Didja Ever Notice

[Knothead]

Didja ever notice that house cats really hate metallic noises. Like clanging sheet metal and ice cubes in a tin cup.

But they seem to like the sounds from a harmonica.

Go figure. :unsure:

[CraigD]

Here’s my oddest cat sound sensitivity story.

 

I had a big black and white neutered male cat named Buffalo (so named in part because he liked to roll in dust). Like nearly every cat I’ve known, the sound of a vacuum cleaner terrified and put him to flight.

 

One day, I distractedly left the door to my garage shop open, and Buffalo wandered in and settled beside me as I was marking some wood before cutting it with a skillsaw. Certain that he would flee with perhaps more vigor than I’d ever before witnessed in him – despite using them for 4+ decades, the sound of a skillsaw still scares me a little – I looked over to see Buffalo lying drowsily within arms reach, barely twitching a whisker.

 

Another cat of my acquaintance was fine with electric guitars, but terrified by acoustics. He would also jump into the hole on a bass kick drum and refuse to come out no matter how much you hit any of the kit’s drums or cymbals, but if outside, would usually make himself scarce whenever anybody played drums.

 

Cat behavior never ceases to surprise me.

[niviene]

My cat goes absolutely bananas whenever a raindrop even slightly taps on the windows in the house. However, not only will she sleep in the sink, drink from and play in the faucet, and stand in the shower with me at times and endure those droplets and sounds, she will also lay on the back deck several feet from the running lawnmower, yawning and disinterested. I find this fascinating :)

[Vox]

Here’s my oddest cat sound sensitivity story.

 

I had a big black and white neutered male cat named Buffalo (so named in part because he liked to roll in dust). Like nearly every cat I’ve known, the sound of a vacuum cleaner terrified and put him to flight.

 

One day, I distractedly left the door to my garage shop open, and Buffalo wandered in and settled beside me as I was marking some wood before cutting it with a skillsaw. Certain that he would flee with perhaps more vigor than I’d ever before witnessed in him – despite using them for 4+ decades, the sound of a skillsaw still scares me a little – I looked over to see Buffalo lying drowsily within arms reach, barely twitching a whisker.

 

Another cat of my acquaintance was fine with electric guitars, but terrified by acoustics. He would also jump into the hole on a bass kick drum and refuse to come out no matter how much you hit any of the kit’s drums or cymbals, but if outside, would usually make himself scarce whenever anybody played drums.

 

Cat behavior never ceases to surprise me.

 

I´ll assume that the reason is; Cats are sensitive to single transient sounds and use them to locate accurately the source/direction/prey. If we create sounds which are "all over the place" and loud in volume, not nature like, cats are scared and confused. Cat´s hearing is evolved to locate prey from small audio clues /single detectable transients. Drums (inside of bass drum is "safer place for cat" due sound(s) pitch is low compare to outside of drums) skill saw, multiple unnatural metal transients are annoyance, too high in amplitude to cats and confuse them? Take into consideration that within the normal room there is very reflective surfaces normally which creates total "sound chaos" with high amplitude, multiple transient sounds bouncing within the room. And I´ll assume you have noticed how cat will direct his or hers auricle towards the assumed transient source to get better clue concerning the sound direction without moving they head.

 

http://www.jneurosci.org/cgi/reprint/18/6/2147.pdf

[Vox]

My cat goes absolutely bananas whenever a raindrop even slightly taps on the windows in the house. However, not only will she sleep in the sink, drink from and play in the faucet, and stand in the shower with me at times and endure those droplets and sounds, she will also lay on the back deck several feet from the running lawnmower, yawning and disinterested. I find this fascinating :D

 

 

Yes it is, for humans the clues and systems of the nature are many times too subtle or too large with long cycles to understand but. One can learn a lot when observing let´s says cats or dogs behavior in the premises :)

 

I want to include one of my own experiences: I was cleaning my car park which has a reflective wall and a sealing, there we motorcycle riding past with low rumbling noise from motor. My eyes were direction to the motorcycle and my back was towards the car park wall under the sealing. Rumbling sound reflected as an echo and altered sound characteristics within the car park.it "scared the hell out of me" goose bumps etc. After while I analyzed what the heck was my reaction and then I noticed that the sound came from my back and resembled big lions roar. It seems that we still have some subconscious reflexes from our past living within same surroundings with lions :ebomb: