* "Mrs. Harris is adorable, she is also ferocious...." We are still not quite sure how Mrs. Harris came to be ours, but her name appeared in a dream. She is our wide eyed princess cat wearing her round Elizabethan collar. She even has little ear tufts and resembles "a small woodland creature," adds Rob. She has a perky trot, with head held high, like a Pomeranian dog.
Sand Cats and Other Cats
Who are the Sand Cats? Sand cats are small Sahara desert cats also found in the Middle East. Sand Kittens may show stripes on their legs or black spots. Adults are usually orange or sand color. The first domestic cats may also have been orange. Sand Cats have large ears like foxes, huge fountains of feeler whiskers, and little flat faces. Sand cats dig burrows or find den shelters. They are nocturnal hunters to avoid the dry desert heat. Sand Cats eat insects and small lizards. Mrs. Harris eats small amounts of food at a time. She borrows under her orange and black blanket decorated with bears and tree patterns and becomes invisible. Mrs. Harris is a small burrowing animal. When she lies with her head upside down, her ears flatten out, and her smiling expression is quite like a sandcat.
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| Zar |
Our first Sand Cat
Zar was a giant among cats, weighing twenty-four pounds and sporting white Zar boots and a handsome face blaze painted on a fox-red coat. Zar had a sense of humor. For example, he adopted paper grocery bags. Every afternoon, he entered the kitchen, opened a cabinet door on the bottom shelf, and jumped in to inspect his bag collection. It was Zar's adopt-a-bag program. ** Zar also liked to sit on top of our car, rule and survey his territory the way a Elsa, the lioness, lounged on a land rover in Africa.
Zar dug out his water like Sand Cats! He poised over his water bowl, and pawed around the bowl, then drank his fill similar to a Sand Cat digging in the sand to get water.
Years Later golden Sancat got his name by digging his water again. So far we have only observed orange cats digging water, but since there are plenty of mixed genes, it wouldn't surprise me to see a dark tabby do it as well. Smart Sancat learned how to open the sliding screen patio door with his paw after watching us open it. Sancat stopped digging his water after he saw me refill the bowl in the sink. This upset him greatly since he had made it a point to dig out all of the cats' water bowls every morning. He was disappointed to notice the bowl was refilled in the sink, not by digging. When he is really thirsty after coming in from outdoors, he will still dig his water.
The domestic cat is thought to be a mixture of several species of African Wild Cat. Our Chessie was a good example of a cat of the Nile, a brown and gray tabby mix. She ruled her subjects like the Queen of Egypt. She even looked Egyptian with her regal profile, slim frame, and emerald eyes. We can easily picture Chessie wearing golden earrings and jeweled collar of a temple cat.
Sasha, Sancat's sister, is a dark tabby with a leopard build and personality. Sasha has a short thick tail, unlike Sancat's long Cheetah tail. We can see in Sasha a sleek seal-like animal or an ancient Triceratops as she swings her tail like a weapon. Sasha has very tiny feet to support a stocky muscular body. Tom, our wolf-like gray four-square built athletic cat sports black rings on his tail plus a white tail tip like the wild Cheetah. Regal Tom's face and body resemble a Cougar. Sancat and Sasha have several rows of round Cheetah Spots on their flanks plus spots turning into Tiger stripes on their sides. Interestingly, small wild cats and Cheetahs developed in separate genetic lines lines about eleven million years ago. Larger cats like Lions, Tigers, and Cougars developed later by branching off from the already developed small wild cats.
The cat puts down its paw with weight on center of foot first, then after testing the ground for stability, the cat shifts its weight fully onto the foot, much like weight shifting during Tai Chi practice. A mother cat trains kittens to hunt. Their reflexes are much quicker than their mom's, but she has lessons of wisdom and skill.
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** "The cat is a Tai Chi Master," Jou, Tsung Hwa
Reigning Cats and Dogs
Related Posts:
*Welcoming Mrs. Harris (How Did Mrs. Harris Find Us?)
The Little Chessie That Could
Escape Artists
Silver Stars and Moonbeams
Picture Perfect Catching Up
Intuitive Teachers Fully Present
Stars and Snow, Spirit of Phoebe Mrs. Harris provides the clue to painting Phoebe's portrait.
Resources:
* Shirley MacLaine is an actress, author, and mystic. Welcoming Mrs. Harris was accepted for publication on Shirley's web site, Pet Pages, Archived Stories, 2002. Mrs. Harris' story reprinted with permission from Shirley MacLaine and Team, July 2011 on Out of the Blue
Jou, Tsung Hwa, Tai Chi Master, author, mathematician, The Tao of Taijiquan, The Tao of Meditation
Photos
Portrait of Mrs. Harris at 1 year, photo by Paul, published with permisson
Zar, photo by Dahlis
