BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: GUEST,Norval
Date: 30 May 07 - 11:43 AM

Bee: The DEERMOUSE is a known carrier of the sometimes fatal HANTAVIRUS. This cat and mouse game could cause serious health problems in your home. This link gives some good information.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Becca72
Date: 29 May 07 - 06:43 PM

My two youngest boys (they're a little over a year old) were totally freaked out by the Memorial Day parade that went right in front of our house yesterday. They were obviously too young to retain the information from last year (they were about 12 weeks old then). They darted from window to window every time a marching band went by with a "WTF????" expression on both their little faces. It was actually quite funny to watch.

I wonder if they'll remember what it is next year.

The almost 10 year old was totally unaffected, which I think made them even more crazy as he's usually the jumpy one.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 29 May 07 - 03:22 AM

Ah, but what if the insane kitty is between you and the blanket box?

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Bee
Date: 28 May 07 - 12:57 PM

Ah, but Nick, that's part of the joy of living with a cat, big or small - they aren't really tame, ever, and even a small one can put the fear of God into a human once in a while. Just last year (or the year before), police were called in town by three adults because their cat, they said, had gone mad and attacked them, and they were afraid to enter their apartment without police protection. Apparently there was lots of blood and a very riled up cat, but I never heard what happened in the end. These people were never named in the press, just as well, as they must have been mortally stupid: the most insane of kitties can be rolled up in a blanket pretty easily.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: GUEST,Nick
Date: 28 May 07 - 09:51 AM

Just give it time. Your cat will eventually, on a whim, tear the little head off the mouse, just as he would yours were he big enough.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: wysiwyg
Date: 28 May 07 - 08:59 AM

:~)

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: JennyO
Date: 27 May 07 - 11:20 PM

You can tell SHE wasn't eating at the time, can't you :-)

Imagine all that fur sliding down your throat - and coming up again!

Jenny, who finished eating a while ago.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Bee
Date: 27 May 07 - 02:03 PM

You are an evil, evil person, WYSIWYG - although I suspect the barfing it back up would just occur naturally.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: wysiwyg
Date: 27 May 07 - 01:13 PM

If you eat the mounse as a training exercise, remember:

You have to barf it back up again too, partially predigested for the kitten, and no flavoring either-- so the kitten learns the smell and taste.

:~)

Have a nice day!

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Bee
Date: 27 May 07 - 12:06 PM

Lady Jean, our last cat used to leave those squirrel halves all over the property - and it always seemed to be a boy squirrel...

Lin, now I have to clean my keyboard!

Ragdall, I think it's been just the one masochistic mouse - but that's a horrifying thought!

Liz, my diet strictly forbids the eating of raw mice... for... uh... religious reasons, that's what!

And JennyO, that's... disturbing!

And my problem is, at least temporarily, solved! It's been a warm couple of days, and this morning I managed to chase the mouse out the door with kitty in hot pursuit. The mouse appears to have escaped, as kitty came in mewing sadly and giving me that cross and aggrieved face that tabbies are so good at, having all those wonderful expression enhancing facial markings. (He's my first classic tabby, and although my other cats all could express themselves perfectly well, this fella seems particularly eloquent, and I think it's because of that face.)

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: JennyO
Date: 27 May 07 - 06:31 AM

Hey, mousie.......mousie.........

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 27 May 07 - 06:27 AM

Ah, good old 'V'... must watch that again soon, got it on DVD for cheap.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: JennyO
Date: 27 May 07 - 05:04 AM

Well, since you don't want to do it, maybe your cat needs a lesson from this lady?

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 27 May 07 - 03:29 AM

Why all this prevaricating... do you not want to eat the mousie and teach him proper cat behaviour?

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: ragdall
Date: 27 May 07 - 02:33 AM

Am I the only one who thinks it's the mouse who is the slow learner?

Have you considered that there may be an endless stream of unititiated mice who are caught by your cat, leave the house in disgust and are replaced by the next mouse in line?

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Lin in Kansas
Date: 27 May 07 - 01:44 AM

When we were still letting our cats roam the outdoors, my big ol' Lonnie Sue was a superior hunter. He too liked to "play" with his prey, and one morning as I was sitting at the kitchen table sipping coffee, he came to show me his latest catch, still alive and kicking. As I tried to persuade him back outdoors, he looked up at me with the mouse hanging from his mouth, mewed, and spat the thing on the floor at my feet. "See me, Mom?" The mouse promptly fled up my pant leg.

I screamed, the mouse flew back down and away into the living room, Lonnie zoomed in the opposite direction, coffee went everywhere, and my SO nearly had a heart attack. Never did re-catch the damned mouse.

Lin

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: LadyJean
Date: 26 May 07 - 04:27 PM

Whenever one of Hollowfox's cats catches a mouse, the cat is given soft food as a reward for bringing the live rodent to her humans. Then the mouse is realeased, outside, with a stern warning.
My late lamented Ocelittle (as opposed to ocelot) used to bring live cicadas inside and turn them loose. Hours of fun for the whole family.
Then there was Soloman who liked to bring us half a dead squirrel every now and then, always the bottom half.
Just in case you're wondering why Viggo and Gracie don't go out.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: wysiwyg
Date: 26 May 07 - 10:25 AM

Love, love, LOVE that Kliban piece, long been a favorite. Never heard it sung till now (THANK YOU), but it explains the "they" in it-- as I just heard it sung, I heard a southern-accent "their" that had no R sound-- they-(ah). Now I knew THAT all along, but I had a hard time explaining it to people who would insist on making it other than how Kliban wrote it. It's the phonetic spelling of the southern accent version of "their."

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Gurney
Date: 26 May 07 - 02:45 AM

Susan, I think it would have to be a MICEfeeder before you were overrun. Heh Heh.

Bee needs to borrow an experienced mouser for a while. Gentle Johnny would soon get the picture.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: katlaughing
Date: 26 May 07 - 12:06 AM

Ah, yes, the Catch & Release A-non-ee-mouse Program. It's all part of their 12 step program. When their families just can't stand the late nights, the crunching on bones, the fur stuck between the teeth and the old lady threatens to leave with all of the kittens and the humanfolk are getting really touchy, too, then it's time to take thyself to a CRAP meeting and take the Pledge!

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Little Hawk
Date: 25 May 07 - 11:16 PM

I find it rather comforting that there are cats out there who catch mice and release them.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Sorcha
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:56 PM

I just have live cats (and dogs) on the bed. I don't NEED Kliban sheets! They have plenty of animal hair on them already.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: katlaughing
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:39 PM

Me, too, Bee. Have you heard the tune for it...sung by the cat himself! click here.

I still have a set of flannel sheets with pillowcase which have him walking all over; they are really good quality as we've had them about 25 years and nary a hole.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Bee
Date: 25 May 07 - 08:26 PM

Kat, I love Kliban. I have a small Kliban box with the same ditty printed on top. ;-)

Dave's Wife, I have caught and released many a mousie, although my husband does laugh at me. When I lived in the city, I used to take them out to the street. I lived in an... umm... interesting part of the downtown, and a couple times astounded the Working Ladies on the corner by appearing on my step late at night in my housecoat and slippers to shake a mouse out of whatever container I'd caught it in.

Yup, Georgiansilver, it is indeed CATastrophic!

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 25 May 07 - 08:09 PM

This might I say is a CATastrophic thread.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: GUEST,jus passin by
Date: 25 May 07 - 07:54 PM

Bee-
Might we humbly suggest that you burn the mickey mouse club kitty hat & videos, along with the mighty mouse ones for a starter. Then you might consider tossing (figuratively speaking, of course) the feline outside for a time each day. If that doesn't work, try getting a chum, or borrowing a well seasoned barn cat for your mouse-friendly feline to associate with. Meanwhile, either get some mousetraps or put up a sign (in front of the snoozing furrball) which says "mouse crossing."

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: katlaughing
Date: 25 May 07 - 07:12 PM

I say be glad he isn't of murderous intent and leave them be as friends. None of my cats hunt and I am glad of it. I still put on shoes when I get out of bed at night, though, in deference to the "old ones'" predilections for leaving half-eaten bodies on the bedroom floor when we lived on the ranch.

♪ ♪ Love to eat them mousies
Mousies what I love to eat.
Bite they little heads off
Nibble on they tiny feet!♪ ♪

(Thanks to the Kliban cat tea towel I had!)

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 May 07 - 05:59 PM

If you set up a mousefeeder, you will soon be overrun with mouse litters....

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Dave'sWife
Date: 25 May 07 - 05:04 PM

I think he's just playing with the mouse. He's still pretty young. He'll catch on. Your job is to grab the mouse after he releases it and either kill it or deposit it down the street.

Somehow that never works for us, the dumb things come right back and our cat, FANG then eviscerates them. She has a taste for mouse brains. She sucks out the grey matter, slits the belly open, drapes the guts all over the bathtub (her fave place to "play" with mice) and then walks away. Cat the Ripper.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Bill D
Date: 25 May 07 - 04:58 PM

The comic strip cat, Garfield, regularly goes thru the motions of chasing the local mouse to appease his 'master'....he & the mouse have this understanding. Maybe your cat can read...

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Becca72
Date: 25 May 07 - 04:56 PM

Mmario,
It's the male who is still with me. But they were mother and son, now that I think of it....maybe my boy just never caught on, either!

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Gurney
Date: 25 May 07 - 04:52 PM

We had a Siamese that did that. After half a day, baby birds would try to co-opt him as Mum, and run after him begging for food.

Good Luck. When something is lodged in their brain, it takes a lot of shifting.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Bee
Date: 25 May 07 - 12:22 PM

I truly don't care if he eats them or not, so long as he removes them from the premises - and Greg B., the deadly properties of field mice are greatly overstated, at least around here, and the risks as assessed by several vets I've had are very low providing kitty is well immunized. I have owned, over the years, six mouse-eating cats, and not one has ever become ill. Matter of fact, all but one died of old age, and only one of them had any serious illnesses, and that one caught his illness at the vet's (a vet I had very, very briefly).

Liz the Squeak, I am not yet prepared to eat the mouse, although I may be just saying that to save face because I can't seem to catch it myself. He was too young to leave his mother, but it was one of those dire cases where he might not have been permitted to survive if I didn't take him. The owner stated he was seven weeks, but I suspect he was maybe six, as he was still only able to drink cat milk and eat very soggy bits of solid food.

The Fourth Leg: A Cat Detective Novel... we had one cat who we accused of laziness in the mousing department, until the morning we came downstairs to see three tails perfectly lined up on the kitchen floor. ;-)

WYSIWYG, that would likely work, but I might consider a second cat first! I'm hoping he'll yet figure it out himself.

I may have to resign myself to the purchase of the teeny dish and a matchbox litter tray.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: MMario
Date: 25 May 07 - 12:22 PM

So which do you still have? Because is the male pre-deceased, then there is a case for hunting shortening life; but if the female pre-deceased - then there is a case for the actual"kill" shortening life...

(not serious)

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Becca72
Date: 25 May 07 - 12:20 PM

I once had a pair of cats (I still have one of them, the other is no longer with us) and the male cat could catch anything but would bring it to the female for "the kill". We are city apartment dwellers, so this mostly consisted of bugs, but...

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Greg B
Date: 25 May 07 - 11:12 AM

We have a barn cat that catches garter snakes, deposits them
in the barn in a place calculated to cause a great start to
poor humans, but generally doesn't kill them.

The poor creature is found there, playing dead, and has to be
transported back outside, across the creek, lest the game
begin anew.

But you really don't want your moggy to develop a taste for
wild-caught mouse-flesh. They carry intestinal worms and
other parasites, as well as some fatal neurological diseases
which can shorten the life of your cat and line your veterinary
surgeon's pockets.

Not to mention making a mess on the carpet or in your bed, or
where ever the cat chooses to hold the mouse by the neck while
disembowling it with her back claws.

"Look out little furry folk
He's the all night working cat
Eats but one in every ten
And leaves the others on the mat
And the mouse police never sleeps..."

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 25 May 07 - 11:11 AM

My cat is also a slow learner....I said that I would teach him to speak Queens English and he just said "Meee Howww"

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:57 AM

What is your goal? If you want him to catch and eat mice-- I mean eat them as motivation to catch and eliminate them-- you can teach him to do that until his age and hormones catch up. How to do it is to get an already-decesaed mouse from the pet store (my son gets them frozen for his snake).

Remove the head, and slit the belly open. (If you are really adventurous, see if you can find and expose the liver.) Leave all of the remains in the catfood dish. The smell releasesd thereby, plus the cue that it's in a food dish, may inspire the cat.

He will probably not knaw on the training mouse, but it may inspire him to sink his teeth a little deeper in the next catch. The blood smell should do it, then, over time.

Our cat took his time learning to tear them open; I never had to use a frozen one myself, but from what my son described with the snake's ability to learn "This Is Food," I would think a cat can learn as well.

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: gnu
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:28 AM

Liz! Hahahaha........... I gotta get a paper towel for my tea! Hehehehe.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:10 AM

It's possible that he was never taught what to do with it by his mother. You may just have to get down there and eat that mouse in front of him... unless you can get a tin of cat food that looks and tastes like mouse.

The run and catch instinct is always there, it's the 'this bit is safe to eat' and 'only eat 3 legs because the big people love finding the 4th leg in their shoes' lessons that have been missed.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Cats
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:06 AM

We have a 'mouse jar'. We catch the presents that our two bring in [well most of them] and take them over the next field or by the compost heap, while the cats are not looking, and let them go well away from the house. I know we are on to a loser as we live next to a farm but you can always try...

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: MMario
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:01 AM

No, the mouse will be perfectly happy to share with the cat-god.

It appears your cat is pretty good at Catching the things - but doesn't know that

m . o .u . s . e

spells food!

and despite the people who say "man is the only animal that captures and kills others for sport" healthy well fed cats will catch and release.

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Jean(eanjay)
Date: 25 May 07 - 09:59 AM

Definitely. They are obviously friends now and the mouse is probably enjoying feeling "safe and secure".

Either that or you could try viagra!

Subject: RE: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 May 07 - 09:58 AM

That sounds so cute! Yes, and please send us the photo of the two eating side by side!

Subject: BS: Help! My Cat is a Slow Learner
From: Bee
Date: 25 May 07 - 09:56 AM

Not that anyone can likely help, but you never know!

He's past nine months old, and we do have A Mouse, a Deer Mouse, in fact, which should be out in the fields collecting seeds. A week ago, he caught it... and let it go. Next morning, he caught it again... carried it around in his mouth like a kitten for a while... and let it go. Next day, same thing. I think the mouse is getting used to it, as the durn thing runs about with seemingly not much concern. This morning, once kitty had caught the mouse, I tried to encourage him to take it outside, thinking the fresh air might inspire some cat-like behaviour, or at least the mouse would be outdoors as well. Not he! He dropped the mouse over by his food dish and ran outside to play with some leaves.

Should I just give up and get a teeny little food dish for the mouse?