Animal Insting

Well, yesterday my kitty friend Dodi wrote a comment saying that his mom thinks he's destructive.  I was surprised, and I asked Chloe and Charlie, my kitty siblings, if cats could ever be destructive.  They told me that, unlike dogs, cats were always perfectly well behaved and never destroyed anything.  But when Mom heard this, she said au contraire!  Which is French for "They're lying to your face!"

That's when I decided to do a little research, and guess what!  I found a bunch of pictures of stuff that cats had torn up.  So now I will show you some of those pictures, just to prove that cats really are destructive, too.

Cats have very sharp toenails that they call "claws," and they are always having to sharpen their claws on things, like for instance on the corner of the mattress or on the recliner.  This is probably the biggest kind of damage that cats do.


Also cats dig stuff up in the garden, just like dogs do.  But the reason cats dig in the garden is because they are covering up their poop.  Dogs don't usually cover up their poop.  Dogs just like to dig because it's fun, and also they can bury a bone or something and come back for it later.  Or they can make a nice, cool hole to lie in on a hot day.  I think dogs have better reasons for digging than cats do, but that is just my opinion.





Cats also like to play with things and tear them up just for the fun of it.  Or maybe they are doing it to relieve stress.  Anyway, cats and dogs are sort of alike in this way.








And if cats can find some nice food to get into, they will do that, which is very smart of them.  Cats are short, but can jump up high onto counters and get to the food that way, and also they can sometimes open cabinet doors.  At our house, Chloe is the only one who knows how to open the cabinet doors, but Mom doesn't keep any food in the lower cabinets.  Chloe can get into the trash can, though, because she can open the door to the place where it lives.  One time she left the door open and then Barry got into the trash and ate some dog treat wrappers. Well, okay, he started eating them, and then Mom caught him doing it, so she took them away from him.


Feral cats can make a big mess, too, because they like to rip trash bags and get the chicken bones and other yummy food out.  This happens in our neighborhood sometimes on trash day because we have feral cats and we also have trash bags, so it's a perfect combination.













Okay, so now I know that Charlie and Chloe were pulling my leg when they said that cats never destroy anything.  And now that I think about it, I remember that Chloe has got into trouble a few times for sharpening her claws on the box springs.  And Charlie peed on the bed when he didn't like the kind of litter Mom was using in the kitty boxes.  Which means that those cats aren't the angels they pretend to be, so there!