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Myths About Cats

Most myths about cats seem to have come from sources that didn't really observe their subject very closely. For instance the myth of loyalty; my own experience, acquired over fifty years of animal husbandry, is that cats can be far more loyal than dogs. I have had cats warn me of prowlers while the dogs slept. One current cat has taken on the task of being a "hearing cat" and comes to get me whenever the phone or doorbell rings. He will then lead me back to where the phone is or which door the visitor is at. This is an entirely self taught behavior. As for intelligence, a cat is very different from a dog, but this does not make it less intelligent or less devoted to its person. It does make the way the animal displays this loyalty different. the following story is anecdotal, but I have over a dozen other similar stories, including some about the cat now sitting on my feet. When my daughter was 13 we acquired two cats, a brother and sister pair. They had been completely declawed and always lived inside. They were bathed once a week.

The children, who were the in the same age bracket as my daughter, lost interest and the mother wanted to get rid of the cats. We took them.

The male was so distressed that he hid under my daughters bed for three days. crying pitifully. He even had tears flowing down his nose. Eventually she convinced him to come to her and begin eating. That was eleven years ago. When she went away to college he went into a decline. Had she not been at a school where it was easy for her to get home frequently I believe he might have died at this time. When she moved back home he stuck close whenever she was around. She is now in law school and this time took him with her. She reports he waits for her at the door and if she is very late getting home he fusses at her worse than I ever did. He stays by her side at all times when she is at her apartment. His fussing isn't about food because he always has food available since, whenever possible, we feed our animals dry food free choice. Oh his sister? She adopted me as her person and still stays close by whenever I'm in the house. She has to share me with another cat who, as a twelve week old kitten, marched into a bandhall full of kids practicing to get to me.

Over the years many other cat owners have confirmed my own observations about the loyalty of cats. Another common myth is that cats are loners, yet it isn't at all uncommon in any household with multiple cats to see several of them piled up together. Sometimes the pile is such that you cannot tell where one cat ends and another begins. Most of the time you see dogs curled up in a little ball all by itself. In my experience Dalmatians are one breed in particular that will group up like cats. I've been told by Pug owners that their dogs will also cuddle together in groups. As for intelligence, on the whole,I've seen nothing to suggest that cats are less smart than dogs. Individual animals are like individual humans, they vary widely in IQ's. The intelligence of cats and dogs is very different. They have to be trained differently because you cannot force them to obey you the way you can a dog, but they can learn a great deal if you use Clicker Training methods. They also learn from watching other animals, including dogs.

My point is all animals are different. Dogs do not learn and respond like horses who in turn do not learn and respond the dogs and/or cats do. this is something that applies to all the animals who share our lives. It is far more fun to celebrate these differences rather than get into a "my dog is better than your cat who is better than your horse..." argument.

Learn more about this author, Elizabeth J Baldwin.
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