did you know that there are some really major differences between male and female cats it's the Battle of both the Sexes and the century who will win in the Red Corner representing female cats we have Queenie who said in a recent press release that she's here to show her opponent who really runs the world girls and in the blue Corner bringing his top game for the boys is Tom who in a pre-match interview was quoted as saying meow and then rubbing his face against the interviewer's trousers still haven't got all the cat hair off so
we've had some strong words exchanged and we're ready to ring the bell in eight rounds from personality to hidden abilities it's time to decide who is best male or female cats but quickly before we start Queenie and Tom would like to send a quick thank you to all their friends over at feline Fanatics and ask that all their fans subscribe so that they can learn more about these wonderful animals round one affection what's the best thing about having a cat for a lot of us it's the cuddles how your cat shows you affection will definitely
vary more between individual kitties than between male and female cats but there are some traits that seem gender specific male cats will often be more physical about things head butting you to say hello rubbing themselves all over you jumping into your lap or trying to groom you when they play they'll often get kind of rough using their claws and teeth more than you their human Playmate might like but don't assume that your kitty is doing this to hurt you it's actually just a further sign of their affection they're getting over excited by the experience of
playing with their best bud and they're getting carried away and playing with you the way they would play with another cat female cats on the other hand will often be more subtle in their affections they might sit next to you on the couch but they might not actually Dain to sit in your lap they might follow you around the house but they won't be yowling for affection the whole time the way a male cat might studies show that female cats tend to be less interested in playing with their humans directly your girl might prefer to
wrestle with a catnip mouse or a feather wand rather than with your arm whether you consider this a good thing or a bad thing is probably very dependent on your pain tolerance interestingly this Dynamic is almost completely reversed for cats who haven't been spayed or neutered intact male cats will feel driven to roam as far away from home as possible searching for female cats to mate with their excess testosterone will often make them aggressive both with other males and sometimes they're humans female cats who are in heat meanwhile tend to get super clingy partially because
going through heat is just generally a tough time for your kitty she'll likely be achy hormonal and unable to understand why she can't just go out and find a mate and a hug from their human friend is one way that they can cope with it the other reason is because female cats in heat feel a much stronger urge than normal to scent mark their surroundings because they need to advertise that they're in heat to any passing male since you're part of their surroundings this can often lead to your cat rubbing obsessively against you trying to
cover every part that they can reach with their scent however since most pet cats are fixed we have decided to go with Tom on this one the boys win this round round two territoriality Queenie would like to point out that one of the likely reasons that male cats are so much more affectionate with their humans is because they find it harder to form similar relationships with other cats Queeny Then followed this up with a personal comment about Tom not having any friends feral cats who don't have human owners have surprisingly clear gender roles female ferals
will often form colonies around a common source of food or shelter these colonies aren't exactly matriarchal in nature because no cat is going to acknowledge anyone as boss not even if they're another cat but they are matrilineal meaning that they're based around the family relationships between sisters and mothers and aunties male cats are allowed to stay in these colonies when and they're kittens but then get driven out once they reach a certain age these cats go on to form large territories that might overlap with the territories of multiple colonies of female cats and they guard
them viciously from other males feral male cats will sometimes have positive interactions with the female cats in these colonies aside from mating we mean and on rare occasions they might even step in to help with the kittens but when two males meet it will B basically never end well as a result if you own a male cat who is passed puberty then it's probably a good idea to wait until you've got them neutered before you start trying to introduce another boy to your household otherwise one or both cats are likely to interpret the other as
an intruder and act accordingly neutered males find it much easier to accept other cats but they frequently prefer the company of humans over their feline fellows when it comes to compatibility with other kitties female cats come out on top round three exploration Tom would like to issue a rebuttal to queenie's comments about feral cats although male cats who are out living in the wild don't generally spend a lot of time with other cats they do spend a lot of time exploring once puberty hits an unneutered male cat's mind is only on three things one girls
two girls and let's not forget get three girls unlike female cats who are only interested in finding a mate during the times of year that they are in heat male cats are ready to mate at any time when a female cat is interested in finding a boy she'll release a special feromon scent in her urine and in the scent glands on her body which to a male cat will act like a giant glowing neon sign saying wanted literally any man male cats will travel for Miles look for a whiff of this scent and as a
result tend to be a lot braver about traveling farther a field at home this tendency can cause even neutered males to be more confident about investigating New pieces of furniture in the home or scratching at closed doors if your little man is an indoor cat then they might spend more time trying to escape and explore the Big Wide World female cats meanwhile are often more cautious they don't need to move around as much when it comes to finding a mate because the boys tend to come to them and from an evolutionary perspective it's generally better
for them to save their energy moving around and taking risks uses up a lot of energy that could be better used for making kittens plus a female cat who keeps shifting territory and ending up in unfamiliar places where she isn't familiar with the dangers is more likely to end up in dangering any kittens she does have because she will find it harder to find a safe place to have them this isn't to say that female cats are cowards as Queenie is urgently jumping in to tell us they're just sensible adult male cats in the wild
will only ever have to look out for themselves and have no responsibilities besides that female cats meanwhile have to look out for not only themselves but for their kittens and if they live in a colony for their sisters and mothers and aunties taking risks is a lot less fun when you've got so many responsibil ities our judges sympathize with queeny's position but the fact remains when it comes to who is the best at exploring male cats take the prize round four hunting prowess cuddly and cute as they may be cats haven't always been kept simply
as house pets back in the day our four-legged friends had to work for a living if you can imagine such a thing Queenie and Tom's certainly can't the main job that these career kitties were hired to do was Pest Control back then communities would keep large supplies of wheat and grain in big storehouses to eat during the winter when no crops would grow if mice and rats got into the grain storage then that could be the difference between the community surviving the winter or starving to death and so cats were an invaluable help female cats
especially sorry Tom in fact the world record holder for the most mice caught by one cat in their lifetime was a female tortoise shell cat who lived at the Glen turret whiskey distillery in Scotland between 1963 W 1978 Tazer the Mouser caught an average of over three mice a day by the end of her life she was thought to have killed 2899 of them to get an idea of how many that is if you for some reason decided to place all of houses victims in a line from nose to tail then you would have over
2 mil of mice and a lot of explaining to do if anybody saw you doing it Tom would like to point out that there hasn't been any official research done on whether male or female cats are better at killing and although he's right there is a lot of anecdotal evidence to suggest that the girls are superior there's even a scientific explanation it's theorized that because female cats have to hunt not just for themselves but for their kittens and because they eventually have to try and pass those skills onto the Next Generation they naturally get more
practice as such our judges have decided this round goes to the girls round five social skills male cats may not be as good at mousing but according to Tom they are better at the house pet side of the equation despite their Posh off AR roaming which is more more of a problem for unneutered cats when they are in the house they're often much more keen to hang around their humans male cats might even follow their human from room to room going out of their way to check out what they're doing and trying to participate in
their activities female cats can also follow their humans around but are more likely to do it from a distance instead of trotting around at their human heels a female cat might prefer to find a nice high perch to sit on so that can watch their human from on high instead Queeny claims that this is called being sophisticated and that male cats by comparison are meddling busy bodies Our judges think that she might have a point but also that it's more fun to have a cat running around after you rather than sitting up high and Out
Of Reach as such they're giving the boys this round round six looks Queenie and Tom are both looking beautiful tonight in that old feline classic a fur coat cat coat colors are determined by genetics and although most colors are unisex some are gender specific Ginger is the most famous of these being generally thought of as a male color although surprisingly some of the more fashion forward female cats will often also sport this color coat here's the sciency bit Ginger fur is caused by a gene that is carried on the X chromosome which causes the umin
the pigment that causes black or brown coloring in the cat's coat to be entirely replaced by fom melanin red pigment if a cat has only Ginger jeans then they get a solid Ginger coat if they have the ginger Jean combined with a black or brown Jean then they end up with a coat that has patches of Ginger and patches of black or brown most male cats like Tom have only one X chromosome if that chromosome carries a ginger Jee then they get one copy and end up with a fully Ginger coat female cats Like Queenie
on the other hand have two X chromosomes in order for a female cat to be fully Ginger she needs to have the ginger gene on both her ex chromosomes since this would require her to have inherited the gene from her father and her mother it's significantly less likely to happen only 20% of ginger cats are female instead female cats with the ginger Jee are more likely to have a copy of the brown or black Jean on their other X chromosome resulting in a coat with patches of Ginger and patches of brown or black in other
words a tortoise shell cat these Tori cats will sometimes have a copy of a completely separate Gene that causes patches of white fur resulting in a Calico coat it is generally impossible for a male cat to have a tortoise shell or Calico coat The Only Exception occurs with intersection X cats whose chromosomes instead of having the typical male configuration of XY are instead xxy because of this almost all male calicos are infertile and unable to pass the genes on now we think that both our competitors tonight look positively stunning but since female cats have a
wider range of options in their wardrobe than male cats our judges have determined that Queenie wins this round round seven temper you might have assumed from all the talk of territoriality that male cats are the ones who are the most aggressive and you'd be right for unneutered males but when it comes to fixed cats at least according to popular opinion female cats are actually the feistier ones tortoise shells and calicos especially are stereotypically known for their tortitude the cutesy name for these pretty cats Tendencies to lash out when something doesn't go their way males meanwhile
tend to be calmer and more playful ginger cats especially are stereotyped as being incredibly friendly if a little hmbo at times studies so far into this phenomenon have not shown any meaningful difference in aggression between male and female cats but most of the studies conducted have also had a relatively limited sample size there are a few possible explanations for the popular idea that female cats are more aggressive one possibility is that it's a side effect of their being more social in general with other cats when you're living in a large group you need to be
good at getting on with others but also good at setting proper boundaries or it could be because female cats tend to be smaller than males and may feel the need to make up for their size by being more aggressive or possibly it's just a matter of self-fulfilling prophecy owners who have heard the stereotypes about male and female cats might subconsciously treat them differently according to their expectations this could then affect the cat's Behavior as a result Queenie would like to put forward the fourth explanation that male cats are annoying and female cats are only bad
tempered because they have to put up with them we are ignoring her the judges have come down firmly on the side of Tom and the mail cats for this round round eight problem solving when it comes to problem solving male cats tend to go for the brute force method the shortest Road between two points is a straight line and the simplest way to get something that you want if you're a cat is to either shove at it with your paws until it opens up or the preferred method for most kitties Screech at the top of
your little lungs until a helpful human comes over and opens it for you female cats however tend to be more self-sufficient and strategic in their approach they are more likely to stud study the problem from all angles until they've worked out the best offense they're much less likely to yell for human help as a first Resort although obviously they'll use it if they have to sometimes they might even choose to copy the humans if they're trying to operate something designed for humans like a cupboard door or a cat treat bag then female cats are more
likely to study what their owners do and try to copy that Queenie says that this is a sign of female feline intelligence while Tom claims that it just over complicates things our judges prefer queeny's method however not least because it involves much less screaming and so this round goes to the female cats the result at the end of our rounds the votes are in and it's a tie well that was something of a let down but at least we all learned some interesting things about male and female cats eh Queenie and Tom and they've both
settled down for a catnap the one thing that they definitely both have in common right while they're having a snooze why not check out this video on how to tell if your cat think you're an idiot Queenie and Tom recommended it specially
