Cat Facts

About the cat

Cats must eat mostly meat. Their retractable claws suit catching small prey like mice and rats, and they have flexible bodies, quick reflexes, sharp teeth, good night vision and a strong sense of smell. They are social animals but hunt alone, mainly at dawn and dusk. They talk with meows, purrs, trills, hisses, growls and grunts, plus body language and scent marks, and they can pick up sounds that are too quiet or too high-pitched for people to hear.

Cats were domesticated in the Near East starting around 7500 BCE, and today an estimated 600 million domestic cats live worldwide, 400 million of them in Asia, including 58 million in China. The United States has about 73.8 million, and the United Kingdom about 10.9 million. Feral cats also roam freely and avoid people, and abandoned pets add to their numbers, which has hurt bird, mammal and reptile species.

Did you know?

• The domestic cat's scientific name is Felis catus.
• Cats both release and detect chemical signals called pheromones.
• Cats show intelligence by learning through observation and solving problems.