My son has a yellow tabby short hair. He’s sort of an odd cat, which incidentally fits with my son. He’s always marched to a different drummer. For instance he named this cat Spring Heel Jack. Spring Heel Jack was a Victorian urban legend. Springy, as we usually call him, will lay on top of me stretched out and relaxed, slow blinking, or kneading his feet (all four) as happy as a cat can be. However, no matter what I have never heard or felt this cat purr.
It just struck me the other day, so I’ve been paying close attention, and no matter how relaxeed and content he is, he never purrs.
I had an orange tabby short hair as a child that never purred. I didn’t think it was weird at the time since it was my first cat, but all other cats I’ve had, mostly black short-hair cats, all purred when petted and content. My first cat was happy to lay on me while I stroked her stomach and she appeared to enjoy the attention and seemed quite relaxed. Now that I think about it, I don’t remember her really making any sounds whatsoever. Perhaps she was mute.
Some cats are like that. And sometimes they change, cats iz weird.
My current cat didn’t purr much his first few years here. His brother purred an awful lot, you could hear him from several feet away. But after the brother died, the current cat started purring a lot more. I figure he thought his brother had it covered, but then he had to step up a bit.
He still doesn’t purr as much as his brother did, though.
My granddaughter, COTU#2, has a cat who seemed purr-less. I was mourning the fact, because he is an exceptionally affectionate, and one of the main reasons for my cat love is my addiction to the purr.
Everyone told me, “Oh, he purrs, he just sounds differently than most cats.” Since I can’t hear worth a damn, I figured I was doomed to miss out on enjoying his purr.
I started to pay more attention to him when he would jump up in my lap and demand attention. And then I realized: he doesn’t have a standard purr. He hums!
My brother thought Raymond, our tuxedo/tabby cat never purred. But Ray actually does purr, it’s just very quiet. You have to put your ear up to his torso to hear it unless he meows mid-purr.
So maybe your yellow tabby is just not ostentatious about his purring.
My cat has a very very very quiet purr.
You cannot hear it–you have to feel it. When I pet her under her chin and neck, I put a finger against her throat, and can feel her vibrating .
Indeed. Our previous cat, Kola, was very vocal – he’d meow all the time, and had a big voice. But, when was happy, even though it felt like he was purring if you touched him (i.e., he was vibrating), you couldn’t hear a purr. But, as he got older, his purr became at least somewhat audible.
In contrast, the first cat which we had (prior to Kola), who was named Mercury, had an extremely loud purr…but, when he opened his mouth to meow, no sound came out.
Necco was a small cat with a small voice and the tiniest inaudible whisper purr. It was only aidible if you were listening to her breath right at her nose.
Well, he purred today. He was kneading me, again, and I stroked along his side on his ribs. I could feel vibration. Still couldn’t hear it. I wanted to to check is throat and nose but he decided he was done. And that is that with him.
I have two cats.
The older cat Diana, purrs but very very quietly, almost inaudibly,
The younger, Pelusa Wakako Carpinche Nimué Nonna Pocacosa, can be heard from afar.
Yeah; the cat may be purring, but so quietly you can’t hear it. Try feeling his throat while he’s kneading and happy (@Sylvanz) – though as you say you can’t feel him purr, maybe you’ve already tried that.
Having said that: cats vary a lot. But they have multiple ways of expressing happiness, comfort, and enjoying contact with humans; and yours is showing several of them. If he’s not purring at all, I wouldn’t worry about it. Every cat must do something different from what most cats do, after all; maybe this is his Cat-Required Difference.
I’m not sure whether that’s the “comforting-myself purr”. Years ago, I was visiting a significantly older sister who had recently had a baby. While I was there, one of her cats produced kittens – and, while doing so, kept saying "purrr prrrr prrrr (contraction) Yowl! purrr prrrr prrrr (contraction) Yowl! purrr prrrr prrrr (contraction) Yowl! " And my sister said that that was exactly how she’d felt while in labor.
There may have been sound outside your range of hearing. Cats can hear higher frequencies than humans can. Some cats realize that humans can only hear their lower voices (or just tend to meow in lower voices anyway); some cats with high voices never figure it out.
That’s your younger cat. She is way more vocal than our older cat, both in time spent making noise and in sheer range of sounds: chirps, brrs, mews, meows, and other sounds I can’t describe. She’s a real chatterbox but she doesn’t audibly purr at all. If I lay my thumb on her throat I might feel a vibration but that’s it.
My older cat either just makes a loud “Meow!” or hisses (usually at her annoying sister). But she sounds like an outboard motor when she’s laying on the couch next to you getting her pets in.
We have a 13 YO cat that purrs but up until a few years ago never vocalized at all. Now she frequently “sings” when she is alone in a room. It sounds like she is gargling broken glass. (It’s a disturbing sound)
My older cat for about the first 3 years of his life rarely purred, and I could’ve counted on one hand the number of times he sat on mine or anyone’s lap. Now he does both to an obnoxious level. Cats are weird.
Our new cat, Nina is like this-- so loud and so talkative, I think she has to have Siamese or Oriental shorthair in her background. But her purr is very subtle. I can’t hear it at all, just feel it in her throat, and that only barely.
My cat Summer never talks when she is in the room with me. But she talks up a storm if she is in another room. She especially likes talking to the doorway between the living room and hall. I have no idea what she is on about.
