chirps and hoots

[serena_p]

I know that indoor cats often chirp when they look at prey, but does anyone have cats that use chirps as their primary form of communication? My two cats chirp or hoot (I've been told they sound like owls) all the time. Misty especially likes to walk up to you as if she wants to be stroked, then when you're about to touch her she chirps and runs away.

I've looked in cat books but I've only found the explanation listed above. I'd like to think they don't consider their parents prey. Is this a fairly common behavior, or do I just have nutty felines?

 

[arlyn]

My new Siamese rescue only chirps, she sounds like a momma cheetah in miniature

 

[serena_p]

That sounds cute.

I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one with "chirping" cats.

 

[winwin]

Our Bobcat, the manx we lost about a year ago (it STILL hurts) would sit on the couch arm next to the window and "hunt" the bird feeder outside the window and he would "chirp", or "tweedle" when a particularly tempting morsel would land on the feeder. Our two indoor fuzzies, Grey, a stumpy manx and Boots, a holstein DSH will "chirp" at each other and then bolt away like they are "ghost busting" or something. Boots also has the habit of making a sorrowful moaning howl right before he hurls, thankfully giving us time to grab a newspaper and get it under him before he blesses the carpet with another hairball.

Leonard

 

[serena_p]

This may sound silly, but until J.D. and Misty I've never had cats. What exactly does a hairball look like? I found something on the floor the other day that resembled a used SOS pad, but I wasn't sure if that was it.

 

[arlyn]

It varies, and I'm sorry to sound gross, but mostly they look like turds in a puddle of stomach fluids

Long in my case because my longhair expells and backs up at the same time.
Your used SOS pad is a fairly apt description.

 

[random]

I've owned cats for most of my life and never experienced cat chirping until I got my Siamese mix (noisiest cat in the world

). He likes to sit on the windowsill and bird watch. Then, he'll just chirp chirp chirp away when a bird lands on the lawn. I was wondering why the heck he did this until now. Thanks for the info! *chuckles*