Anthropology

stalked Fluffy. The vet said that felines in general, whether domestic or wild, can be very calculating on the hunt. But Ember was play acting, not actually hunting, and she used planning to set up her games. It was like watching an imaginative human child playing make believe.

Ember is 1/4 Egyptian Mau. She does not have the Mau's spotted coat pattern, but she does have the body shape and many of the behavioral traits of a Mau. Their breed description says that, although they love the stimulation and company of interactive play, they also create their own games to entertain themselves.

She has one trait that is exclusive to Mau cats, called the "wiggle tail" in breed descriptions. When anticipating something that they really like, they raise their tail up and it vibrates from the base to the tip. It's as if their excitement is just too much to contain and they have to let it out somehow. Ember does this when anticipating interactive play with a favorite toy and also when anticipating food that she really loves. I usually give her dry kibble, but sometimes switch to canned Fancy Feast. Her favorite Fancy Feast flavor is a tuna/shrimp mix. The minute she gets a whiff when the can is opened, that tail starts vibrating.

So, since some traits of intelligence and emotional behavior are in the breed descriptions of dogs, cats, and birds, I wonder why people (including me) get surprised when animals show intelligence and emotional capacity. Are we just so accustomed to thinking of humans as the ultimate in smarts that we assume that animals lack those qualities?