We’ve rescued cats for years, including abandoned litters, and have had as many as 25 at a time, and special arrangements with our vet (who sometimes asks us to adopt a defective one who’s been through a fan belt, missing an eye, whatever). So we have sampled many.
Of the cats who stay with us for years, I think about half learn their names. Not the concept of names, as far as I can tell – just that they learn when we make some specific noise something interesting will happen. I guess most of them think they have multiple names, one of which is the sound of the can opener.
But one cat, a really really clever one, learned some of the names of other cats. When we’d address another cat by name, this cat would look at that one.
I have two young cats. Linden is a Balinese, which is a Siamese cat with a gene for long hair. Poe is a Maine Coon.
Linden is clever, though not smarter than my last Maine coon. I wanted to see if I could train him, and as long as he can see a treat, he will come running at least 80% of the time if I command “Linden, come.” We’re not having nearly as much success with “up” but we might get there. He does find smart ways to cause trouble like his Siamese cousins.
Poe…he’s sweet most of the time, but I’m not convinced that he even knows his own name. His big strength is figuring out how cabinets open, but still, I painted the pantry cabinets the Thursday before last and while he worked out how to get into them while they were still empty a week ago today, I had to rescue him because he couldn’t get back out once he let the door close on him.
Our cats have all been smart, in their own ways (it’s like talking about your children!)
But my favorite “smart thing” that one of our cats did:
We had three cats at one point, and they would be a little too rambunctious at night, so we would shut them in the basement at night–we also did this when we were opening the front or back doors for whatever reason, to keep the indoor-only cats from getting outside.
Over time, we noticed that one particular cat had a knack for escaping. It was our calico cat that had immigrated from Romania with friends some years back. We discovered that if we put her in a room and shut the door, she would eventually escape, but she never did her Houdini trick when we were watching.
We had to get to the bottom of this.
I set up my phone on a tripod in a room and left her alone for awhile. Eventually we found her outside again. When I looked at the footage, I saw her go up to the door and make two or three leaps to grab at the lever-style doorknob. Each time the handle would flip up and down a bit. On the final leap, the door unlatched and swung open and she scampered out. Very cool.
But we needed to be able to keep our kitties locked up–it took me an embarrassing long time to figure the simple solution: replace the lever with an ordinary round doorknob.
My wife found the same video. She bought one of those little white bells with paw prints on it and began teaching our gray mottled tabby to ring the bell for treats.
Now, she (the cat) goes up to the bell and rings it multiple times for each treat. And it never gets old.
We do put the bell away after she has had her fill.
It’s my theory that round doorknobs owe their existence to the existence of cats. Lever ones are easier for humans to handle, after all; but few if any cats can get a good grip on a round doorknob (I’ve seen a number of them try.) If cats historically had been good about shutting the door behind them (trying to keep them shut in is mostly a relatively recent development), it might well be lever handles that would be the standard.
I have 2, brother and sister (we couldn’t break them up). The male, Rudy, is inexplicably mean at times (he’ll let you pet him for a moment then attack). He also attacks his sister for no reason (I suspect it’s because he used to be smaller and he’s kind of a bully now. Rudy also doesn’t follow lasers or care about catnip, but that may be a kitty preference. May be dumb or just of average smarts.
Tilly is clever. She can open doors, cupboards and drawers (even those without handles) and pulls out my socks for no reason. She licks off the faucet and will paw at the handle (though I think it’s just to get someone to make it drip). She’ll also chase reflections and use the higher ground to attack her brother. Very troublesome when she opens a bag of dry cat food or pushes a container off the counter in order to eat it on the ground. She also climbs under my mom’s blanket when she’s sleeping and stay down there, which is just weird and not something I’ve heard of cats doing.
Once I figure out how to insert pictures from my phone I will flood you with them.
Is he attacking, or trying to start a rough wrestling game?
Those can look a lot alike. If his sister’s still friends with him, I’m guessing that it’s the latter; which is very common with male cats who are friends, less common with females who often don’t want to play that rough, especially when they’re no longer young kittens.
That’s a good point. He uses his claws where his sister doesn’t but she does give as well as she gets and they still snooze together, so you’re likely right.
I rescued Summer eight years ago after she had been living in the woods near my workplace for several months. I think she had lived in a house before because when I brought her in, she loved being inside. I kept her isolated for a few weeks and then started introducing her to my other two cats. They weren’t very happy about this but she was amazingly smart about it. When they would hiss or growl at her, she wouldn’t even flinch. She would sit there and look them right in the eyes. You could almost hear her: “hey, I got it, this is your house, that’s cool but I’m not leaving, now smell my butt”. She won them over in just a few days.
She won them over in just a few days.