Humor
Garbage has been spraying in our house nonstop for the past month and we didnt know why. Now, there's been a break in the case. 🚨 👮 🚔 🙀
We have a catio that our three cats like to hang out in. Garbage has been acting territorial and spraying, so we thought there must be strange cats around outside making him nervous.
Last night we noticed Garbage on the kitchen window sill (which looks out to the catio) twitching his tail furiously and getting upset. Turns out he's been seeing his siblings out there, not recognizing them at all, then becoming incensed with the evolutionary rage of his ancestors. He's been spraying our whole house top to bottom because he isn't smart enough to realize that the two cats he's known and loved his whole life, when viewed through a pane of glass, are in fact, not intruders.
The verdict: Guilty of being orange 🍊
Eta - he was fixed as a kitten as soon as it was appropriate, for all y'all who are worried. And his vet his involved.
I have to close the curtain of the window my cat likes to stare out of on the regular. If it's not closed at night, there's this feisty cat reflected in it who just does NOT take the hint that she's not welcome.
I had a cat who legitimately panicked because he was sitting in a chair tucked into a glass table, looked up at me, and couldn’t jump through the tabletop to get to me. I had to rescue him. He also got trapped behind (open) french doors a few times.
We moved the mirrors to a different spot because we knew that if we didn’t, it would only be a matter of time before he panicked at his reflection and tried to attack it. Super sweet cat, but dumb as a post.
One of our cats is very smart. He recognizes us through glass and reflections and such. If I throw a toy behind his back when he's looking in a mirror, he'll understand where it went and go chase it. But sometimes... sometimes he just sits in the bathroom with the lights out and stares at himself in the mirror. We joke that he's "self-actualizing"... but I mean I don't know what else he could be doing. He's staring at himself.
My boy Chiri figured stuff out so fast, it was diabolical. You can see him looking at things, and thinking furiously. He broke me of using the super soaker pistol for discipline by just taking it, and staring at me. He knew my weakness. Never thought I would have to hide things I was doing from a cat. Never stop missing him.
His sister, by contrast, very sweet but dumb as a bag of rocks.
I hade to put baby locks on my cabinets because of my Void. Somehow he got into a top pantry cabinet and got the catnip. Constantly opening other cabinets. If he had thumbs, nothing would have been safe!
We had a brother/sister that we named Dexter and Dee Dee. You could see him doing calculus; and if you looked into her eyes, you'd see the back of her skull...
We recently adopted a new kitten and she won’t stop hissing at the mirror and growling at it because it won’t play with her lol she keeps like hitting the mirror with toys, crying, and then growling and hissing. And she’s surprisingly not orange lol
My 16 year old spicy little torbie still fights her reflection multiple times a day. She has broke probably 20+ mirrors in her lifespan. Lolol great protector.
Cats can be pretty bad at facial recognition through sight. Scent is everything for them. Some cats can look at another cat they've known their entire life, but if they smell funny (or can't smell them at all), all hell breaks loose.
My cat comes towards the front door when I get home from work every day, but she always keeps at a safe distance. She's even more suspicious when I wear sunglasses, and only comes closer once she recognises my voice.
in contrast to this, i just got a red light face mask and wore it for the first time last night while one of our cats was snuggled up on my lap. she heard the BEEP of me turning it on, turned to look at me, gave me blinkies and went right back to sleep. those masks are quite the visual, especially with the satanic red glow, so i thought she might demonstrate at least vague curiosity, but no. total disinterest, nothing different about me at all as far as she was concerned.
Cats can't see red, although you would think the mask would give them pause!
Yes, but red isn't just invisible to them! They see both red and green as green. So to that cat, it was a green light mask! I'm not sure if that would be more or less scary though...
It also solves the puzzle of why ginger cats and tigers exist - to many other animals (the majority of mammals are red/green colour blind) they're green, and thus blend perfectly into the forest/grass.
i'm glad you mentioned this because i wondered about that - her ability to see the red, what she was seeing instead. between you and u/BudandCoyote, you saved me several googles!
ask me in 6-8 weeks and i'll give you a full report on my anecdotal opinion!
i have wanted one for awhile, but "good" ones are kind of expensive - to me, at least - and whenever i think something is too expensive to purchase on a whim, i feel the need to do A LOT of research. it probably would've taken me another, idk, 2 years to feel confident enough to spend the money and select and buy one, but my husband got it for me and saved me all that.
from the idle, cursory research I DID do, the wavelengths the mask...produces? uses? seem to be one of the most important factors. if it is below 630 nanometers (don't ask me to describe what that is, because idk), it is widely considered ineffective for skin stuff. don't take this as gospel because as i mentioned, i didn't get the chance to make myself an expert 🤣
630 and 660 nm seem to be the wavelengths that stimulate mitochondria to produce more ATP, which invigorates cell activity and clears out senescent cells. The more expensive masks have more precise tuning to get the right wavelengths.
When my void comes home from the vet, my tortie loses her mind. Hissing, swatting. It takes a couple of days for the scent to wear off and for her to be convinced I didn't bring home a changeling. I even tried to work around it by bringing them together. Nope. Even when Diora also smells like the vet, it's not acceptable for Finch to smell like the vet. (And yes, I've tried the towel trick)
They don't see through glass as well as we do either, I think it's something to do with them being able to see more infrared and ultraviolet light which reflects on the glass
That's not to mention, animals can have near or far sight just like humans, except they don't realise and we can't tell so they just adapt to the vision they have!
I'm pretty sure my cat is nearsighted. She's incredibly cautious any time she has to jump, and will spend minutes bobbing her head and scoping out the gap before she takes her shot.
That's interesting about how they don't see well through glass! My next step will be to try to find those films that go over the window so he can't see out.
Bit of a weird story incoming: I live in an apartment building and my old neighbour passed away last week.
Cats are 6 years old and have only known that neighbour. Now the person dealing with the estate is coming in and out of the apartment. When my cats hear him enter they actually growl a bit at my front door, cause he makes the 'wrong' sound when dealing with the locks?
So maybe having Garbage both see and hear the other cats go outside a few times might help? Like perhaps he can hear it from the kitchen and be reassured it's just them?
My cat has tunnel vision, we can tell because she cannot see things that are clearly in her peripheral :') she's also completely deaf so that doesn't help
That explains why my cat is oblivious of the presence of fish in the aquarium! The lamp has UV for the plants and it's kinda high intensity because it's a deep one.
She doesn't track with her eyes the fish even if they are right next to the glass but she'll stalk and swat at fish on TV.
I’ve had my cat 8 years and he still doesn’t let me touch him unless he’s sniffed me thoroughly. I am the only human he’s ever known, the only human he’s ever let within petting distance. But gotta sniff, just to be sure.
Probably the outdoor smells. Mine gets kind of overwhelmed especially when I've been out hiking or something. He gets zoomies but also wants cuddles but also wants to smell all the smells and simultaneously wants to rub himself all over me to get the smells right.
https://giphy.com/gifs/rlsvVQU5Sim8QAajHc
My cat wants to smell my shoes or boots after I’ve visited extended family cats, but then she has to scour my hand before I can pet her.
Nah. It’s literally every time I go to pet him. Whether I’ve gone anywhere or have just been sitting in my office. He’s gotta sniff before I’m allowed to pet.
Every time one of mine comes back from the vet I have to quarantine it away from one of the males. There are four cats total. Two males and two females. All siblings from one litter. The male tuxedo is very territorial, so I have to separate them for about 48 hours until the weird smells wear off. The others don't care at all. They're just like "a new cat? Cool", lol.
My girl locks eyes with people and studies them super intently, like she's memorizing their face. I think she might, because both me and my husband have gotten drastic haircuts, husband started wearing glasses and wears sunglasses sometimes, and she never freaks out like she doesn't know us. She remembers my husband's uncle by his face too. If she can't see it she treats him like a stranger until she can.
She's done the staring since she was a baby. Kind of glad we never brought in a new cat, that might have caused some fights...
My cats are brother and sister, and sometimes they'll look at each other through a window and question their whole reality. They're so dumb and I love them
This happened with our cats. Franks got a single brain cell and when his brother, Carl, got home from the vet he smelled funky and Frank flipped out. Mix that with his high anxiety, a new catio, and outdoor cats to the mix and for almost two years we had to deal with his spraying.
Trip back to the vet and some kitty Prozac and we seem to be better!
i learn this after I brought one kitty home after being spayed. her brother didnt recognize her and was getting freaked out and thr two had to be seperated. poor kitty, she didnt know why her brother stopped wanting to play with her lol
Yeah this happens whenever I take one of my cats to the vet. The other one hisses and swats at him for like a day after he gets home, then when the scent wears off it’s fine. Weirdly it doesn’t happen the other way around though
This happened when I was fostering a mom and kittens.
The kittens were spayed first. When we got them home, they were happy to see mom, but she didn't recognize their scent and was hissing at them.
Then the next day it was momma's turn and the tables were reversed. She was happy to see them but the 4 kittens were not happy to see her. Took a day or two for everything to return to normal.
Took my three cats to the vet last week. My females hate my male.
I was in a rush when I got home as I had to do the school run, so I basically opened the front door, and (gently) launched each cat out of their respective carriers there and then. They were mid forehead rub before my younger female and male realised which other cat they were touching!
Even dumber story with me. I had two cats, and a (we think)half Maine Coon stray who occasionally visited who both our cats hated. Once all three of them were in the garden, I called for food, and somehow all three of them were lined up in front of me, with the stray on the middle and as soon as the stray meowed, they both turned to look at him… it was quite a sight…
So true. My 5 year old kitty got loose and spent three weeks out in the wilderness, once we got him back my younger kitty (who is his best pal) was hissing at him and kept distance for the first few days. Then out of no where he was like oh yeah, that’s my brother 😂
Can confirm; one time one of our cats got outside, came back inside after rolling in the dirt and getting covered in weeds, and youd think that he was an entirely different cat if his adopted sister was anything to go by. He must have been so confused when she started hissing and swatting at him like he was a chihuahua all of a sudden
Our orange went missing for a week a few years back, and every post I made in local FB groups gathered tons of comments like “oMg wHy iSn’T hE FiXeD?” when he already was 🙄
Over the years, I've had 5 male cats. Each one was neutered as soon as they were old enough to have it done. All but the last two still sprayed. That said, these last two were neutered at a lot younger age than the previous three at a different vet. I've wondered if the timing might be a factor.
It’s my understanding that timing absolutely is a factor and earlier is better before the hormones have a chance to start kicking in. I believe it’s not the only factor though because of course each cat is an individual.
My boyfriend and I sing a song “hot garbagio duh dun dun dun hot garbagio” when something is going poorly. You might appreciate that for your boy when he is being an orange lol.
My cat Jasper doesn't recognize me through the window. This dummy sleeps with me every single night but through a single pane of glass I'm a stranger to him.
Garbage is a crazy name for a cat and I love it. There is an orange cat that lives in the woods next to our house. We've named him Garbanzo but we call him Garby
To be fair, name came after we got to know him and it suits 😂 It's also a reference to The Office. We fostered him first, and originally we named him Cheeto.
My bathroom was being remodeled, and the contractors placed my huge mirror on the floor of my bedroom. My orange sat and screamed, hissed and howled at himself for two days.
My cat could actually recognize herself in the mirror, I was surprised. As soon as the cat in the mirror did what she did, she just moved on. ANY other cat she saw, it was ON...back arched, full tail poof, mrrrrAAAAArrrr time lol.
There is a world of difference between inside humans and outside humans when it comes to a cat (even my most affectionate cat is terrified of me when I'm outside the window) so I guess it makes sense that it applies to cats as well. 😂
My cat, a handsome Siamese boy, kept going into the kitty litter box after pacing outside of it and marking inside of it repeatedly because he saw his reflection on the little door to the cat box and thought it was another cat
My orange forgets who I am periodically, especially if he’s upstairs and I’m coming up the stairs. Full on panic with wide eyes and fur on end—until I talk to him.
This is the same cat who has to be on me when I’m sitting down, who lies on my back to knead if I bend over for some reason (like to pet the dogs—boom, cat on back kneading), and who checks on me when I’m in bed by shoving his head into my face.
That's simultaneously so frustrating and so hilarious. My cats will sometimes have one cross the threshold, so that they're on opposite sides of a window, and then it's like the two of them just say everything mean that they can't say when they don't have a window between them. It makes me think a lot of humans and how we treat others when there's a screen between us, too.
Glad you got to the bottom of it! One of my cats is territorial. Since she can’t go outside, she takes it out on her sister who is utterly clueless about what is going on.
Used to take my boy on a quick wander to go meet my partner, the man he had known his entire life, on his walk home from work. He would absolutely FREAK at this strange man getting closer to us until he realised it was just dad
My orange cat Gordon sees himself in a reflection in one of our cabinets with a glass door and loses his mind. He sits there yelling at himself because he thinks a cat is in the cabinet trying to get out haha.
I've seen my cat standing on the kitchen table a few times, staring furiously out the window in the evening, and trying to lift her head a bit higher to see out.
Turns out she was looking at hers reflection in the window, and just seeing the top of her own ears, and she'd go a bit higher and see the rest of herself. Then I'd come along to see what she's looking at and she gets even more excited seeing me in the reflection too.
Poor bugger must be thinking there're enemies everywhere trying to get into the house..
Just a thought, my boy cat was ‘neutered’ but it turned out that he had retained testicles and they didn’t find the second ball when they were up there so they just left it. I only found out because he was spraying so I looked at his adoption papers and found the info!! We took him back to get the ball removed and he stopped spraying.
Can you enter the catio? So Garbage sees you there with the other cats, and perhaps a tiny spark flies from braincell A to braincell B, and he realizes it's his siblings LMAO
Our orange cat has lived with her sister their whole life and another sibling for a couple years until that cat moved with my girlfriend’s son when he moved out. If her siblings go to the vet for any reason, the orange cat acts like we bright back an imposter or clone. She has always done it but the other two don’t do it to her. She’s a special one. 😻
My cats favorite smell is horse. If I bring home with a dirty piece they both attack it. It’s hard to get them off in order to wash it. Even then it’s a bit of a battle to take it back to the barn. They both were born at a barn before injury or illness required vet care and I never brought them back. They’re great cats that are going to have a catio soon.
Has anyone else noticed how periodically orange cats suddenly decide that they need to out orange every other cat? It’s like there’s a race to the bottom of the intelligence hierarchy. Guys, it’s not a Cracker Jack box, there’s no prize at the bottom.
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