When I was a kid, I had a cat that was a great adventurer. It got into fights all the time, brought home hunting trophies, and even went on a three-week, 30-mile safari after we’d moved to another part of town (okay, I’m guessing he got lost).
That cat got himself up a tree he couldn’t get down. A big, big tree. Granted, I’m using dusty memories and kid-scale measuring, but it was forty feet if it was an inch (I base that on its relative height compared to the two-story house it was in front of).
Anyway, the cat couldn’t get down. I couldn’t find it. I spent the better part of an afternoon wandering our neighborhood, calling for it. It started meowing. Loud. Loud enough to be heard on the ground, half a block away.
Now, maybe the cat COULD get down. Maybe it just didn’t know that. But it sure looked trapped.
Luckily, there just happened to be a very friendly power company team working the lines on my block at the time, using a gargantuan cherry-picker (one of those trucks with an extension arm a bucket that can hold a couple people). I went over and asked them if they would help get my cat down. They did-- moved the truck, extended that arm right up to the cat, and grabbed him (while weaing some stout working gloves, for sure). Had him down in a couple minutes.
I was a charming kid. And those were a couple of very cool power company employees.
Anyway, the cat seemed about as relieved as a cat can possibly be.
Then he leapt out of my arms and was run over by the power truck leaving the scene.
NO! I’m kidding. The cat lived for another six years. But that would have been a funny ending. Not at the time-- now, I mean.
So I think we don’t cat skeletons in trees 'cause of gravity, not feline descent capabilities.
