What does your cat reeeaallly do all day?
It’s likely that you’d guess…catnapping. Surprisingly if you did, you’d be wrong!
“Cat cams” — a small digital camera apparatus that attaches to the collar — provided a sneak peak at a day in the life of our unsupervised furry friends. Fifty housecats were outfitted with the small gadget and then left at home to their own devides. These cat cams snapped a digital photo every 15 minutes and created a mosaic of what exactly these kitties did all day long.
The photographic proof put a damper on the human idea that cats just slept and lazed about.
Based on the photos, about 22 percent of the cats’ time was spent looking out of windows, 12 percent was used to interact with other family pets and 8 percent was spent climbing on chairs or kitty condos. Just 6 percent of their hours were spent sleeping.
“What surprised me was how active the cats were. I believed my three cats were sleeping during the day,” said Jill Villarreal, an animal behavior scientist who studied the photos from the cat cams. She looked at 777 total photos which showed the cats looking at a computer, television, DVD or other media 6 percent of the time and hiding under tables 6 percent of the time. Coming in at 5 percent was playing with toys; eating or looking at food finished at 4 percent.
Makes you wonder what your other pets do while you’re away! Dog cam next perhaps?
msnbc.com
