The secret lives of roaming cats

May 26, 2011 5:53 PM

What do feral and free-roaming house cats do when they're out of sight? A two-year study offers a first look at the daily lives of these feline paupers and princes, whose territories overlap on the urban, suburban, rural and agricultural edges of many towns.

"There's no (other) data set like this for cats," said Jeff Horn, a former graduate student in the University of Illinois department of natural resources and environmental sciences who conducted the study for his master's thesis with researchers from his department and the Prairie Research Institute at Illinois. "Without these sensors, it would require a field team of 10 to 12 people to collect that data."

posted by moody cow (41 comments total)

"There's no (other) data set like this for cats"

Maybe not, but there's some pretty entertaining anecdotal information.
posted by dersins at 5:58 PM on May 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

The pet cats managed this despite being asleep or in low activity 97 percent of the time. On average, they spent only 3 percent of their time engaged in highly active pursuits, such as running or stalking prey, the researchers reported.

See, I'd have said my cat was only asleep about 80% of the day.
posted by Artw at 6:25 PM on May 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

That 97% inactivity statement stood out to me too (and made me laugh). I have young, active cats, but they still do quite a lot of sitting around and staring, even if they're awake.
posted by something something at 6:28 PM on May 26, 2011

The pet cats managed this despite being asleep or in low activity 97 percent of the time.

Seems pretty accurate to me. My cats stay indoors, and I have to laugh every time I come home from work and find them sleeping in the same place they were 9 hours earlier.
posted by TrialByMedia at 6:28 PM on May 26, 2011

Hm. I always sleep in the same place too.

I think I might be a cat.
posted by stubby phillips at 6:33 PM on May 26, 2011 [2 favorites]

The feral cats in my neighborhood (downtown LA) seem to spend their copious free time staring at the birds that never fall from the sky, occasionally catching a really old or really young rat that lives in the produce company pallet colony behind our falling-down fence or working on their stuff for Burning Man.
posted by Ideefixe at 6:44 PM on May 26, 2011 [7 favorites]

Interesting, but I'd like to see some heat maps.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 6:46 PM on May 26, 2011

Amazingly enough my cats manage to spend their 3% of not-sleepy-time about evenly divided between all of the following activities:

1) pooping
2) eating
3) spastic running attacks
4) dragging in live mice
5) digging dirt out of planters onto the carpet
6) sitting on my chest trying to block the view of the TV
7) sitting on my keyboard trying to prevent me from typing
8) glaring indignantly at each other or myself with expressions ranging from mildly disgusted to mildly offended
9) ignoring me
10) chattering at squirrels
11) shredding my sofa and my t-shirts

I guess it makes for a busy day when you only have ~45 minutes to accomplish all this...
posted by Hairy Lobster at 6:48 PM on May 26, 2011 [9 favorites]

It just so happens I took a feral cat to the spay clinic this very morning. It would be interesting to learn if spaying and neutering feral cats reduces their ranges. Of course, people who do TNR are also feeding the cats, which would keep them close to the food location.

For the colony my neighbors and I are feeding/TNR-ing, they don't seem to go more than about three blocks in any direction. The colony is mostly spayed females who have been trapped and unspayed females whom I'm trying to trap and their kittens. The unspayed females don't seem to cover any more territory than the spayed ones, although of course I cannot say for certain.

I also have several possums who are happy to eat with the feral cats. At one point I had two raccoons. This is a fairly urban area--Midtown Atlanta.

(Anyone want to adopt a rescued kitten?)
posted by Violet Hour at 7:05 PM on May 26, 2011 [3 favorites]

We are backed by lots and lots of woods. Around the edge of those woods, a bit down the road is a house full of farm cats that an older couple has been capturing and neutering. There's maybe 25 of them, they're all outside, and it seems like they spend the bulk of their time torturing our inside cats by hanging around outside the windows.
posted by nevercalm at 7:20 PM on May 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

Interesting, but I'd like to see some heat maps.

I think it's safe to assume that the greatest concentration of cats correlates pretty well with the greatest heat.
posted by maryr at 7:27 PM on May 26, 2011 [10 favorites]

I actually thought the 3% figure looked a bit high. No way my cat reaches that. It's basically 23 3/4 hours sitting, sleeping or ambling, 15 minutes frenetic running.
posted by Greener Backyards at 7:37 PM on May 26, 2011

Cool idea with the radiocollars. It makes me wonder if Apple is planning to release a study?
posted by cacofonie at 7:56 PM on May 26, 2011

That 15 minutes of running invariably takes place at midnight. My mother always explained it by simply saying it was the "witching hour".
posted by maryr at 8:02 PM on May 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

This study supports the assertion that free-roaming house cats have significant ranges and adds a bit of behavioral data, albeit on a much more limited population. Science!
posted by multics at 8:08 PM on May 26, 2011

When my wife and I got a cat for the first time we bought one of those "How To Take Care Of Your Cat" books, which was largely unremarkable aside from a section on cat sociology. It claimed that cats have been seen meeting up in groups in alleyways, backyards, etc. where they just...sit there...or something...and since then I've been obsessed with observing one of these alleged meetings (which no-one I know has ever seen or even heard of) in the wild. Although, seriously, I'd be more than a bit freaked out if I walked down the laneway behind my house and stumbled across eight cats just sitting around in a circle.
posted by The Card Cheat at 8:13 PM on May 26, 2011 [6 favorites]

"Even feral cats were always within range of a building. That shows that even though they're feral, they still have a level of dependency on us."

This is why population-controlling TNR programs, and people who manage feral colonies, are so important. At the risk of sounding preachy, we humans domesticated these animals, and it's our responsibility to... well, be responsible. It makes me so angry to see so many abandoned, neglected cats out there living among us. Just a few weeks ago, the shelter where I volunteer had to put down a stray cat that someone had abandoned.(Previously on AskMeFi, I wrote about a ravaged abandoned cat.)

OK, preaching over. As far as activity goes, I've long since dubbed it "Kitty Olympics" when my two boys chase each other at 2 a.m. through the playground of my living room. But on the days when I work from home, honestly, they sleep ALL FRIGGIN' DAY. Lazy, adorable bastards.
posted by flyingsquirrel at 8:18 PM on May 26, 2011 [2 favorites]

At the risk of sounding preachy, we humans domesticated these animals, and it's our responsibility to... well, be responsible. It makes me so angry to see so many abandoned, neglected cats out there living among us. Just a few weeks ago, the shelter where I volunteer had to put down a stray cat that someone had abandoned.

Knowing cats, I think it's much more likely that they domesticated themselves once they discovered that rodents like human settlements. That said, I'm definitely not cool with people abandoning their pets.
posted by TrialByMedia at 8:25 PM on May 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

Interesting, but I'd like to see some heat maps.

I think it's safe to assume that the greatest concentration of cats correlates pretty well with the greatest heat.
posted by maryr at 10:27 PM on May 26 [4 favorites +] [!]

I agree. If you put down a heat map to look at it, guarantee a cat will be there within seconds to lay on it.
posted by orme at 8:28 PM on May 26, 2011 [18 favorites]

For the last few years, my community garden has housed eight feral cats. We worked with a TNR group to get them all snipped and they fend off any intruder cats, so the population is steady. They're fed twice a day by a very sweet lunatic from the building next door. (We had to stop her from lining the fence with cat food cans and piles of kibble.) She and the true cat-fan garden members built a sheltered feeding station and a complex of winter housing. Our feral cats are sleek and glossy, and some even have those jiggly cat udders.

Compared to the owned cats in the study, our cats are agoraphobes. Early on, one or two intrepid souls struck out across 8th Street and eventually got run over. Those who remain very rarely venture to the other side of the block. And why would they? It's a pretty good life: food and shelter and freedom, without having to debase oneself with any display of servility or affection.

Fine for them. Meanwhile, they’ve become an enormous point of contention among the gardeners. The chief complaints:

1. They kill birds. Which is true. I’ve seen them stalking and it can’t be out of hunger; it’s just what they do. I like cats but in the garden setting, I prefer birds. That said, I strongly object to nailing the fresh, slightly gnawed corpse of a red-headed woodpecker to the garden sign at eye-level to the kindergarteners arriving for a visit that afternoon, just to make a point. Collateral damage and all that.

2. They shit in plots. Also true. Plots are where people grow tomatoes, lettuce, bitter melon, all sorts of edibles. It's very difficult to maintain any enthusiasm for eating just-picked produce from your very own plot when you know that plant spent its entire life being shat on by cats, locavorism be damned.

We’ve reached a détente. No one is allowed to poison or otherwise kill the cats; no one is allowed to introduce more cats or kittens. A cat latrine has been set up and efforts continue to train the cats to use it. People defend their plots as best they can. My favorite: dozens of plastic forks shoved into the soil, tines up. Pleasantly surreal.
posted by dogrose at 8:31 PM on May 26, 2011 [3 favorites]

I had a cat that would walk down to the pub with me (a distance of about a k), hang out out the back while i was inside drinking, then we'd hook up and walk back home.
posted by wilful at 8:32 PM on May 26, 2011 [22 favorites]

When we had two cats they would often see, hear or smell (who knows?) my wife and/or I returning home, appear out of nowhere, run down the sidewalk to greet us and then follow us home. They would also try to follow us when we left, so usually we'd let them out the back door and hustle out the front before they could catch up with us.
posted by The Card Cheat at 8:43 PM on May 26, 2011

For other retarded readers, may I note that TNR must mean Trap-Neuter-Release? I read the whole thread trying to figure out what TV show or meditation discipline you were discussing.
posted by mwhybark at 9:21 PM on May 26, 2011 [4 favorites]

I had a cat that would walk down to the pub with me (a distance of about a k), hang out out the back while i was inside drinking, then we'd hook up and walk back home.

Yep. Aloysius, the Best Cat Ever, goes for walks with us. But his enthusiasm wanes after a bit (short legs and built for sprinting, not for distance, I suppose). Then he'll sprawl out and pant and mewl piteously as if we are horrible, horrible people engaged in fiendishly agonizing cat torture. So then we have to carry him home. He'll happily submit to being draped around my neck, where he'll stay until we're in sight of the house. This is fine on a crisp January afternoon, less pleasant in muggy August. (He's a Maine coon, and his fluffiness is epic.)

He's insistent about going with, though. We've left for a walk while he's off being Mysterious Invisible Cat somewhere, and within two or three hundred yards of the house he'll dash out of the undergrowth and trot along beside us.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 9:32 PM on May 26, 2011 [9 favorites]

When we had two cats they would often see, hear or smell (who knows?) my wife and/or I returning home, appear out of nowhere, run down the sidewalk to greet us and then follow us home

I was recently describing this phenomenon to somebody. We had indoor/ outdoor cats in Brooklyn of all places ( it was the 70s). Each night, didn't really matter what time, they would sneak up as we unlocked the front door, I'm sure there have been studies done to figure out exactly how cat do this, it it is pretty cool. We always left a window open so they could get out and meet us at the front door, and only started closing it when other cats started showing up and making themselves at home.
posted by Ad hominem at 9:33 PM on May 26, 2011

where they just...sit there...or something...and since then I've been obsessed with observing one of these alleged meetings (which no-one I know has ever seen or even heard of) in the wild

Mr Lee's cat cam has some pics of cat meetups.
posted by Ad hominem at 9:40 PM on May 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

It's basically 23 3/4 hours sitting, sleeping or ambling, 15 minutes frenetic running.

This is basically my day except with the cats doing about 15 minutes more frenetic running than I do.
posted by Justinian at 10:03 PM on May 26, 2011

For other retarded readers, may I note that TNR must mean Trap-Neuter-Release? I read the whole thread trying to figure out what TV show or meditation discipline you were discussing.

Trap, Neuter, Return is the only method endorsed by the ASPCA as a humane and effective way to manage feral cat colonies.

You do sometimes see it listed at Trap, Neuter, Release, but it's important that the ferals be returned to where they came from: releasing them in a different location is generally considered inhumane.
posted by Violet Hour at 10:16 PM on May 26, 2011 [2 favorites]

My girl does the spastic running attacks too. But a surprising amount of her time is spent on her obsessional hobby, "rip boxes apart with my teeth".

If a box is open, it will be shredded to tiny pieces. I've taken advantage of this: there's one box that she bit a hole in the bottom side. I slip my fingertip in the hole, as if it's a little "pinkie" mouse, and she'll run across the room, leap into the box, and attack my finger. Generally this means she leaps into the box and three-quarters of her arm shoots through the hole. Right out of a horror movie. We are slowly learning to NOT use claws and teeth when the prey is my finger, but at this point my fingertips are like a diabetic's.
posted by orthogonality at 10:36 PM on May 26, 2011 [2 favorites]

It claimed that cats have been seen meeting up in groups in alleyways, backyards, etc. where they just...sit there...or something...and since then I've been obsessed with observing one of these alleged meetings (which no-one I know has ever seen or even heard of) in the wild.

There are seven indoor-outdoor cats in our immediate neighbourhood (we have one, next-door has four, and there are two others from elsewhere). We have on occasion seen all seven of them sitting on different parts of various garden walls and posts, just looking at each other. They do fight sometimes, but these staring sessions seem to be separate from that dynamic.
posted by altolinguistic at 12:48 AM on May 27, 2011 [1 favorite]

A few years back we had A Wonderful Cat (Sampson). He was a pretty sociable cat and we were always seeing him just sitting with another cat or two. Sometimes they'd just sit, but sometimes they would just look up at uncatchable birds, and other times they would gang up (ineffectively) on the alpha male cat in the neighbourhood. One night Sampson got out and was hit by a car and died. Most nights for a week afterwards there would be at least one cat just sitting where he had been hit. A week later, another cat was hit on the same spot - she'd been just sitting there and refusing to leave.
posted by Alice Russel-Wallace at 1:08 AM on May 27, 2011 [2 favorites]

When I was in high school, I, and a friend who could draw, postulated Catland. Catland is a cat disco that cats go to at night while humans are asleep. The cats all have beepers that go off if their humans wake up, so that they can get back home in a hurry. The bar in Catland serves catnip drinks.

I would be disappointed to find out I was wrong.
posted by wittgenstein at 5:07 AM on May 27, 2011 [1 favorite]

This is a total lie.

They grab their friends, hop to raves, clubs, and bars and come home drunk puking on your rug.
posted by stormpooper at 5:38 AM on May 27, 2011 [4 favorites]

I don't know where my (TNR'd) feral colony spends most of their day. The kittens who were born here are 5 now, and I see them occasionally in/near the barn during the day (which is more than I used to!) so maybe they're slowing down a bit and sticking closer to home. I almost never see the mama cat though, so "getting older and slowing down" may not be part of it. Maybe it has to do with increasing tameness, being a little more relaxed around people.

I feed them in a barn in the middle of about 15 acres of cleared area, so I could see them if they were coming and going. Most days they just show up at feeding time if they happen to be hungry that day.
posted by galadriel at 6:51 AM on May 27, 2011

Round my way, they play cat chess.
posted by Decani at 7:16 AM on May 27, 2011

the card cheat: you're just not invited to the right kind of parties.
posted by lester at 8:06 AM on May 27, 2011 [1 favorite]

I don't even own a cat but on any given day at any give time there seems to be one asleep on my couch.
posted by srboisvert at 8:14 AM on May 27, 2011

Granted, I only own senior cats, but the two that I allow outside during daylight hours actually go a fair amount of walking, rather than just resting and spastic running. My one, who's particularly territorial, has almost what looks like a patrol route when I let him out (from what I can see): go to very specific spot on hedges, mark it, go to front right wheel of red car parked in the street, mark that, cross street to neighbour's picnic table, mark it... and so on. While he'll often end up sleeping on the platform from an old tree house in the apple tree in the backyard, I'm pretty certain he can't go there until his he's completed his patrol. I often see him fighting with other neighbourhood cats, which seems to be the only thing that will actually get him moving at any pace above a walk.
posted by Kurichina at 9:25 AM on May 27, 2011 [1 favorite]

Although, seriously, I'd be more than a bit freaked out if I walked down the laneway behind my house and stumbled across eight cats just sitting around in a circle.

I saw this once when I was standing outside my apartment late at night. At least five feral cats underneath or flanking my wife's car, all of them staring at me. It was unsettling.
posted by L. Ron McKenzie at 1:21 PM on May 27, 2011

violet hour - are you the kind lady who cares for the feral tribe around the Midtown Plaza parking lot? My Boyfriend eats his lunch there and enjoys bonding with/seeing the kitties there.
posted by mkim at 5:20 PM on May 27, 2011

mkim--

No, that's not me, although I'm maybe half a mile from there going West on Ponce. The ferals are in an empty (well, of people) building and in several backyards behind my building.
posted by Violet Hour at 8:15 PM on May 27, 2011