I love cats and I like to read about them as much as I can.

And, I love to look up cat facts along with other things I don’t know about felines. But, sometimes there are things that you randomly find out about these adorable creatures that fascinate you even more!

In this blog post, I will answer the question, “What do you call a group of cats?” along with some other facts.

Let’s begin, shall we?

What Do You Call A Group Of Cats?

The correct term to use when you’re referring to a group of cats is ‘clowder.’

There are also two other valid ways to refer to a group of cats, other than just saying “group of cats” or “cats”.  Those other two terms are:

• clutter
• glaring

That’s not all, though.

If you want to refer to a group of wild cats, the correct term to use for it is destruction or dowt. When neutered, a male cat is called a gib, and if not, he is called a tom. Similarly, female cats are known as molly.

Did you know that the word “cat” itself derives from the Old English ‘Catt’?

Catt has its source in the Late Latin “catus”, meaning: “domestic cat”.

Some Interesting Cat Facts

In this section of the blog post, I would like to go through some interesting facts about cats. Let’s begin.

• Cats can’t detect sweet taste
• Domestic cats can run as fast as 30 mph
• Cats purr at around 26 cycles per second, which is about the same as an idling diesel engine
• The heaviest cat ever recorded was 46 pounds 15.2 ounces
• Cats can see quite well in light levels as little as 1/6 of what is required for humans to see well
• Domestic cats typically have a lifespan of around 12 to 14 years
• A female cat will often mate with several male cats while they are in heat.  This will often result in cats within the same litter having different fathers
• Unlike dogs, cats do not have a sweet tooth. Scientists believe this is due to a mutation in a key taste receptor
• The technical term for a cat’s hairball is a “bezoar.”
• Every year, nearly four million cats are eaten in Asia.
• While it is commonly thought that the ancient Egyptians were the first to domesticate cats, the oldest known pet cat was recently found in a 9,500-year-old grave on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus. This grave predates early Egyptian art depicting cats by 4,000 years or more.
• During the Middle Ages, cats were associated with withcraft, and on St. John’s Day, people all over Europe would stuff them into sacks and toss the cats into bonfires. On holy days, people celebrated by tossing cats from church towers.
• The first cat in space was a French cat named Felicette (a.k.a. “Astrocat”) In 1963, France blasted the cat into outer space. Electrodes implanted in her brains sent neurological signals back to Earth. She survived the trip.
• During the Middle Ages, cats were associated with withcraft, and on St. John’s Day, people all over Europe would stuff them into sacks and toss the cats into bonfires. On holy days, people celebrated by tossing cats from church towers.
• According to Hebrew legend, Noah prayed to God for help protecting all the food he stored on the ark from being eaten by rats. In reply, God made the lion sneeze, and out popped a cat.
• Cats are North America’s most popular pets: there are 73 million cats compared to 63 million dogs. Over 30% of households in North America own a cat.
• Approximately 40,000 people are bitten by cats in the U.S. annually.
• When a family cat died in ancient Egypt, family members would mourn by shaving off their eyebrows. They also held elaborate funerals during which they drank wine and beat their breasts. The cat was embalmed with a sculpted wooden mask and the tiny mummy was placed in the family tomb or in a pet cemetery with tiny mummies of mice.
• The earliest ancestor of the modern cat lived about 30 million years ago. Scientists called it the Proailurus, which means “first cat” in Greek. The group of animals that pet cats belong to emerged around 12 million years ago
• Mohammed loved cats and reportedly his favorite cat, Muezza, was a tabby. Legend says that tabby cats have an “M” for Mohammed on top of their heads because Mohammad would often rest his hand on the cat’s head.
• A cat’s brain is biologically more similar to a human brain than it is to a dog’s. Both humans and cats have identical regions in their brains that are responsible for emotions
• Some Siamese cats appear cross-eyed because the nerves from the left side of the brain go to mostly the right eye and the nerves from the right side of the brain go mostly to the left eye. This causes some double vision, which the cat tries to correct by “crossing” its eyes
• Spanish-Jewish folklore recounts that Adam’s first wife, Lilith, became a black vampire cat, sucking the blood from sleeping babies. This may be the root of the superstition that a cat will smother a sleeping baby or suck out the child’s breath.
• The ability of a cat to find its way home is called “psi-traveling.” Experts think cats either use the angle of the sunlight to find their way or that cats have magnetized cells in their brains that act as compasses.
• Two members of the cat family are distinct from all others: the clouded leopard and the cheetah. The clouded leopard does not roar like other big cats, nor does it groom or rest like small cats. The cheetah is unique because it is a running cat; all others are leaping cats. They are leaping cats because they slowly stalk their prey and then leap on it

Do you have any interesting cat facts that you would like to share with us? If so, leave them in the comments!