CLAIRE BESSANT

EVERYTHING YOUR CAT WOULD WANT YOU TO KNOW
DO YOU KNOW what makes your cat tick – what motivates it to behave as it does?
With behaviours developed and honed over millions of years to produce a highly skilled hunter and adaptable survivor, how has the cat managed to slip into the role of man’s top companion without actually compromising any of its instincts?
What goes on beneath that beautiful exterior – would understanding the secret life of the cat enable us to make sure it is happy living alongside us?
Actually, we put a great deal of pressure on our pet cats in our modern lives, trying to keep a largely asocial animal with others of its kind, often without access to outside or with it having any understanding of its motivations.
We live in cities where the density of cats must cause them great stress and we expect them to take on our human frailties of needing to be needed.
We are breeding cats which have inherited problems, are failing to socialize them in early life and expect them to live with however many other cats we decide we want to have around. Our attitudes and demands are a real challenge to the adaptability of the cat and it is a credit to its flexibility that so few problems do occur and most cats and people live very contentedly together.
This book is a combination of two of my favorite books – Cat Whisperer and What Cats Want.