Cats and mice are instincts, but more and more cats are gradually forgotten because they are pets, because now, cats are used more as companionship, and owners do not require cats to have the ability to catch mice. But as a wild cat, this is indeed a life skill and must be mastered. So how old should a cat start to catch mice?

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1. The skill of cats catching mice comes from mothers' teachings

Cats catch mice and eat mice as food, which is usually taught by their mothers. When a cat is a month old, the mother of the cat will eat the mouse it catches in front of the kitten, which is to let the kitten understand that mice are a delicious food. After the kitten grows to two months, the mother cat will bring the mice they catch for the kitten to eat. After tasting the delicious food, the mother cat will catch live mice for the kitten to play with. Gradually, the mother cat will not catch mice for the kitten to eat. When it is hungry, the mother cat will naturally catch mice.

If the pet cat is put in the wild, can he still catch mice?

However, cats nowadays leave their mothers very early and cannot learn the ability to catch mice with their mothers. In addition, there are few mice in cities now, so they don’t know that mice are delicious cats, so they naturally won’t catch mice. Even if you meet a mouse in your daily life, you may regard it as a friend to play for a while.

2. How old should a cat learn to catch mice?

Once the kitten's legs and feet are fully developed, it can begin to chase moving objects. At the same time, I exercised my physical strength and practiced how to seize the opportunity to fly and jump. When it gets a little bigger, the difficulty of "playing" will be upgraded. You can skillfully complete ambush, sneak approach, and finally jump up to capture the prey. If it is a wild cat, you can start real hunting at this stage. After experiencing many failures, you can learn perfect hunting techniques. This level can usually be reached 4 to 5 months after birth.

3. Can domestic pet cats learn to catch mice?

Even if cats raised by humans are kept outdoors, through some outdoor practices, they will catch some small insects at the beginning, and they can slowly catch mice and birds. However, if raised indoors, it will stagnate before the "try to real hunting" phase due to the lack of practical opportunities. If you are suddenly attacked by a mouse after you grow up, you will even be shocked: "What is this?!" Some cats will run away in fear. Recently, more and more cats have never seen mice in their lives. Cats like this have been continuing the game of suspected hunting, so they will never catch mice in their entire lives.

4. Cats that are difficult to move by nature

Now there are more and more stray cats. Many people catch the cats back and raise them by themselves out of a kindness to rescue them. Many times this method will give the cat a good life. However, most stray cats after adulthood cannot adapt to life with humans. They want to escape from such an environment. Rather than saying that stray cats like freedom, they have adapted to the wild environment and are more cautious, more lively, and more accustomed to hunting. This is an innate habit. Therefore, if you adopt stray cats, try to raise them from a young age and change their habits. Such cats can be more adapted to human life. www.xiupet.com

In fact, whether a cat can really catch mice has nothing to do with age. It is not that when a cat grows up, it will definitely catch mice. The skill of catching mice is learning when he was a child and continuous improvement after he grew up. Many owners believe that cats are instinct to catch mice, so if they put the cat back to nature, they will definitely survive well. In fact, this is not the case. Many kittens who have left their mothers since childhood have not learned the skills of hunting. In a natural environment, they may starve to death before they learn to catch mice.