{"id":1480,"date":"2016-09-08T04:37:25","date_gmt":"2016-09-08T12:37:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/?p=1480"},"modified":"2016-09-08T04:37:25","modified_gmt":"2016-09-08T12:37:25","slug":"thoughts-for-thursday-cats-that-hoard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/?p=1480","title":{"rendered":"Thoughts for Thursday \u2013 Cats that Hoard"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AlyzayBirthday3Yesterday we covered cat hoarders. Today, I want to talk about something a little lighter\u2014cats that hoard. This was a fun study. Made me smile. I found cats that steal and hide chap stick, one that takes the dog\u2019s toys and surrounds her food bowl with them, one that hides wads of paper receipts under the bed and a cat that steals and delivers socks to its owner. I discovered cats that hoards bottle caps and even Christmas ornaments\u2014glass ones and not one is found broken. One cat was found to have hidden dozens of pens, nail polish, rubber bands, small containers of hand sanitizer, lipstick, a quarter, and candy under a sofa. There are cats with fetishes for rings off milk jugs, straws, wads of tin foil, and even crayons<\/p>\n

Why do they do that? One theory is that it\u2019s handed down in their DNA as a survival \"LilySock\"technique\u2014they\u2019re imitating the practice of catching prey and bringing it back to the nest or cave for future meals. Some think it has to do with mothering instincts\u2014the items they hoard, in other words, represent imaginary offspring. Some cats bring items to their person. In appreciation? Because they believe it\u2019s prey and we don\u2019t know how to hunt? It is thought that those that are attracted to shiny objects or a particular item\u2014such as hair ties, jewelry, etc., and they hide these treasures, it could be an obsessive compulsive disorder.<\/p>\n

In the Klepto Cat Mysteries, Rags takes things\u2014all variety of things that interest or delight him\u2014and he generally hides them. Sometimes he brings something important to his people. He has a main stash, but often something that goes missing will show up in a totally new, unexpected location, such as occurs in the latest story\u2014soon to be published.<\/p>\n

\"LilyToys\"I think most of you know that I patterned Rags, the kleptomaniac cat, partly after our Lily, who has a fascination for small stuffed animals and other soft toys. She has removed all of the stuffed toys and small dolls from the grandkids\u2019 toy basket. Her toy basket is overflowing now with stuffed things of all types\u2014an eagle, a moose, a hedgehog, baby possum, bears and more. Among the treasures she has claimed is our granddaughter\u2019s Dora doll. She scatters these things around the house, mostly along the route between my bedroom and my office. Often, she brings her toys or my slipper socks and drops them at my feet. And usually with a prrrrt<\/em> sound. Sometimes I find a toy mouse or spider or bird floating in her water dish. Is she trying to give it swimming lessons? Maybe she thinks it\u2019s thirsty.<\/p>\n

Would love to hear your cat hoarder or cat hoarding stories.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday we covered cat hoarders. Today, I want to talk about something a little lighter\u2014cats that hoard. This was a fun study. Made me smile. I found cats that steal and hide chap stick, one that takes the dog\u2019s toys … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1480"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1480"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1480\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1481,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1480\/revisions\/1481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matilijapress.com\/catscapades\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}