To add on to other’s stories- my cat will come and hop into my lap 100% of the times I call him, even on another floor, and I didn’t even train him to do this, he just really likes my lap.
Sometimes he does cute stretches on the way to me, or makes mrrps and other sounds to tell me he’s coming (and I assume ask if there might be treats, because one time he mrrp’d and I somehow remembered that there were treats that exact moment like two years ago) but yeah. Cats can come when you call them.
That’s really cute, especially the verbal communication. My dog would hop up onto the couch and just stare at me until I said “well, come on then”, and then he would throw his whole body down against my chest and cuddle. Pets are adorable.
i have found that my cat always comes running to me if i do a rising high pitched whistle
In public places, my late father had assigned a specific short whistle tune to each child to identify our location (he’d whistle and each of us would answer via specific tune in turn). It also worked as a “distress” or “attention needed” sound if we did it without prompting.
Thank you for reminding me of that!
I’m suspicious of this story because the cat came over. The cats awkwardness gene would have awakened and the cat would have become immediately aware of the awkwardness of the situation and would have known that the correct course of action is to stays put for maximum embarrassment.
Then demand feeding.
There is no way this story actually happened.
When I was a kid, I had a 90% success rate for getting my cat to come to me and hop up onto my lap.
Now, it would only work if my cat was in the same room, but it did work. Most of the time.
As my (comes 100% of the time when called) cat gets older, I suspect the amount of energy he’s willing to expend when I call will change his willingness to do so, and I’m prepared for and even welcoming of that day.
“I would like to pet you” does not necessarily override his comfort once he’s old enough that coming running might make his bones ache or interrupt a particularly nice nap.
I do have a little song I sing when he’s “missing” and I’m worried, which I trained him to come to (with wet food) when he was a teensy kitty and I would worry he had gotten lost in my home or wedged under furniture. I do it every once in a while as an “emergency” song, and I give him all the treats and affection and play fetch when he answers that one.
For your entertainment reader, the lyrics, which are nonsense (first thought up in a panic):
“I wish I had my kitty man,
So I could pet my kitty man!
And if I had a kitty man,
Then I would pet that kitty man!”
He usually arrives during the beginning of the third line.
This was also helpful the one time I accidentally shut him in a closet. I guess he got shut in and just decided that was a cue for a nap, but once I started singing he started howling and pawing loudly at the door.
50% percent of the secret to calling a cat is calling them when they want to come.
“I’d like to see a sunset… Do me a favor, your majesty… Command the sun to set…”
“If I commanded a general to fly from one flower to the next like a butterfly, or to write a tragedy, or to turn into a seagull, and if the general did not carry out my command, which of us would be in the wrong, the general or me?”
“You would be,” said the little prince, quite firmly.
“Exactly. One must command from each what each can perform,” the king went on. “Authority is based first of all upon reason. If you command your subjects to jump in the ocean, there will be a revolution. I am entitled to command obedience because my orders are reasonable.”
“Then my sunset?” insisted the little prince, who never let go of a question once he had asked it.
“You shall have your sunset. I shall command it. But I shall wait, according to my science of government, until conditions are favorable.”
One of my cats will come if I call them, the other one will sometimes come when I call them. All depends on the cat.
I had a cat which responded vocally with “mrrr” when hearing his name. Saying the name repeatedly had an 80% chance of summoning my cat, and a 20% chance that he would come running and jumping up into my hug. I loved that cat so much. Smart loving bastard who liked to also chew on my wife’s foot on her way to the bathroom at night, and lovingly hump his towel when he was bored.
I had two cats and both knew several words pretty well, like their names and “food”. There is no beast that comes at you faster than a cat when it hears a promise of food.
Who call their cat in a tone that could even been mistaken for cat calling? That’d be as creepy as cat calling…
Plot twist: the guy trained the cat for exactly this scenario.
