect the prisoners, they found an unexpected survivor - a black and white cat clinging to a floating plank. For the next several months this cat hunted rats and raised British morale - until a sudden torpedo strike shattered the hull and sank the ship. But, miraculously, not the cat. Nicknamed Unsinkable Sam, he rode to Gibraltar with the rescued crew and served as a ship cat on three more vessels – one of which also sank - before retiring to the Belfast Home for Sailors.

Many may not think of cats as serviceable sailors, or cooperative companions of any kind. But cats have been working alongside humans for thousands of years - helping us just as often as we help them. So how did these solitary creatures go from wild predator to naval officer to sofa sidekick?

The domestication of the modern house cat can be traced back to more than 10,000 years ago in the Fertile Crescent, at the start of the Neolithic era. People were learning to bend nature to their will, producing much more food than farmers could eat at one time. These Neolithic farmers stored their excess grain in large pits and short, clay silos. But these stores of food attracted hordes of rodents, as well as their predator, Felis silvestris lybica - the wildcat found across North Africa and Southwest Asia.

These wildcats were fast, fierce, carnivorous hunters. And they were remarkably similar in size and appearance to today’s domestic cats. The main differences being that ancient wildcats were more muscular, had striped coats, and were less social towards other cats and humans.

The abundance of prey in rodent-infested granaries drew in these typically solitary animals. And as the wildcats learned to tolerate the presence of humans and other cats during mealtime, we think that farmers likewise tolerated the cats in exchange for free pest control. The relationship was so beneficial that the cats migrated with Neolithic farmers from Anatolia into Europe and the Mediterranean.

Vermin were a major scourge of the seven seas. They ate provisions and gnawed at lines of rope, so cats had long since become essential sailing companions.

Around the same time these Anatolian globe trotting cats set sail, the Egyptians domesticated their own local cats. Revered for their ability to dispatch venomous snakes, catch birds, and kill rats, domestic cats became important to Egyptian religious culture. They gained immortality in frescos, hieroglyphs, statues, and even tombs, mummified alongside their owners. Egyptian ship cats cruised the Nile, holding poisonous river snakes at bay. And after graduating to larger vessels, they too began to migrate from port to port. During the time of the Roman Empire, ships traveling between India and Egypt carried the lineage of the central Asian wildcat F. s. ornata. Centuries later, in the Middle Ages, Egyptian cats voyaged up to the Baltic Sea on the ships of Viking seafarers. And both the Near Eastern and North African wildcats – probably tamed at this point -- continued to travel across Europe, eventually setting sail for Australia and the Americas. Today, most house cats have descended from either the Near Eastern or the Egyptian lineage of F.s.lybica. But close analysis of the genomes and coat patterns of modern cats tells us that unlike dogs, which have undergone centuries of selective breeding, modern cats are genetically very similar to ancient cats. And apart from making them more social and docile, we’ve done little to alter their natural behaviors. In other words, cats today are more or less as they’ve always been: Wild animals. Fierce hunters. Creatures that don’t see us as their keepers. And given our long history together, they might not be wrong.

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