I happened upon an old but “new” article today about feline vocalizations. If you’re a cat owner, I think you’ll enjoy reading this article about a Cornell University study that found that though cats lack a language – one word, MEOW, does not make a language – they still know how to get humans to do what they want. I can attest to that!

Here is an excerpt:

“No matter what we like to believe, cats are probably not using language,” says Nicholas Nicastro, a self-described cat person who has documented hundreds of different feline vocalizations in the common house cat (Felis catus ) and its ancestor, the African wild cat (Felis silvestris lybica ). His study, which he will describe June 5, 2002, at the 143rd meeting of the Acoustical Society of America, in Pittsburgh, “shows that some very effective cat-to-human communication is going on,” he says. “Though they lack language, cats have become very skilled at managing humans to get what they want —- basically food, shelter and a little human affection.”