kitten – Page 2 – Pain In The Bud

Does The Budster Love Me?

“Love is a strong word, human. I prefer ‘tolerate.’ On days when you anticipate my snack cravings before I verbalize them, you could maybe say I’m fond of you.”

Newsweek has an interesting interview with a cat behaviorist on the subject of whether cats love their humans.

Chantal Howard, a certified cat trainer with Feline Focus Training in Ottawa, told the magazine there are nine primary behaviors that indicate — or confirm — a house tiger loves his or her person. Most of these won’t be new to PITB readers, who are of course among the most cat-savvy people out there and have magnificent taste in cat blogs, but it’s still a handy way to ascertain how your feline overlord feels about you.

So how does Buddy do according to this checklist? Let’s see:

Headbutting: ✅ His Lordship is quite fond of headbutting me and favors me with dozens of headbutts throughout the day, ensuring his pheromones remain on me. You know, in case some other cat somehow comes wandering in and there’s a dispute about which furball owns me.
Kneading: ✅ Considering the fact that I’ve had to toss quite a few t-shirts because of claw rips, I’d say that’s a yes. At least he doesn’t knead my face anymore, as he liked to do when he was a kitten and would take his perch on my shoulder, nuzzle up to my neck and make biscuits against my beard.
Purring: ✅ Nine times out of 10, Buddy’s purr is inaudible, but it’s there. It’s a bit odd that such a talkative, loud cat barely makes a buzz. He likes to lay on my chest and purr up a storm while I rub his head and tell him he’s got admirers all over the world.
Chirping: ✅ Yes! In fact, chirps and trills make up a significant part of the Buddinese language. While meows can be positive, negative or demanding (“I can see the bottom of my bowl! This is an outrage, human!”), trills and chirps are always happy sounds.
Nipping: ✅ Unfortunately, yes.
Licking: ✅ He grooms my hair and my beard, and when I shave he licks my face, which is pretty gross.
Bringing Gifts: ❌ Negative. Then again, what kind of gifts can he bring me when he’s an indoor cat and doesn’t fully understand the concept of hunting?
Exposing Belly: ❌ Does he expose his belly? Yes. Does he feel comfortable enough to snooze in my lap with his belly exposed? Of course. Does he want me to give him belly rubs? No, he emphatically does not. The primordial pouch is not to be touched!
Tail Position: ✅ One of the most awesome things is the fact that Bud’s tail goes immediately into happy mode when I say “Hi, Bud!”, when I hold my hand out for a headbutt, and when I talk to him in general. His tail quivers with excitement when we play with the laser pointer or his favorite toy, and when he catches the first whiff of catnip.

So that’s 7 of 9, or 7 of 8 if we count gifts as N/A due to Bud’s hilarious ineptitude when it comes to even grasping the concept of hunting.

Bud has been known to throw up from excitement when I return from vacation, he often naps by the door when I go out, he talks to me constantly, and he’s rarely more than three or four feet away from me at any given time. All those things, plus our strong bond, have proven to me that he does love me, but it’s also nice to confirm it with a behaviorist’s criteria.

How does your cat perform on the checklist? Don’t forget to share your results in the comments.

LISTEN: The Buddies Release Their Worldwide Smash No. 1 Single!

Buddy the Cat’s quest for world domination has moved into the realm of music. Listen to the new single here!

NEW YORK — Buddy the Cat made history as the first feline to top the charts in multiple genres this week with the release of “Move Your Ass” by The Buddies.

Listen to it here, but before you do, make room to get funky. (“And use proper headphones or speakers please!” Buddy says. “Don’t do us dirty by playing it through a phone or a laptop. You’ll miss all the bassy goodness that makes it funky!”)

The incredibly funktacular nu-disco track pays homage to the talented feline, who played guitar, bass, keyboards and percussion, while his human assisted him with certain particulars that required an opposable thumb.

“Obviously I could have done this on my own,” Buddy says, “but I like my human to feel like he’s involved in things, you know? Camaraderie and all that. But for future documentaries, ‘Behind the Music’ episodes and other retrospectives, it should be clear I’m the musical genius and the talent. The brains and the brawn, so to speak. Also the beauty. Obviously.”

“Move Your Ass” hit the top of Japan’s pop charts after an early release on Jan. 20 in that country, while it’s dominated the dance music charts in Luxembourg, the Principality of Sealand, Monaco and France. After its Jan. 30 release in the US and UK, it was steadily climbing the charts on Spotify and terrestrial radio.

Asked about his musical influences, Buddy waxed poetic about the funk, disco, French house and nu-disco he grew up listening to.

“From my earliest days of kittenhood, I remember Big Buddy playing Earth, Wind and Fire, Kool and the Gang, McFadden and Whitehead, The Brothers Johnson, Daft Punk, the Galactik Knights and Televisor. I love Televisor! I would dance around and joyfully smack my human on the head, then go hide in his shoes.”

Buddy’s already hard at work on his next single, which he promises “will be just as delicious as this one.”

Through Tears, Young Girl Revives Kitten Succumbing To Cold

A feel-good video about a kitten who was rescued from the brink of death.

The girl in this video found an orange tabby kitten on the verge of death in Hubei, China, and refused to give up on the little one.

Through tears, she used a hair dryer to warm the kitten while her 39-year-old dad filmed her efforts. She was successful! The kitten slowly began to stir and felt well enough after two hours to lap up some milk.

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Temperatures in Hubei can plunge into the 20s and 30s overnight this time of year, so the kitten would have died without the little girl’s intervention.

Paleontologists Recover Shockingly Intact Saber-Toothed Kitten Buried For 35,000 Years

The find is extraordinary, allowing scientists to directly study the extinct cat’s musculature, fur, head shape, and even its claws and whiskers.

A team in Russia stumbled on the find of the century when they located the stunningly well-preserved remains of a saber-toothed kitten in Siberia.

The kitten, which was found near the Badyarikha River in northeastern Siberia, was about three weeks old when it died, scientists estimate.

Unlike typical finds — a fang here, a mandible or partial skeleton there — this specimen still had its fur, claws, whiskers and muscles, which means scientists have already learned more about the species, Homotherium latidens, than they have with almost any other long-extinct animal.

homotheriumpawpads — Images of the extinct cub’s paws compared to (D), the paw of a 3-week-old lion cub pictured on the bottom right. The Homotherium paw is thicker but less elongated. Credit: Borissiak Paleontological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia

While the saber-toothed cub is a true felid, it boasts adaptations unlike any surviving member of the panthera genus.

It has wide paws wrapped in heavy fur, a short tail and a stockier, lower-to-the-ground build than modern lions and tigers. Those adaptations, scientists believe, made it easier for Homotherium latidens to traverse environments with ice and heavy snow.

Its head shape is slightly different, with smaller ears than modern big cats, and its neck is enormous, more than twice as thick as the neck of a comparable three-week-old lion cub which was used for comparison. Likewise, its mouth is capable of opening significantly wider, although the team did not compare it to the jaguar, which has the widest-opening jaw among extant felids.

Homotherium cub — A photograph of the cub, top, and a scan revealing facial, ear and neck structure, below. Credit: Borissiak Paleontological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia

The frigid, arid clime of Siberia made it possible for the cub’s body to endure for so long. The team that made the discovery conducted radiocarbon dating that puts the cat at between 35,000 and 37,000 years old, according to reports.

It’s not clear how the cub died, although its species went extinct about 10,000 years ago, likely as a direct result of fewer prey animals in the frigid zones it occupied. Additional bones belonging to the rear of the cub skeleton were encased in a large cube of ice immediately next to the intact upper body.

The cub’s remains were recovered in 2020, but the results of the research team’s analysis were just released on Nov. 14 and published in the journal Nature. The paper’s authors have a lot more to share about the species’ physical characteristics, they noted in the text, and plan to follow up soon with a second paper going into more detail about what they learned from the cat’s intact musculature.

Top image: An artist’s impression of an adult member of homotherium.

Happy Mother’s Day To All Moms Human And Feline!

Moms are the best.

Moms are the best. They tell us we’re good at things even when we’re not, they put up with all our nonsense, and they never stop worrying about us even when we’re adults.

They make us feel better when we’re down and they don’t hesitate to tell us when we’re being stupid. They make the special meals that we love, and use love as a special ingredient. I can still taste the bologna sandwiches my mom used to make for me in my school lunches. Somehow they were always more delicious than any sandwich I could make. Now that I’m an adult and have been a vegetarian for years, she makes pastitsio for me on special occasions. Thanks, mom!

Animal moms love their kiddos too, as we can see in these photos. Happy Mother’s Day to all moms!