Do you consider yourself a cat lover? Well, we doubt your credibility if you don’t know these 14 fascinating facts about your furry buddy:
1. Your furry buddies can jump 6 times their height
The reason why you often find your cat on top of your fan, wardrobe, and fridge is that cats can jump high. They can jump over 6 times their height. Cats have very strong limbs that help them catapult their body in the air almost effortlessly. This is why playing the obstacle game which is your cat is the most fun cat activity.
2. Cats have 18 toes in total
Cats have four limbs, so you might think that cats have 20 toes, right? Wrong! Cats have 18 toes. Their front limbs have 5 toes each and their back limbs have 4 toes each. This helps cats maintain their body’s balance and helps them in running and leaping faster.
3. Cats can spend up to 70% of their life sleeping
If you think that you sleep a lot, you are no match to your feline friend. Cats can sleep up to 16 hours every day. This means that cats spend up to 70% of their day sleeping. The reason why cats sleep so much is that they have to save energy. This is why when your cat is awake, it is active and playful. This habit also helps cats in hunting as by getting this much sleep, cats have a lot of energy and this helps them speed towards their prey.
4. Cats age 15 times faster than humans
With your busy schedule, you might often think that life goes too fast for you, right? Well, your cat’s life goes 15 times faster than yours does. Your cat ages 15 times faster than you do; this is why they don’t live more than 15-20 years in most cases. So, when a cat turns 1, this means that in human years, the cat has turned 15!
5. Your feline friend can run at speeds up to 30mph
Your furry friend’s strong limbs not only help them catapult up to 4-5 feet in the air, but they also help them run at speeds up to 30mph. That is as fast as a car traveling on a normal road with speed limits.
6. The oldest cat ever lived was 38 years old
Even though cats have an average life span of around 15-20 years, the oldest cat in the world lived up to 38 years. It might not seem a lot to you, but as cats age 15 times faster than humans, the human age of this cat would have been 570 years! The cat was called Crème Puff.
7. Cats have been kept as a pet for 9,500 years
Cats are probably the oldest pet that humans have been keeping for thousands of years. The oldest domesticated cat was discovered in a 9500-year-old cat grave in Cyprus by archeologists. This discovery predates Egyptian cat art by a whopping 4000 years! Looks like cats have been a man’s best friend for thousands of years. No offense dog lovers!
8. The richest cat in the world was worth 7 million dollars
This makes me look more broke than I am. A millionaire only had one friend in his life, his cat, and when the time of his death was near, he refused to recognize his family members who came to pounce on the wealth he was leaving behind. The millionaire decided to leave 7 million dollars to his cat. The cat’s name was Blackie was it holds the record for being the richest cat in the world.
9. The cat door was invented by none other than Isaac Newton
Who knew about that! The man who discovered gravity also made the first cat door. He was working on his experiments at the University of Cambridge and he was getting distracted by his cats. So he called the carpenter and made two large holes in the door, one for the mother cat and one for its kittens.
10. You shouldn’t make direct eye contact with your cat
Cats keep staring at us, but we are not allowed to stare back, as staring back at cats is a sign of aggression and this can either scare your cat away or make it aggressive.
11. Cats hate water bowls
If you want to make sure that your cat hydrates well, you should take it to a running sink faucet. Cats hate to drink from a water bowl and will end up spilling everything in frustration. Cats like to drink through running water when they are in wildlife and domestic cats have the same preferences.
12. A cat owner once left her feline friend over 13 million dollars of fortune
This cat was left behind almost double the fortune that Blackie, the richest cat in the world, had, however, legally, it couldn’t have possession of that much money. Millionaire Maria Assunta loved her cat so much that after her death, she left behind 13 million dollars for her cat in 2011.
13. A cat was the mayor of an Alaskan town for over 20 years
If you think your mayor is incompetent, you can make a cat your mayor, just like the people of Talkeetna did. An orange tabby cat, named Stubbs has served as the mayor of the Alaskan town for over 20 years.
14. Your cat can beat Usain Bolt in a 200-meter foot race
Usain Bolt is the fastest man alive, but he still isn’t as fast as your feline friend, as, with its 30mph top speed, your house cat can easily beat him in a 200-meter foot race.
We hope that these facts shocked you just the way they shocked us when we read them the first time. And, if you knew all of these facts, pat yourself at the back, you are a true cat geek!
