cat behavior – Page 15 – Pain In The Bud

What’s The Real Reason Cats Love Boxes?

It’s about more than just having a cozy place to sit.

Buddy is not overly obsessed with boxes.

I think that’s because he feels safe here, he’s got plenty of places to hide if he wants, and he’s got a big cat tunnel with four ways in or out. He doesn’t need another little space to crawl into.

Still, like any cat, the little dude likes a good box. When he gets to play with a new box he likes to sniff it, rub against it once or twice, then jump inside and determine if it’s comfortable. Then he gets serious, looks around, and slowly sinks down below the top of the box…

…and remains there for a few seconds before cautiously raising his head and looking around. Usually this is accompanied by a delighted trill, and I get the strong sense that he thinks he’s invisible to anyone outside the box while he has the advantage of seeing them.

“You cannot see Buddy, but Buddy sees you!”

Does he ambush me from the box? Does a bear crap in the woods?

There isn’t an abundance of research into why cats love boxes so much, but the existing data combined with what we know about the feline mind strongly suggests that, first and foremost, boxes have a strong psychological effect. They make cats feel secure and well-protected.

Anyone familiar with cats knows the little furballs like to wedge themselves into hideaways, scurry under tables and hide in laundry baskets. The behavior starts in kittenhood when they’re tiny enough to crawl into shoes and sneakers.

In 2021, animal cognition grad student Gabriella Smith conducted a study in which she found cats will happily sit in Kanizsa contours with the same enthusiasm they have for boxes.

Kanizsa contours are two-dimensional. The participants created them by using tape and paper to make the shapes on the floor. They’re not even proper boxes, just the illusory suggestion of boxes or general square shapes. That doesn’t seem to matter to cats:

Research shows cats are attracted to two-dimensional boxes as well as boxes made of cardboard and other materials.

A cat sitting in an illusory Kanizsa box.

Of course pieces of tape or paper on the floor do not afford any real protection, so the feline affinity for boxes seems to be more about feeling protected.

Since cats are territorial, it could be that they also like clear boundaries around their personal space.

The key here seems to be having the boundary without blocking access, as cats are notoriously not cool with closed doors or being confined. If they want to spend an hour in a tiny space and it’s their idea, they’re fine with it, but they don’t like to be restricted by when they can come and go.

Notably, this isn’t behavior limited to felis catus. So far there doesn’t seem to be any exception to the box-loving rule among felines and felids of any species. Tigers, lions, jaguars, leopards, snow leopards and pumas seem just as fond of them as their smaller cousins, as you can see in this video from Big Cat Rescue:

Boxes are comforting, cozy, fun to explore and make the perfect hiding spots for ambushes. If you’re a cat big or small, what’s not to like?

‘Sleep Scritches’: Buddy’s Latest Innovation

Buddy has devised a method to get me to scratch his head without even waking me.

I’m not exactly sure when I first consciously noticed it, but over the last six months I’ve woken up in odd circumstances in the middle of the night: My hand is raised and Buddy is there, nuzzling against it and purring.

It started with the Budster nudging my hand with his muzzle, then somehow he got me to raise my hand without waking me.

Not content to stop there, Bud has somehow engineered what I call “Sleep Scritches,” in which he triggers me to pet him while I’m unconscious.

It’s really weird to wake up on your back with your hand raised and your cat sounding like a motorboat as he guides his forehead beneath your fingertips. It’s also weird to wake up with said cat sitting on your chest and licking your nose or your beard.

Buddy the Clever — “You shall pet me even whilst you are asleep, human servant!”

Let no one say Bud isn’t a clever cat when he wants to be, which is basically whenever there’s food, attention or affection involved.

He saw a problem, which is that it’s really difficult to wake me up once I’m properly asleep. And he solved that problem not by waking me up, but by getting what he wants without having to wake me. He does the same thing when dealing with my tendency to toss and turn in my sleep: He finds a nook wherever one is available and burrows in when it’s cold, or simply drapes himself on top of me when it’s warm.

Score another one for feline ingenuity.

At this point I wouldn’t be surprised to discover he’s got me sleepwalking to the treat cabinet every night.

Of course I could set up a camera to record me while I sleep a la Paranormal Activity, but I’m afraid I might see him grooming his butt before licking my face while I remain unconscious. Sometimes ignorance really is bliss.

What Do Cats Think When We Meow To Them?

A Redditor shared a video of her cat who was apparently delighted when he realized she spoke meow.

We’ve all done it. Whether we’re bored, curious or just exasperated, every cat servant has meowed back to their furry overlord at some point, and the reactions of our feline friends run the gamut from pleasantly surprised to utterly confused.

The latter would be an apt description for Buddy’s reaction the first time I meowed back at him. I do recall a friendlier “conversation” in meow between us when he was a kitten and laying adorably on his back atop my desk, playfully reaching out at my fingers with his tiny paws as I typed.

However, it feels like our first real meowningful exchange came one day during a conflict: I needed to get some articles done on deadline, and Buddy was insistently pointing out it was dinner time.

Like all cats, if he doesn’t see some action starting 15 or 20 minutes before Official Meal Time, he makes sure I know Yum O’Clock is rapidly approaching. That’s exactly what he was doing as I pounded the keyboard, trying to tie up a pair of 750-word stories.

“Mmmmmrrrrrrrowww?” Buddy questioningly meowed, looking up at me. “Mmmmmrrrreeeowww? Mrrrrrrrrroooowww!”

Translation: “Uh, Big Bud? Dude? My yums aren’t here. Where’s my food, dude? Where’s my food? Where’s my FOOD?!?!”

He kept at it, increasing the volume, frequency and urgency of his meows to the point where you’d think he was dying, and I couldn’t ignore him any longer.

“Mrrrrrowww!” I mockingly meowed back to him. “I’m Buddy, and my dinner might be late! Mrrrrowwww! So terrible!”

He sat there dumbfounded, and I used those fleeting seconds as best I could. Then he decided that, yes, I was mocking him, and he made his displeasure known.

“MMMMRRROOOWWW! Mrrrrrrrppp!”

“Mrrrrooowww! My dinner isn’t here yet! The world is ending!”

Back and forth it went until he flopped onto my desk, breaking my line of sight with the monitor, and began protesting even more insistently.

This short video from Reddit shows a woman having a meowversation with her cat, who has a decidedly Buddesian look to him:

When your human finally understands you from aww

This kitty’s even got a white bib similar to Buddy’s!

He seems shocked that his human is finally singing The Song of His People, growing more insistent with each exchange.

“So she does speak the sacred tongue of Meow! It is a miracle! Wait, has she been listening to me complain about her all this time and I didn’t know it?!?”

Both reactions are amusing: Human servant laughing uncontrollably, cat having a revelatory moment.

Longtime readers of this blog will remember I once posted an audio clip of Bud and I having a conversation in meow. WARNING: Bud’s roar is extremely tiger-like and may trigger some listeners. If you’re uncomfortable with the sounds of savage and intimidating animals, please consider skipping this recording:

Oh who are we kidding, he sounds like a mix between baby Elmo and an 8-week-old kitten calling to his mommy for milk.

Just, uh, don’t tell him I said that…

How do your cats respond when you meow to them?

Seven Thousand And One!

Buddy’s back to his usual routine, including loudly demanding snacks.

The streak continues!

Buddy's House — “I make the rules, human!”

Buddy had to wait an extra day for my return from the Outer Banks due to the snowstorm, which made a mess of the roads, led to canceled flights and would have been miserable — and impossible — to drive through. My SiL’s brother tried to drive through it and gave up after 13 hours, getting as far as just north of Washington, D.C., before booking a hotel room and driving the rest of the way to New York the next day.

As expected, little dude tried to play it cool at first. He couldn’t stop himself from getting up and going to the door, but he played it off like “Hey, you’re home. That’s cool, I guess.” Then he nonchalantly padded away.

The indifferent act lasted for about 15 minutes, as usual, before Bud forgot he was supposed to be mad at me. He hopped up to the couch and started nuzzling and scent-rubbing on me, happily purring.

However, it took him longer than usual to act like his normal self, and he’s been particularly clingy since then. At one point I put on my coat and shoes to get a bag I’d left in the car, and Bud started nervously pacing, loudly vocalizing and sat down in front of the door as if to say “No! Big Buddy stays here!”

I think he does okay if someone’s here with him, but having a cat sitter stop by once a day probably doesn’t cut it anymore. Partly that’s Bud’s fault for attacking her last time, because she won’t play with him anymore, but I’ll have to think about alternatives next time I’m away for more than two days or so.

I took some photos of OBX and will post them this week after I’ve had time to sort them. We were very fortunate, with 65-degree days for the entire stretch, and even in winter there’s lots of interesting history to see on the islands where two Americans first achieved powered flight, colonies disappeared and notorious pirates stashed their treasure.

Do You Use ‘Baby Talk’ With Your Cat?

Buddy does not tolerate baby talk.

A few years ago when Bud was a bit more of a daredevil than he is now, I was sitting on my balcony on a warm summer night when the little dumbass squeezed through the railing bars and did a circuit of the balcony outside the rail — with only three or four inches of ledge between him and a potentially brutal fall onto the concrete below.

“Bud!” I said, feeling my own fear of heights bubble up as I watched him take his precarious stroll.

He ignored me.

“Bud!” I said again, loud enough to make sure he heard me but not so loud as to startle him and cause him to fall. “Bud! I’m talking to you! Get back over here right now!”

He paid me no mind. I stood up, put my hands on the railing and looked down at him.

“Buddy, get back here now! I’m not gonna say it again!”

At that point I realized there was a couple about my age, probably returning from the bars, drunk-walking toward the back door of the building and watching me have a furious one-sided discussion with my cat. They seemed to think it was hilarious, not only because I was speaking to my cat, but also because I was talking to the little stinker like he was a person.

I don’t baby talk with Buddy, and I’ve noticed my brother doesn’t baby talk his dog, Cosmo.

Sure I’ll speak to Bud warmly and encourage him when he’s clearly frightened of something. (Which is very rare, of course, because he’s such a fearless and brave tiger!) But it isn’t baby talk, and 95 percent of the time I speak to little man as if he’s, well, a little man.

It turns out I may be “doing it wrong,” at least according to some veterinarians and animal behaviorists who say baby talk is a good way to communicate with pets. Animal behaviorists call it “pet-directed speech,” and although the studies so far have been limited, they seem to suggest cats (and dogs) are more likely to respond to it than typical speech in normal registers and cadences. (A study published in the journal Animal Cognition earlier this year found horses respond well to “baby talk” too.)

Despite that, I just can’t bring myself to do it. There are certain standards we must uphold in this home, and besides, I’m pretty sure Bud would paw-smack me if one day I scratched his head and started saying “Who’s a good widdle boy? Is that you? Are you the good widdle boy? Yes you are! Yes you — OUCH! What the hell, dude? Why’d you do that?”

Do you “baby talk” to your pets?