What's so great about cats?

**xbuzzerx** · January 20th, 2013, 10:51 PM

Originally Posted by Scealle

I am more of a bird person

We finally have it-- the way to end every cat vs. dog person debate.

Kill the bird person.

**justsimon** · January 20th, 2013, 11:04 PM

This cat traveled 200 miles to find his home.

Nobody knows how it happened: an indoor housecat who got lost on a family excursion managing, after two months and about 200 miles, to return to her hometown.

Even scientists are baffled by how Holly, a 4-year-old tortoiseshell who in early November became separated from Jacob and Bonnie Richter at an R.V. rally in Daytona Beach, Fla., appeared on New Year’s Eve — staggering, weak and emaciated — in a backyard about a mile from the Richters’ house in West Palm Beach.

“Are you sure it’s the same cat?” wondered John Bradshaw, director of the University of Bristol’s Anthrozoology Institute. In other cases, he has suspected, “the cats are just strays, and the people have got kind of a mental justification for expecting it to be the same cat.”

But Holly not only had distinctive black-and-brown harlequin patterns on her fur, but also an implanted microchip to identify her.

Read the rest here.

**BreakTheIce** · January 21st, 2013, 04:27 AM

Originally Posted by GiancarloC

Um somewhat true about dogs. Dogs are trained for hunting. But wild dogs are natural born hunters. They are smart animals on their own... especially these clever African wild dogs. Dogs have as much instinct as cats.

Not necessarily true either. But I'll agree to disagree.

Except hunting for dogs and cats is instinct driven so it doesn't have anything to do with intelligence. To say dogs are trained to hunt makes little sense. This implies that dogs didn't know how to hunt before they were domesticated. This is obviously false, because they would not have survived if they didn't know how to hunt.

Dogs are trained to hunt for & with people, which is true. But this again goes back to dogs being better at picking up commands from people, because they were domesticated to perform services they didn't usually perform. This includes herding sheep, helping disabled people, sniffing out drugs, etc.

Try going on a hunt with a feral dog, it wont work. But it will still chase around squirrels. They know how to hunt. They have to. But the feral dog will not understand anything we expect pet dogs to understand, such as commands to sit, stay, etc. It needs to be taught these.

The household cat's ancestor, the african wild cat, also is an accomplished hunter. But this has nothing to do with intelligence. It's instinct driven. If the ancestors of domesticated dogs and cats didn't know how to hunt, the wild population would have died out long ago.

tombastep · January 21st, 2013, 04:52 AM

Originally Posted by justsimon

This cat traveled 200 miles to find his home.

Read the rest here.

Damn, pretty crazy.

**palbert** · January 21st, 2013, 10:19 AM

Cats and dogs each keep food costs down in Asian restaurants.

GiancarloC · January 21st, 2013, 11:12 AM

Originally Posted by BreakTheIce

Except hunting for dogs and cats is instinct driven so it doesn't have anything to do with intelligence. To say dogs are trained to hunt makes little sense. This implies that dogs didn't know how to hunt before they were domesticated. This is obviously false, because they would not have survived if they didn't know how to hunt.

To imply cats are more intelligent than dogs is a false one. That's my only point.

Dogs are trained to hunt for & with people, which is true. But this again goes back to dogs being better at picking up commands from people, because they were domesticated to perform services they didn't usually perform. This includes herding sheep, helping disabled people, sniffing out drugs, etc.

Australian cattle dogs actually do have a natural instinct to go at the heels. I owned one... well it was a mix but it still had that instinct. I never taught it to do that.

**BreakTheIce** · January 21st, 2013, 01:09 PM

^It's bred for the trait, selective breeding with desirable traits. It's the same way you get all the different breeds of dogs, looks & size wise. Genetically they are the same species. The expressions of genes (phenotype) differs.