The Cute Animal Pics/Videos Thread

[besleybean]

Isn't that just cats with everything?!

[Carol the Dabbler]

Remember the discussion about cats and boxes?

 

Wired has an interesting article - turns out cats may like boxes so much because they keep them nice and warm. Cats' comfortable temperature range seems to be above that of humans, and a small cardboard space is a good insulator.

Cats' normal body temperature is definitely a bit higher than ours, so it would make perfect sense that a comfortable room temperature for us would be chilly for them -- and our winter energy-saving thermostat setting would be even worse. Our cats like to lie in the sunshine on our enclosed porch, even on 95-degree afternoons when it's God-knows-what temperature in the porch.

 

I get why cats sleep/snuggle in boxes ... buy why the heck to they jump in, jump on, race through, chew up and generally make mayhem with boxes? :D

I've finally decided that with our cats, it's because they're psychopaths, and psychopaths get bored.  Seriously.  So we've started making a point of leaving out any boxes that we empty, at least for a few days.  They love it!

 

[besleybean]

My cat sat on or in anything that came in the house.

[Arcadia]

I had one that was obsessed with paper. Any piece of paper, no matter how big (newspaper) or how small (store receipt) -- if it fell on the floor, he immediately got up from wherever he was and came over and sat on it.

 

I had another one, that was his technique for catching mice. He'd wait for the other cat to drive the mouse in his direction, and when it ran his way, he'd sit down on it. The only problem was, he never had a clue what to do next. The little cat would be frantically racing about, trying to figure out where the mouse went, while the big cat just sat there, looking confused. Usually the problem was solved by me reaching under Mr. Big and grabbing the mouse myself.

[besleybean]

Thankfully my cat couldn't catch anything!

[SherlockedCAMPer]

Occasionally my brother's cat would sit on the comics as he and I were trying to read them.  "Um, thank you Blackie, but we're trying to read Garfield and you're covering up half the page."

[besleybean]

My cat used to sit on my dad's knee, whenever he sat down to read his paper.

She used to sit and flick her ears, every time the paper touched them!

[Bakerstreet Irregular]

Cats seem to be drawn to books, newspaper, computer screens, what ever is taking up their human's interest at the time, besides them. But anyway....to get a bit off subject. Someone just posted this to Facebook and I am a sucker for it. It is sssooo funny.

 

 

      

[T.o.b.y]

The cat we had when I was little used to like to sit on my toys. And woe to anybody who tried to move her. I got a claw right across my forehead once in an attempt to free a storybook. Blood dripped down my face and dropped off my chin onto the carpet, and what did my mother say? "I told you not to bother the cat". :lol:

 

Bless that old furry monster. I cried my eyes out when she died.

 

 

Spring is coming! I met one of these today, chirping happily in the graveyard. They are so cute:

 

[besleybean]

Love birds.

[Carol the Dabbler]

Spring is coming! I met one of these today, chirping happily in the graveyard. They are so cute:

 

 

What type of bird is that, T.o.b.y?  The red-winged blackbirds usually migrate back to our meadow the last week of February, but next week's forecast is all below freezing, so I wouldn't be surprised if they waited till early March this year.

 

Cats seem to be drawn to books, newspaper, computer screens, what ever is taking up their human's interest at the time, besides them.

 

But your actual intention is to interact with the cat, right?  So they're just trying to help.  :P

[Ruthyone]

Robin in the snowdrops........

[besleybean]

Cute.

[T.o.b.y]

What type of bird is that, T.o.b.y? 

 

It's a wren: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wren

[Carol the Dabbler]

Thanks!  We have wrens here too, but although they're closely related to yours, they're not the same species.  Cute li'l fellas!

 

[besleybean]

Yep, I love Jenny Wrens!

[Carol the Dabbler]

We call them that here, too   :D   even though they're technically House Wrens rather than Eurasian Wrens.

 

[Arcadia]

I love the wrens, they're so pert. And they pick the oddest places to nest sometimes. We had one build a nest in our barbeque grill; needless to say, we didn't do bbq for awhile! Another chose to nest in a rack of shelves where we kept garden supplies, even though there was a perfectly good wren house about four feet away.

[Carol the Dabbler]

Wrens used to (maybe still do) nest inside Mom's old, unused garage.  At least I assume they were nesting in there -- I used to see them fly in through a knothole (by holding their wings against their sides as they passed through).

 

And we once had a robin (an American red-breasted thrush closely related to the European blackbird, not the kind of robin that Ruthy posted above) nest on the top of a folded stepladder that was leaning against the side of said garage.

 

[besleybean]

Our robins are very friendly with humans...but horrible to each other!

[Carol the Dabbler]

I've never seen one of your robins, though I've looked for them when we're over there.  We see lots of blackbirds, magpies, various crows, various pigeons, various gulls, assorted waterfowl, and one kite -- but never a robin.

 

[Caya]

[Arcadia]

I love to watch (American) robins. Alas, we hardly have any here; not enough grassy areas, I guess. Lots of adorable chickadees, though!
 

[Bendydoodle Cantaloupe]

I see those around where I live, although not recently because lately it's all been below zero. Lots of cardinals too; I don't know how they camouflage so easily, they're all bright red!

[besleybean]

Is that what a chickadee is?

Much better name than our ' tit '.