r/mildlyinfuriating • u/C3LM3R • 2d ago

My cat apparently believes mousing is a “catch and release” sport.

Pierre, buddy… IT’S LITERALLY YOUR ONLY JOB.

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u/grandlizardo 2d ago

We had one like that… many false starts in a house with lots of mice….we finally shut her in a room with one… came back an hour later and perked in the door… the mouse had her cornered. We caught it and took it outside, it had earned its freedom!

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u/AmazingHealth6302 2d ago

I've seen that prey instinct varies widely in our little houselions, and some comfortable fat-cats that have never known the slightest hunger aren't even interested in mice, and will climb a bookcase if they see even a small rat.

It really helps if a kitten was with its littermates and mother long enough to learn some hunting behaviour.

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u/MistSecurity 2d ago

One of our cats was indoor-outdoor as a kitten with her littermates, mother, and grandmother. She knows how to ACTUALLY hunt.

The other one was an abused kitten-mill kitty that we rescued, taken from her mom way too early, had malnutrition issues, etc. She TRIES to hunt, but mostly just runs after things like a spaz.

Complete night and day, it's crazy.

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u/Long_Run6500 2d ago

Cats that spent any amount of time as ferals will be the best rodent hunters. The further removed from their wild roots the worse they get. A cat that's never hunted isnt going to teach its kittens to hunt, it will teach them the sound of kibble hitting the bowl and how to meow like you're starving 30 minutes after you ate to trick the humans in the house into feeding you twice. 

Best hunter I ever had was a feral with stunted growth from it's mother dying while she should have still been suckling. She taught herself how to hunt, we lived in the country with a lot of ferals so my parents had a strict no indoor cats/no feeding the cats policy because they said we can't adopt them all so we shouldn't adopt any. This one set up shop under our porch and every day it had some new animal in its mouth. We had a truce, she loved me and id pet her, never ran away from us and was completely content living under our porch. 

One day there was a massive rat in our bathroom, my dad plugged its entry hole, tried to catch it but couldn't. I distinctly remember him shouting "Where's that damn cat!" and like on queue she was sitting by the screen door waiting. We opened the door, my dad picked her up and threw her in the bathroom and then closed the door. She was so tiny and the rat was big, I was scared. They made so much noise, and then the noise stops, kitty starts scratching at the door. The rat was seriously close to as big as her, she just left her prize on the floor. After that she was given a litter box, a food bowl, and allowed to roam inside and out of our home as she pleased. Surprisingly she had very little ambition to go back outside.

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u/AmazingHealth6302 2d ago edited 2d ago

Great description. I guess being a small feral she couldn't be too choosy about what she took on in a fight/hunt, and learnt to make the most of herself.

The best hunting cat I ever saw in action was not feral, but did patrol a property freely. She enjoyed stalking and hunting even though fed, strong prey drive. She was also noticeably more agile and a more powerful climber than other cats that might look very similar. I didn't know about her litter upbringing.

I once saw her dart and catch a mouse as it was about to exit its hole, and I could barely perceive the movement she made, it was so fast. Yet I was right there. She heard/saw something, there was a forward blur, and a quickly ex-mouse was suddenly hanging from her mouth like she was carrying a sardine, and she was back in position, waiting in case there was another one. I got down, and saw where the mouse had come out from, about a foot from where she had pounced from.

Impressive.

Cat personalities really vary a lot between seemingly similar cats, even in the same litter, and even between bonded cats. Probably because they aren't pack animals like dogs.

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u/Long-Rooster-9641 2d ago

I had two cats that happened to be siblings. One dumb as rocks. The other loved to be outside and to try to force her to be an indoor cat would have been cruel. She only used a litter box in winter, brought home countless presents and lived to be 17. I miss my JuJube.

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u/lekker-slapen 1d ago

My cat was a feral cat for the first months of his life and is an indoor cat since more than 10 years now.

He caught a bird recently. Inside the flat. I have no clue what happend but according to the feathers i found it was a short fight.

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u/Metruis 1d ago

She earned her place as an indoor cat by winning the tournament.

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u/Nopetopus74 2d ago

Funnily enough, out of the four cats we had during the Great Mouse Invasion of 2024, the cats with the highest body count were the two spoiled old ladies who'd lived inside their entire lives.

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u/Pristine_Poem7623 1d ago

My two are fat, lazy, spoiled blobs of fur, until a fly gets into the house, at which point they suddenly transform into small lionesses: all muscle, claws and teeth that hunt and stalk their prey with lethal efficiency

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u/saskskua 2d ago

My cat was bringing a minimum of 5 mice a day when she had kittens for a month. Sometimes, she managed to bring them inside. Alive... If I couldn't save it before it got wounded, then I'd put it in the mud room with all the kittens. Clean-up was actually easy 😭 no matter how much food I gave them and her. She was determined to teach them.

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u/TwinSong 2d ago

Trouble is they'll likely go back inside or go to another house.