Cat breeds,Cat Senses and Cat Anatomy

The night vision of cats is six times greater than human beings. For function of vision, Cats have more nerve cells in their brain as compared to human beings and all other mammals. Cats also have about three times more rods in their eyes as compared to human beings so they can see better than human beings in dim light. Cats have Peripheral vision and binocular vision which enables it to accurately judge large distances. Eyes of cats have a additional third eyelid or nictitating membrane which is a thin fleshy membrane that is usually tucked away at the inner corner of the eye. The third eyelid helps in protection and cleaning of eye. Cats have highly developed sense of touch. The skin of cats is covered with highly sensitive touch spots which respond to the lightest pressure. Ear of cats can rotate up to 180 degrees in order to locate and identify even the faintest of squeaks, peeps and rustling noises. Ears of cats have twelve muscles.Domestic cats possess some colour vision.Cats sense of hearing is one of the highest in animal kingdom. Hearing power of cats is about three times greater than human beings. Hearing power of cats is about two times greater than dogs. Cats can hear sounds of upto 65kHz and dogs can hear sounds of upto 30kHz. There are more than forty thousand nerve fibres present in the auditory nerve of cats as compared to human beings having about thirty thousand. Sense of smelling in cats is highly developed. Cats have fourteen times more smelling power than human beings.The cats have additional smelling organ known as jacobson's organ besides having nose. The jacobson's organ is located in the upper surface of a cat's mouth. The sense of taste in cats is as developed as sense of smell.The taste buds are present in tongue of cats.Cats prefer salty and sour tastes more than sweetness and bitterness. The tongue of cats is covered with hooklike rough protuberances or papillae, that it uses to rasp meat from bones and to groom itself. Out of all domestic animals, only cats have true furs. Cats have both undercoat fur and outer fur. The fur of cats are warm, soft, shiny, silky and of various lengths depending upon breed of cat. The cats can have upto two hundred hairs for every square millimeter on their body. There are more than hundred breed of cats. There are about forty internationally recognized breeds of cats which differs mainly in their personality, intelligence, coat colour, coat colour pattern, body size, ear size, ear shape, nose size, eye colour, tail length, tail shape, thickness of tail, fur length, face shape and eye shape. Out of all cat breeds, the Persian breed of cats have longest and thickest fur.The coat of Russian Blue cats is blue coloured. The Manx breed of cats do not have a tail. The largest breeds of domestic cat are Ragdoll and Maine Coon. The Siamese breed of cats is exceptionally more vocal.The Maine Coon breed of cats looks somewhat like a Raccoon. The American Curl breed of cats have ears that curl away from the face. Many cat encyclopedias are now available at http://www.amazon.com/. Cat Encyclopedias like Catlopedia, The Ultimate Encyclopedia Of Cats, Cat Breeds and Cat Care by Alan Edward, The Encyclopedia of the cat by Michael Pollard and The cat - A Complete Guide by Claire Bessant are now available at http://www.amazon.com/.Cats are free from many skeletal abnormalities that can affect dogs. All cats have flexible spine. The cat's body has great elasticity. Because the vertebrae of the spinal column are held together by muscles rather than by ligaments, as in humans, the cat can elongate or contract its back, curve it forward, or oscillate it along the vertebral line. A cat uses its tail for balancing while jumping or falling. All cats have an excellent sense of balance, which enables them to leap and pounce with ease. Several spongy pads of thick skin cover the bottoms of a cat's feet. The pads cushion the paws and enable a cat to move quietly. Cat hunts and kills birds, rats, mice, insects, rabbits, frogs, squirrels, lizards, snakes, fishes, cockroaches and other small animals. Cats are most skillful hunters out of all other animals. A cat usually hunts alone instead of hunting in groups because hiding and pouncing cannot be successful in a group whereas dogs always hunt in groups.Cats also have a keen sense of balance and can easily walk along the tops of narrow fences or along narrow ledges.All cats are excellent fisherman. Cats can be used as catchers of fish. Cats run faster than any other animal. A domestic cat can run at speeds of upto thirty miles per hour. Cheetah run faster than any animal. Cheetah can run at speeds of seventy miles per hour. Cats are also excellent swimmers. Some cats can do swim for pleasure and some cats specially the tiger swim for long distances. All cats walk on the tips of their toes, not on the soles of their feet. The Giraffe and Camel are the only known animals that walk on the tips of their toes similar to cats. Cats are sleepiest of all mammals. A cat sleeps for sixteen to eighteen hours in a day.Whiskers are long straight hairs that protrude from the lips of cats. The whiskers are sensitive to air currents. Whiskers or vibrissae are delicate sensitive organs of touch equivalent to fingertips of human beings. Whiskers may help catch reflections of sound, thus serving somewhat the same function as antennae do in other animals.Cats have about twenty four movable whiskers, twelve on either side of their nose. Small groups of whiskers are also situated on other parts of the body as well such as on the outer edges of cheeks, above the eyes and on the back of the front legs.The useful websites related to cats are
http://directory.google.com op/recreation/pets/cats, http://www.petplace.com/ , www.pbs.org/nature/excats, http://www.i-love-cats.com/, http://www.thecatbasket.freeserve.co.uk/,www.nhm.org/cat.For information about cats visit the website of animal planet channel cat guide at http://animal.discovery.com/guides/cats/cats.html. For more information on cats visit the website of Encyclopedia Encarta at http://www.encarta.msn.com/,visit the encyclodedia Aniwa at http://www.aniwa.com.