Hello, I'm Simon. Welcome to Simon's Cat Logic!
We'll be finding out from a cat expert, why cats behave the way they do.
Today, we're looking at ... Love.
I've had cats all my life, and it really helps me when I'm thinking of my stories, because
obviously cats can't pick up baseball bats or, you know, climb up windows, or use their hands.
Animation allows me to use my imagination, but also I can base it solidly in what a cat would think.
By having cats all my life, I kind of know the inside of their heads and how they work things out.
Well, 'Butterflies' is a nice Valentines film. One of the stars of 'Butterflies' is in fact
a chubby girl cat, who is a bit of a love interest for Simon's Cat.
[Do cats fall in love?]
Unfortunately cats aren't really that romantic so it's quite a contrast to the Simon's Cat Valentines Day videos.
Cats can actually mate with quite a few different partners
and they are not really fussy with who they choose to breed with,
and they don't really choose a mate for life like birds do.
Female cats are also known as queens
and a queen can be only receptive to mate, when she's hormonally ready.
Prior to that she may swipe her paw at a male.
When a female cat is in season she'll call quite a lot or meow
and it's a very different sort of meow to what owners are normally used to.
It's quite a persistent noise and, in fact, some owners that aren't familiar with this sound
may actually think that their cats are in pain, but this isn't true.
They'll also get themselves into what's called the lordosis pose,
this is where they actually go down on their front legs, and put their bottoms in the air
and sometimes put their tail to the side as well,
and they kind of, like I said, getting ready for mating.
Owners will also notice cats will be a lot more affectionate
they may be doing a lot of rolling around
and they'll sometimes be grooming their back end a lot more than usual.
[How can we help our cats?]
Cats can actually start mating as young as four months of age,
which is why I recommend neutering from four months.
There are actually many health benefits of getting cats neutered
For both female and male cats, it can prevent certain cancers,
there are many behavioural benefits, it can cut-out sexual spraying,
they are much less likely to roam, they are also less likely to get into fights.
One queen or female cat, that is not neutered
can be responsible for as many as 20,000 kittens over a five year period
if all of those kittens weren't neutered! That's a lot of kittens!
So that's why, here at Cat's Protection, we do a lot of neutering,
because we have so many cats and kittens all looking for good homes.
[Did you know?]
Females can actually mate with multiple males and in fact, one litter of kittens
can have each kitten having a different father.
This can therefore throw in a lot of different, interesting coat colours in the litter
as well as different behaviours.
The trait for boldness or how outgoing the cat is, comes from the father.
So here is Chloe. With her little ears. A tiny little mouth
and I've given her a great big fat, sort of, face and a little love heart collar.
The thing I love most about Chloe is her huge, great, big tail.
She is based on my second cat.
She was such a lovely cat, had a lovely temperament and very affectionate.
You know, as a little boy growing up we were very close.
So it was nice to get a bit of that memory into this film.
This little beautiful girl cat who is a bit of a snob,
but that's only in the Simon's Cat world, not in real life.