Say a cat is sitting on the deck of a boat when he spies a tuna swimming below. We’ll say the tuna is a small one about four feet long. Assuming that this cat is brave enough and a good enough swimmer to jump into the water after the tuna, could the cat kill the tuna? How would he do it? Attack the gills with his claws and teeth?
You have a lot of what if’s going there. Domestic cats don’t just jump in the water after four foot long fish. Most of the cats I know like tuna but only from a can. Any four foot long fish is stronger than a cat. All the tuna has to do is swim somewhere, anywhere to get out of it. If the cat was high on crystal meth or something, it could claw in and try to ride it but the cat would drown fairly quickly. I would like to see a video of that but somehow I don’t think this is the type of thing Mythbusters wants to get involved in.
OK, let’s say then that the tuna is in a shallow tank, rather than in open water.
Can the tuna escape? Are you asking whether the cat can kill the tuna before it swims away, or who would win in a cage (or tank) match to the death?
No way! Very silly question. A 4-ft tuna weighs about 80 lbs.
A cat could flip a much, much, much smaller fish out of a shallow tank, where it would die on it’s own, or could be killed by biting the head. But I would imagine the limit for the front-limb strength of an average 9-lb house cat would be a fish of less than 4 lbs.
Let’s say for now that it’s the latter. The tuna can’t escape from the tank. Could the cat kill it? I’m sure that if the cat went for the gills, it could.
A point of comparison might be the largest fish a fishing cat can handle. They’re about twice the size of a domestic housecat, and more accustomed to water. Something tells me they don’t prey on fish anywhere near that big.
It would be easier for a cat to learn how to operate a tin opener.
Remember cats have weapons. I do not think a determination on what they can kill can be made strictly on how much weight their paws can lift.
Here is a video of a Golden Eagle killing a wolf. No way in hell the eagle can carry the wolf but it kills it.
That said a cat has to go out of its element and into the water to catch the tuna and tuna are big. I cannot imagine a cat even trying unless the tuna was beached or in very shallow water or something. I doubt the cat could do enough damage before the fish swam away (which it would do very quickly).
Nick Danger Badass Cat could.
You never specified what kind of cat. Domesticated house cat? Lion? Rum Tum Tugger? Thundercat?
It makes a big difference.
What are the chances the tuna, which is a predator, would eat the cat?
Disqualified – OP has apparently never seen a cat. My father and mother’s cat couldn’t even kill, much less eat, catnip from my hand. I love cats, but they’re pretty dumb and not that strong. Try asking a cat to open a can of tuna or something. Not happening. My ex-wife’s (stolen) cat (from me) would have given a tuna a good run, but probably, yes, a tuna would and could eat a cat, fur and all. Probably a big rat could eat a cat – cat’s a scaredys.
They obviously didn’t have a fishing cat. As someone else noted the species of cat makes a pretty big difference. A lion could kill a 4 foot, 100lb. tuna fish if it were captive in a shallow tank. A house cat which is presumably what the OP implies, probably could not kill the same sized tuna especially if it were out at open sea.
A cat can’t take a tuna but cats are stupid AND evil. Some of them are really good hunters too. My daughters have a pair of cats that are still young but their policy is that if it steps into the yard, they kill it, you cook it. They are really good hunters and can stalk and kill really well. The largest so far was a small squirrel and whole bunch of chipmunks but they are still growing and a rat would be easy for them. I would give them even odds on a woodchuck or a toy poodle if they were really pissed off. I made the mistake of trying to force Bubbles (aka Psycho) into the house a few weeks ago. I still have to wear long sleeve shirts if I don’t want people to ask too many questions and I don’t know yet if the scaring is permanent.
Correction noted – my sister’s cat just ruined my favorite “fancy” shirt by getting his big claws in it while trying to “play.” I’ll bite and agree with you that – it seems evident – in a stable environment, such as a hatchery, a cat could take a fish of its own weight.
(Enough nitpicking with the “kinds” of cats – we’re talking about housecats, no? Yes, I’m a member of the zoo, and I love Tigers and such, but those hunt men, not just fish. Yeah, I know, she doesn’t like fish – I know what that means. Where’s the drum thread?
ETA that’s a priceless photo of that tabby with the fish. I’m saving that to my computer to scare would-be assassins.
OT, but the scarring might be permanent depending on how deep the wounds are. Things that go through the entire epidermal layer (not that thick) and damage the basement membrane tend to cause scarring, so deep scratches and bites often leave scars. Don’t worry, you’re in good company when it comes to cat-inflicted body art. I even have a bite scar that’s 6-7 mm in diameter from where the canine tooth went in at an angle and killed some of the skin adjacent to the actual puncture.
As for the OP, I’m not sure about outright killing the tuna, but given that a determined cat can inflict a world of hurt on larger mammals under the right circumstances, I wouldn’t be surprised if the cat managed to cause some damage. It would probably end up needing to retreat, though. By comparison, I’ve seen dogs with missing eyes (one was completely blind) from cat scratches, but if a good-sized dog wants to kill a cat and manages to grab it in its mouth, a couple good shakes and kitty is on its way to being history.
I have seen my cat go into apeshit mode (for no apparent reason I could discern…no one touched it and thankfully it only did it once) and if you saw that you’d fear for your life. Doesn’t matter that you are 15x bigger. Us humans rarely see our pets go into super-hyper-spaz-attack mode but if you have seen it then you know to stay the fuck away from them. My cat (again for no reason my wife or I could discern) turned into a ball of fury. Ever see the Tasmanian Devil on Bugs Bunny shows? Like that except for real. A whirling blur of lethal cat claws and teeth.
Frankly scared the shit out of me. I was standing about five feet away wondering what I’d have to do if that whirlwind cat attacked me. I doubt she could have killed me but I bet she’d have sent me to the hospital for a lot of stitches.
As it happened she spazzed for about 15 seconds then stopped.
Yes, she is mental.
The narrowest street in Paris is *Rue du Chat qui Pêche * (Street of the Fishing Cat). Centuries ago, when the Seine overflowed, the basements on that street would flood. Housecats went down to the basements and caught fish. But I seriously doubt they were 4-foot tunas.
