All the Trivia You Could Ever Hope to Find about CATS!
Cats
have a third eyelid. It's called a haw and you will probably only
see it when your cat doesn't feel well.
It
is a common belief that cats are color blind; but recent studies have shown
that cats can see blue, green, and red.
A
cat sees about six times better than a human at night because of the tapetum
lucidum which is a layer of extra reflecting cells that absorbs light.
It's also why the cat's eyes seem to glow in the dark.
Those
dark lines connecting to a cat's eyes are called mascara lines.
All
cats are born with blue eyes.
A
cat cannot see directly under its nose. This is why the cat cannot seem
to find tidbits on the floor.
The
odd-eyed white cat is an Ankara Kedi.
A
large majority of white cats with blue eyes are deaf. White cats with only
one blue eye are deaf only in the ear closest to the blue eye.
Many
cats lack the gene required to be affected by catnip. All the catnip toys
in the world will not affect a cat without the necessary gene...
A
cat has approximately 60 to 80 million olfactory cells while a human has
about 5 to 20 million.
Whiskers
are very sensitive, even to small changes in air currents. A cat has four
rows on each side of its face. The upper two rows can move independently
of the bottom two rows.
A
cat uses its whiskers to determine if a space is too small to squeeze through.
The whiskers act as feelers or antennae, helping the animal to judge the
precise width of any passage.
In
addition to using their noses, cats can smell with the Jacobson's organ
which is located in the upper surface of the mouth.
An
adult cat has around twelve whiskers.
A
cat's whiskers, called vibrissae, grow on the cat's face and on the back
of its forelegs.
A
cat's jaw can't move sideways.
An
adult cat has about thirty teeth.
A
cat's sense of taste is keener than a dog's sense of taste.
Cats
lose almost as much fluid in the saliva while grooming themselves as they
do through urination.
Kittens
lose their baby teeth. At three to four months the incisors come in. Then
at 4-6 months, they lose their canines, premolars and molars. By the time
they are seven months old, their adult teeth are fully developed. This
is one of the ways a vet can tell the age of a kitten.
Ever
notice how rough your kitty's tongue is? The cat's tongue is covered with
backward facing hooks (papillae) that are used to groom its fur and to
scrape meat off bones.
Cats
can't taste sweets even though some seem to love them.
Cats
have over one hundred vocal sounds, while dogs only have about ten.
Cats
purr at about 26 cycles per second, the same frequency as an idling diesel
engine.
Ear
furnishings are the hairs that grow inside a cat's ears.
A
cat has 32 muscles in each ear.
Newborn
kittens have closed ear canals that don't begin to open for nine days.
Non-pedigree
cats have an higher incidence of tabby markings than pedigree cats. Non-pedigree
cats are also more often more robust than highly bred cats.
Cats
have true fur, meaning that they have both an undercoat and an outer coat.
Cats
with white fur and skin on their ears are very prone to sunburn.
Cats
can have freckles. They can appear anywhere on a cat's skin and even in
its mouth.
A
cat will never break a sweat because it has no sweat glands.
Cats
can get "age spots". These are black spots on the skin that are often seen
around the lips, eyes, and nose; and usually start when the cat is three
to five years of age.
~ Feet, Limbs, and Tails ~ Cats
are sometimes born with extra toes. This is called polydactyl.
A
cat can be either right-pawed or left-pawed.
Most
cats have five toes on each front paw, but only four toes on each back
paw.
Cats
have carpal pads on their front paws that help to prevent them from sliding
on a slippery surface when jumping.
Many
of a cat's bones are found in its tail.
A
cat's tail plays a vital part in the cat's balance and in the "righting
reflex" that allows it to land on its feet after falling from a height.
When
a cat runs, its legs are extended fully in the air, then brought down and
back. The cat's extremely flexible spine allows its rear end to move, even
while the forelimbs are on the ground. The cat moves faster by stretching
its trunk fully, making the stride longer. The faster the kitty goes, the
smaller the overlap between the left and right feet gets. This makes the
distance covered greater. At full speed, a domestic cat can be going as
fast as 31 miles per hour!!!
Cats
lack a true collarbone and can generally squeeze their bodies through any
space they can get their heads through.
Cats
are the only animal that walk on their toes, not the pads of their feet.
Cats
step with both left legs, then both right legs when they walk or run. The
only other animals to do this are the giraffe and the camel.
Ever
see a cat jump straight into the air when startled? They can jump up to
five feet this way. As a comparison, a human would have to jump twenty-nine
feet to match this standing high jump.
A
cat can jump as much as seven times its height.
Cats
use more than 500 muscles to leap, jump, and sprint.
Cats
take between 20-40 breaths per minute.
A
cat's normal pulse is 140-240 beats per minute. (Average is 195).
A
cat's normal body temperature ranges between 100.5 and 102.5 degrees Fahrenheit.
Both
humans and cats have identical regions in the brain responsible for emotion.
The
cat's brain needs so much energy to function that over twenty percent of
blood that the heart pumps goes immediately to it.
The
cat has 500 skeletal muscles. Compare that to a much larger human, who
has 650.
Cat
urine glows under a black light.
Cats
must have some fat in their diet because they can't produce it on their
own.
Cats
have AB blood groups just like people. Cats can donate blood to other cats.
Cats
have 13 ribs.
A
cat has 230 bones in its body. A human only has 206 bones.
The
average life span of a cat is twelve years.
The
heaviest cat ever recorded weighed 46 lbs.
Perhaps
the oldest known female cat was Ma, from Devon, who was 34 when she died
in 1957.
Ferals
are domestic cats that have reverted to living wild.
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