That's a picture of my cat running up a tree. If you could pull back the camera a bit, you'd see me standing there with my arm in the air, holding the leash and trying to look like I'm in charge.
I'm not in charge.
If you're someone who also enjoys not being in charge, you might want to try the glorious pastime that is walking a cat.
What Its Like to Walk a Cat
The last time I was out with my cat, I met my next door neighbor for the first time. He seemed surprised. "I've never seen anyone walk a cat before." I looked down to see my panicked cat leaping in every direction possible to get away from this man and the leash. As the neighbor reached out to shake hands with me, my cat chose a direction and bolted, pulling me out of the handshake. "Well, this is why," I said, waving goodbye.
If you want this kind of interaction to be part of your life, you must be tenacious. Cats don't want to go on walks with you and may have to be persuaded sternly into enjoying this activity. My cat, for instance, has come to love going outside with his human. What he doesn't like is the harness. Or the leash. Or that someone is holding it. But other than that, he loves every aspect of going for a walk.
How to Walk a Cat
The first step in taking a cat for a walk is often the last step for most people and also why no one has bothered to invent cat parks.
The majority of cats, when placed in a harness, will protest this indignity with passive resistance. Do not pepper spray them. This only makes your cat a martyr in the eyes of other cats and strengthens the resistance movement.
There are two ways to get a cat to love the harness. The first is patience. Introduce it to him slowly, over several weeks, preferably when he's a kitten. Make it into a toy and use it to play with him. Let him drag it around and feel like he's the boss of it. When you put it on the first time, don't expect him to go anywhere. Let him get used to the feeling. Keep trying until it's no big deal.
Or you can go the easy route, which is to sincerely want your cat to lie down and not move. Make that your sole motivation for putting on the harness. If you do this, your cat will have no choice but to disregard the harness and go for a walk with you, especially if you're in your pajamas and would rather do anything else.
That's what worked for me. As much as I'd like to take credit for my cat's willingness to march around on a leash, what really went down was that he was a former stray, coping poorly with becoming an inside cat. It was the middle of the night, and he was literally pounding on the windows with his paws. I live in a fiveplex and was pretty sure the neighbors were going to show up with torches and pitchforks to demand I release the prisoner. Then I remembered the magic harness in the closet, and it's effect on any cat that wore it. I imagined my cat lying immobile on the floor while everyone in the building slept peacefully. It was a brilliant and devious plan. It didn't work.
Instead, when placed in the harness, my cat was like, "Excellent! Does this mean we're going outside?" Faced with no other choice, we went on our first walk at 1:00 in the morning. There was snow on the ground, and I may have been wearing slippers. But that was the last time he pounded on the windows, so maybe it wasn't such a bad plan after all.
Cats Vs. Dogs
Regardless of how you get your cat to accept the harness, this is only the beginning. You may think that soon you will be riding your bike with your cat running alongside you, panting with happiness. Nothing could be further from the truth. Do not get lulled into thinking that any animal on a leash will behave like a dog. A cat is not a dog, and if you treat him like a dog, you will find yourself being loudly berated in public by an angry, yowling creature, while people with actual dogs laugh at you.
There are a number of ways that cats don't behave like dogs, and it's best to be prepared for them before you go out.
First, dogs generally don't run up trees. A cat will run up a tree faster than you know what the hell happened. Also, I'm willing to bet that if a dog did this, he'd come down when you asked him. He would not hiss at your gentle, encouraging tugs on the leash. Nor would he settle in and take a nap while you wonder if there's any point to holding the leash anymore. Stay away from trees.
Dogs understand that walks are not really for their benefit, despite what they've been told. Walks are for human benefit. Dogs go where humans want to go, for as long as the human wants to go there, and they do it politely. If they slip up, humans shout, "Heel!" to remind them.
Cats don't understand this, and my cat in particular refuses to acknowledge it. We go where he wants to go for as long as he wants to go there, and if I slip up and forget, he hisses me into compliance. The leash allows him to show me all his favorite spots, so he tolerates that it restricts his movement to places where I can follow. But if I use it to suggest a new direction, or worse, that we go home, there's going to be a fight. I'd like to say I win these fights, but only if carrying a squirming, growling cat into the house is considered winning.
A few more things that cats will do that dogs don't. Refuse to stay on the sidewalk if a fence or other tall object is available.
Stop in the middle of the walk to take a leisurely bath.
Hide in the bushes from terrifying nice people who say, "What a cute kitty!"
My cat has also been known to try to ditch me by slipping through small openings or hopping over fences. On more than one occasion he has spent his entire walk lying on the ground eating grass.
Despite these things, walking a cat can be a rewarding experience -- once you accept that your presence isn't needed or, in most cases, desired. Plus, it's easy to do. Just decide that you really don't want to go outside, and let your cat do the rest.
A commemorative tower was built in Scotland for a cat named Towser, who caught nearly 30,000 mice in her lifetime.
My cat deserves a commemorative tower too. Who do I talk to about this? He hasn't caught any mice, but he's knocked at least 30,000 objects off my kitchen table.
A kitten will typically weigh about 3 ounces at birth. The typical male housecat will weigh between 7 and 9 pounds, slightly less for female housecats.
A cat can spend five or more hours a day grooming himself.
How many different breeds of cat are there? Can you name them all?
According to Hebrew legend, Noah prayed to God for help protecting all the food he stored on the ark from being eaten by rats. In reply, God made the lion sneeze, and out popped a cat.
But what are the names of all the cat breeds?
Howdy. Thanks, this is one of the funniest stories I've read in a long long while. Loved it. Plus, I knew your cat was a character, but this takes it to a new level. I assume he still bats everything off your walls and shelves whenever possible. They are such a joy, aren't they, no matter what the new day brings.
Bummer I missed this when it was 'out', as I haven't been on the site much for quite a while. Please make sure to comment back, at least with a (.), so I can vote for that. Don't like this 7 day thing, even if I'm only worth about .15.
Besides the photos, and the "trolling for dust-bunnies" gif is a classic. Now THAT"S a cat that doesn't want to go out for a walk. Have a nice weekend, what's left of it anyway.
Thank you for coming by and reading my post! :-D
My kitty is still up to his usual tricks. If you peeked through the window of my house, you'd see almost everything I own on the floor. He especially loves to knock all the mail off the table and then leap into it like a pile of leaves. My house is a mess, but I'm endlessly entertained.
I always enjoy your posts, keep them coming when you can. (We need a little siren to let us know when things of occasional nature arise, sometimes the feed gets too full and I miss such things. Double sigh)
Your kitty is a character, that's for sure. Never a dull moment. I'd love to see a video of the mailpile leaf-jumping. Classic. Whoever invented these little mouser's definitely had a sense of humor.
Yuan will kinda walk on a leash ...we meander in the courtyard of our apartment building in pretty much the same fashion as the rare occassion he bolts out the front door. He sniffs some doormats, looks down on the courtyard, looks out the side grate, and RUNS to go back home if another human or (gasp!) a DOG can be heard in the courtyard. I should post the video I took of the very first time I tried it, which was actually the most "walking" we've ever truly done without copious roll-around-on-concrete breaks. I tried taking him downstairs once thinking he would like the plants. No. He was like NO I CAN'T BE DOWN HERE I CAN ONLY LOOK DOWN ON THIS FLOOR IN REGAL DISDAIN FROM UPSTAIRS TAKE ME HOME. He then tried to drag me home but was completely lost. He took me to the door that would be ours if we were on the correct floor. I had to carry him back up. :)
Thanks for the great comment! It sounds like your kitty is a character too. I'd say we should walk them together sometime, but I envision lots of growling and spitting and running away, with very little walking. :-)
LOL, I agree with your prediction. He is quite a character!
Meow!!!
Thank you for the resteem! :-D
very cool :) ... will reread this next time I visit my sister who has a cat :)
Thanks so much for the resteem!
because I can't upvote your main post. I'm glad you had a comment available. You know cats!
Thank you so much for reading my post! :-)
"What a cute kitty!" Say I.
how "un-dognified!"
While many cats enjoy milk, it will give some cats diarrhea.
Congratulations @rebelmeow! You have completed some achievement on Steemit and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
Click on any badge to view your own Board of Honor on SteemitBoard.
For more information about SteemitBoard, click here
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOPCongratulations @rebelmeow! You have received a personal award!
Click on the badge to view your Board of Honor.
Congratulations @rebelmeow! You received a personal award!
You can view your badges on your Steem Board and compare to others on the Steem Ranking
Vote for @Steemitboard as a witness to get one more award and increased upvotes!