International Cat Day 2018: Interesting Facts And Photos Of Furry Felines

International Cat Day was observed for the first time on Aug. 8, 2002, when International Fund for Animal Welfare pushed to recognize and celebrate the common pet. Apart from it, National Cat Day is observed every year Oct. 29 in the United States and World Cat Day is observed Feb. 17 in much of Europe and on March 1 in Russia.

Here are 15 interesting facts about cats.

1. Cats can drink sea water as their kidneys can filter out the salt and use the water to hydrate their bodies. However, cats do not have a sweet tooth and cannot taste anything sweet.

2. There are 88 million pet cats in U.S., making them the most popular pet in the country. There are around 500 million domestic cats in the world.

Kittens tend to sleep a lot because their bodies release growth hormones only when they are asleep. By the time an average cat is 9 years old, it would have been awake for just about three years of its life.

4. Female cats are called “molly” and are mostly right-handed. Male cats are called “toms” and favor the left hand.

5. Cats' entire natural vocal range is not audible to human beings, and they tend to evolve their voice to communicate their feelings to humans within our hearing range. They can make over 100 different sounds, which is 10 times more than dogs.

6. A cat named Stubbs was the mayor of Talkeetna, Alaska, for 15 years. Another cat also ran for the position in a Mexico City in 2013.

7. While the world's largest known cat measured 48.5 inches in length, the smallest was only 2.75 inches.

8. The world’s oldest cat was found in a 9,500-year-old grave on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus . It is said that when a pet cat died in Egypt, family members would mourn by shaving off their eyebrows. Also, smuggling a cat out of ancient Egypt was punishable by death.

9. The largest litter ever produced in the world was 19 kittens, of which 15 survived.

10. Around 300,000 mummified cats were found in an Egyptian cemetery in 1888. They were stripped of their wrappings and sent to U.S. and Britain to be used as fertilizers by farmers.

11. A cat’s brain is somewhat similar to that of humans, with identical regions that are responsible for emotions.

12. Cats can jump up to five times their own height in a single bound and run at speeds of over 30 miles an hour.

13. A cat can move its ears 180 degrees and can also move both ears separately.

14. A cat rubs against people to mark out its territory with scent glands around its face and it also licks itself to get a person’s scent off.

15. Black cats are considered good luck in the United Kingdom and Australia but thought of asbad luck in United States and India.