I was wanting to get cat grass for the kitties and I was in the kitchen and you know how cats are. They always want what you have. Well, I was washing some cousbarra (cilantro) and Parpar was wanting some so I let him try it and you know what? He liked it. I mean he really liked it. The others didn't quite catch on but I think they might.
The greens are Important for the cats because it has enzymes and other things they need. My BW, when we lived where he could go outside, would always run to the grass and chew on it. When we moved here where he coulcn;t go out, I got a cat grass for them, which was a mix of barley, wheat, and rye I think,
Saturday, August 30, 2008
Zangwil
Zangwil is my ginger cat. Azngwil is Hebrew for ginger. His nickname is Zangy. Zangy had been dumped on the street and a friend of mine was helping to care for him. He had a sister who was lucky enough to be adopted immediately. I think he was about 3 months old when he came to live with me.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Parpar
Parpar is the first cat to live with me after one and a half years of being catless. He came to me on a Monday after a swim in the dead sea.My friend had other cats in mind for me, but they didn;t work out, and there he was, just sitting, waiting to be picked up. My friend, who knows all the street cats in the area, said it was the first time she had seen him. She said he was just like a gentleman, so that became his first name. Then my boyfriend wanted to call him snow, because he was mostly white.so he became Gentleman Snow, or Snowy. Well, it takes time to know a cat and to get the perfect name. One day I took more notice of the black spots on his back, and they reminded me of butterfly wings. So, he became Snowy Butterfly, With the nickname of Parpar, which means butterfly in Hebrew.
He has now been with me, I think, 7 weeks come Monday. He has more than doubled in size.
He has now been with me, I think, 7 weeks come Monday. He has more than doubled in size.
Friday, August 15, 2008
Your Cat's Senses and Signs
One of the things I want to do on this blog is to post interesting things I find that are relevant to cats. Here is the first one. I got it from the Lillian group I belong to. (write about that later) and was posted by Arlene.
Your Cat's Tail, Ear, and Eye Signals
Tails
When the tail is erect for its full length, it is used as a greeting to another cat or to a friendly human and is an invitation for contact rubbing. This can also be a request for food. The tail flicks of a seated cat often indicates irritation. Tail wagging can range from small irritated flicks which may express indecision-- wavering between two possible courses of action--or in its most pronounced form, it can be the prelude to a fight between two male cats and undoubtedly accompanied by growling. A tail that is held down with an elevated rump belongs to an aggressive cat that is standing sideways near another cat. A fluffed-up, arched tail is seen when a cat stands with its back arched (the "Halloween cat") and it is torn between being aggressive or defensive. A fluffed tail that is positioned straight out or down, is seen when the decision moves toward aggression. (All of these tail positions can be observed when two kittens engage in play fighting.) The tail that is wrapped against the cat's body may mean that the cat is contented or for a nervous cat, it is a defensive posture.
Ears
If the tail alone doesn't give you enough information about what the cat is thinking, take a look at the ears. Cats involved in a standoff will make threatening sounds, but to really understand what is happening, check the ear position. The defender's ears will lie down flat against the head for protection. The cat whose ears are lying flat, but with a twist, so that the tips of the back of the ear can be seen from the front, is the aggressor. Forward-pointing ears are used by confident, curious, cats to listen for sounds in front of them. A cat that is hunting prey (or playing) will also keep its ears forward to collect as much auditory information as possible in order to execute a successful pounce.
Eyes
In a standoff situation the defending cat's pupils will be dilated to provide the cat with wider peripheral vision, an advantage in anticipating an attack. The aggressor's pupils narrow to give him better depth perception, an advantage in judging where to attack. While dilated pupils can indicate fear, they are also indicative of the light conditions. In dim light the pupils expand to allow as much light to enter the eye as possible. Perhaps one of the most wonderful of feline body signals, but one that is most often missed by even the most observant of cat owners, is the slow eye blink. According to Roger Tabor, in his interesting and informative book, Cat Behavior, a Complete Guide to Understanding How Your Cat Works:
"Blinking is a very powerful communication as a reassurance signal and is commonly used between cats when they are sitting or lying in a hunched-up, sphinx-like position. I have used the blink to relax house cats, feral cats, and even tigers in the wild...it is important to put them at their ease by allowing them to read the signals that tell them you are not a threat." (It is also a great way to say "I love you" to your favorite feline companion.)
A continuous stare has the opposite effect on cats. It is threatening and unsettling and is used effectively by cats in maintaining territorial distance. This explains why a cat that enters a room of strangers, all of whom are cat lovers except for one, will choose to approach the non-cat lover, the only one who is not staring at him.
The Amazing Sense of Smell
The Cat's sense of smell, not vision, is its primary resource for identifying the individuals and objects in its environment. The cat's visual acuity is 10 times less then that of humans. However, they have 200 million odor-sensitive cells in their noses compared to only 5 million for humans. Cats live in a sensory world completely apart from ours. The sense of smell plays a very insignificant role in human relationships and in our response to our environment, while for cats, it is all-important and may result in some puzzling and disturbing behaviors. Consider the following:
The owner puts a scented litter in the litterbox-the cat refuses to use it because perfume is actually a repellent for cats.
The owner comes home after visiting a friend and petting her friendly, lap-sitting cat-she is greeted with hisses and growls from her cat.
A new piece of furniture is moved into the house. The unfamiliar scent is upsetting to the cat and impels it to mark it with its own signature scent. (This can be accomplished by rubbing on it, scratching it, or by spraying urine on it.)
Courtesy of Cats International
Your Cat's Tail, Ear, and Eye Signals
Tails
When the tail is erect for its full length, it is used as a greeting to another cat or to a friendly human and is an invitation for contact rubbing. This can also be a request for food. The tail flicks of a seated cat often indicates irritation. Tail wagging can range from small irritated flicks which may express indecision-- wavering between two possible courses of action--or in its most pronounced form, it can be the prelude to a fight between two male cats and undoubtedly accompanied by growling. A tail that is held down with an elevated rump belongs to an aggressive cat that is standing sideways near another cat. A fluffed-up, arched tail is seen when a cat stands with its back arched (the "Halloween cat") and it is torn between being aggressive or defensive. A fluffed tail that is positioned straight out or down, is seen when the decision moves toward aggression. (All of these tail positions can be observed when two kittens engage in play fighting.) The tail that is wrapped against the cat's body may mean that the cat is contented or for a nervous cat, it is a defensive posture.
Ears
If the tail alone doesn't give you enough information about what the cat is thinking, take a look at the ears. Cats involved in a standoff will make threatening sounds, but to really understand what is happening, check the ear position. The defender's ears will lie down flat against the head for protection. The cat whose ears are lying flat, but with a twist, so that the tips of the back of the ear can be seen from the front, is the aggressor. Forward-pointing ears are used by confident, curious, cats to listen for sounds in front of them. A cat that is hunting prey (or playing) will also keep its ears forward to collect as much auditory information as possible in order to execute a successful pounce.
Eyes
In a standoff situation the defending cat's pupils will be dilated to provide the cat with wider peripheral vision, an advantage in anticipating an attack. The aggressor's pupils narrow to give him better depth perception, an advantage in judging where to attack. While dilated pupils can indicate fear, they are also indicative of the light conditions. In dim light the pupils expand to allow as much light to enter the eye as possible. Perhaps one of the most wonderful of feline body signals, but one that is most often missed by even the most observant of cat owners, is the slow eye blink. According to Roger Tabor, in his interesting and informative book, Cat Behavior, a Complete Guide to Understanding How Your Cat Works:
"Blinking is a very powerful communication as a reassurance signal and is commonly used between cats when they are sitting or lying in a hunched-up, sphinx-like position. I have used the blink to relax house cats, feral cats, and even tigers in the wild...it is important to put them at their ease by allowing them to read the signals that tell them you are not a threat." (It is also a great way to say "I love you" to your favorite feline companion.)
A continuous stare has the opposite effect on cats. It is threatening and unsettling and is used effectively by cats in maintaining territorial distance. This explains why a cat that enters a room of strangers, all of whom are cat lovers except for one, will choose to approach the non-cat lover, the only one who is not staring at him.
The Amazing Sense of Smell
The Cat's sense of smell, not vision, is its primary resource for identifying the individuals and objects in its environment. The cat's visual acuity is 10 times less then that of humans. However, they have 200 million odor-sensitive cells in their noses compared to only 5 million for humans. Cats live in a sensory world completely apart from ours. The sense of smell plays a very insignificant role in human relationships and in our response to our environment, while for cats, it is all-important and may result in some puzzling and disturbing behaviors. Consider the following:
The owner puts a scented litter in the litterbox-the cat refuses to use it because perfume is actually a repellent for cats.
The owner comes home after visiting a friend and petting her friendly, lap-sitting cat-she is greeted with hisses and growls from her cat.
A new piece of furniture is moved into the house. The unfamiliar scent is upsetting to the cat and impels it to mark it with its own signature scent. (This can be accomplished by rubbing on it, scratching it, or by spraying urine on it.)
Courtesy of Cats International
I'm Back
It's been over a year since I created this blog and since I posted anything. I created it the week after BW died. Georgie had died the previous November and I was catless. I really did it for myself, and am still doing it for myself. I think I have friends who would like to read their story. If not, I still feel a need to do it. I want to finish telling about BW and Georgie because they were so special and I still miss them very much. I wondered before what I was going to do after I finished telling about BW and Georgie, because , after all, I am not a writer and I am not a storyteller. And I'm not sure cxactly how much I have to tell. Well, it just came to me what I am to do. This will be my cat blog and I will write about other cats in my life, starting with the FIVE new kittens in my life. Yes, I said FIVE! Two I got a month ago and this week, I got 3 calico kittens, about 6 weeks old. Well, their story will be another post, but I think that they are the reason I am able to start writing here again.
I will write later in greater detail about the last 2 years, but briefly, after Georgy died, my health was greatly affected. I was really quite torn apart. If someone had told me before that the death of a pet could affect ones health like what happened to me, I don't think I would have believed them totally. And I don't know if anyone really understands what I went through. Well, 10 days after Georgie died, Elizabeth died. She was 90 years old and had been in bed for a year. I want to write about her also, because she was a very special person and she was also a cat person. Well, as if that wasn't enough, in August of 2007, a year ago, my mother died. So that is why it has taken me so long to get back to this blog.
Also, last winter was more difficult than usual because I had bronchitis very bad for 2 months and it lingered on after that. Many of the days at the school where I teach violin a few days a week I really shouldn't have been there. Both in the months after Georgie died and this past year with the bronchitis. If I had been able to take time off in both cases to recover, it would have been a very different story. But I can not afford to take time off work, no matter how sick I might be. Actually in Feb. I did miss almost 2 weeks of teaching, and didn't play on the street for 2 months. which combined with the trip back to Florida for my mother's funeral, has taken care of all of the small cash reserve I have.
Well, things are looking up. I have really done things to take back control of my health and I feel very good about the future.
I will write later in greater detail about the last 2 years, but briefly, after Georgy died, my health was greatly affected. I was really quite torn apart. If someone had told me before that the death of a pet could affect ones health like what happened to me, I don't think I would have believed them totally. And I don't know if anyone really understands what I went through. Well, 10 days after Georgie died, Elizabeth died. She was 90 years old and had been in bed for a year. I want to write about her also, because she was a very special person and she was also a cat person. Well, as if that wasn't enough, in August of 2007, a year ago, my mother died. So that is why it has taken me so long to get back to this blog.
Also, last winter was more difficult than usual because I had bronchitis very bad for 2 months and it lingered on after that. Many of the days at the school where I teach violin a few days a week I really shouldn't have been there. Both in the months after Georgie died and this past year with the bronchitis. If I had been able to take time off in both cases to recover, it would have been a very different story. But I can not afford to take time off work, no matter how sick I might be. Actually in Feb. I did miss almost 2 weeks of teaching, and didn't play on the street for 2 months. which combined with the trip back to Florida for my mother's funeral, has taken care of all of the small cash reserve I have.
Well, things are looking up. I have really done things to take back control of my health and I feel very good about the future.
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