MVnumb

16/11/2021

Why do cats knead with their paws?
Do you ever see your cat shifting his front paws back and forth just before settling down for a nap? Have you heard some cat lovers talk about their feline friends “making biscuits” or “kneading dough”?

Scientists who study cat behavior call this distinctive paw action “kneading” and believe it to be a sign of a relaxed cat. My own cats knead before taking a nap near me. While they are kneading, they purr – one of them gets so relaxed, he sometimes drools. Kneading usually occurs near a favorite person.
As a veterinarian, I think it’s important to recognize the little moments your cat is telling you she’s happy to be near you.

Kneading in kittens
If you’re ever around newborn kittens, you will see kneading pretty quickly after birth. A kitten kneads on his mother’s abdomen as a way of telling her he is hungry and ready for her milk.
At the same time, the kitten usually purrs, which is a sound created by rapid vibrations of certain throat muscles. Purring is a signal for attention.

Using these two behaviors, kittens are asking their moms, also known as queens, to remain still so they can continue suckling. Young kittens usually fall asleep while suckling.

Kittens stop drinking their mother’s milk by about two months of age. So why do cats continue to knead as adults?

Ready to relax
Kneading seems to be more common in some cats than others. If your cat doesn’t knead, it could mean he is a little stressed – or it could just be that your cat doesn’t display relaxation or affection in that manner.

But many cats do continue kneading into adulthood. It’s pretty safe to assume a cat who is kneading is feeling calm, content and ready to settle down, just like a kitten settling in to suckle and sleep.

You may already know that when your cat bunts, or butts his head and rubs his cheek, head and body against your leg or an object near you, he is putting his scent in these locations. Cats also have scent glands between their toes, prompting some people to suggest that cats are also putting a familiar, comforting scent on their sleeping area when they knead.

Don’t bother to look for these glands on your own cat. They are not easily visible.

16/11/2021

Many of us want to take our dogs on public transport, but others shudder at the thought — what’s the solution?
We’ve been looking at the ways people travel with dogs and what it says about attempts to shift towards a more sustainable and healthier transport system. Our research first established that trips with dogs in Australia are both common and car-dependent. This is because Australia has some of the highest rates of dog ownership in the world but we are relatively unusual compared to other countries in that we restrict people taking dogs on public transport.

We are interested in how this situation might be changed. Our recent research explores why some people might not want dogs on public transport, and how these concerns can be managed.

This research, published in the International Journal of Sustainable Transportation, reports the results of an analysis of 163 comments made on a Conversation article about dogs on public transport. About 40% of comments supported the idea. A similar proportion expressed disapproval.
The trouble with dogs
Many of the negative comments included simple statements about the smell of dogs. Others referenced more complex concerns such as hygiene and disease.

Several focused on the impact on people with allergies to dogs. These comments often pointed out that the rights of people with allergies and of those who do not like dogs should take precedence over the rights of dogs and dog owners.

Some comments referred specifically to concerns about the operation of the transport system. They raised issues such as the increased cleaning workload for facilities, the need to replace upholstery more regularly, as well as concern about who would pay the costs of accommodating dogs on public transport.

There were several passionate comments about dog attacks. Statements that dogs are dirty and dangerous often either implicitly or explicitly referenced the notion that dog owners cannot be trusted to control, or minimise the impact of, their dog.

Many claimed that canine and transport contexts are different in Australia, suggesting a policy that works in, for example, a European country would not work in Australia. Sentiment that Australia is somehow “behind” countries in Europe often underpinned these comments.

Read more: Australians love their pets, so why don't more public places welcome them?

We need to listen to objections, but there are solutions
Many of the comments contained opinions that were obviously posted with some emotion. Dogs are, indeed, a polarising issue. This polarity reflects the common perception that there are “dog people”. Policy change proposals must consider the opinions of those who support pets on public transport and those who don’t.
Our analysis, however, does provide several reasons Sydney’s public transport agencies should consider a policy to allow dogs to travel on public transport.

First, negative comments were more likely to demonstrate unfamiliarity with the operational details of a policy that permits dogs to travel on public transport. For example, physical separation of those travelling with dogs could overcome many of the concerns about smell and even allergies. This separation is easily attainable on trains and also possible on buses.

Similarly, concerns about payment could be resolved by ensuring a ticket must be bought for dogs prior to travel, with the fare based on the cost to the system. This may also go part way to alleviating the sense that allowing dogs on transport is a clash of rights between dog owners and non-owners.

Third, negative comments suggesting Australia’s dogs and dog owners are somehow less responsible than their European counterparts are not supported by empirical evidence. Positive local experiences of travelling with well-behaved dogs could soften negative perceptions.

16/11/2021

COVID variants: could dangerous new ones evolve in pets and farm animals?
People have been panicking about COVID-19 in animals since the very start of the pandemic. There’s now plenty of evidence that SARS-CoV-2 – the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 – can cross from humans into other animals. This is known as spillback. The virus is capable of infecting a range of species, from hamsters to gorillas.

Reassuringly, the vast majority of animals do not get as seriously sick from an infection as humans do. Also, at present there are very few documented cases of animals then transmitting infection back to humans. But a new concern is now being discussed: what if SARS-CoV-2 could be replicating unnoticed in animals and mutating? Could new variants emerge that can reinfect humans and create more havoc?

SARS-CoV-2 has been evolving in humans throughout the pandemic, resulting in many new variants arising, and there are two factors that appear to have helped variants emerge. First is the vast number of infections in people worldwide, as the virus has the chance to mutate every time it reproduces. The second is the much smaller number of chronic infections that happen in people whose immune systems aren’t fully functioning. When facing a weak immune system, the virus isn’t quickly wiped out, and so has the time to evolve ways of evading immunity.

Is it possible that these evolution scenarios are also going on in animals, but that we’re unaware of them happening?
To get a sense of whether this is a risk, we first need to know how many infections are occurring in animals. This will help identify any possible hidden reservoir of the virus. To this end, SARS-CoV-2 infections in animals are being studied extensively in many places across the world. Scientists are investigating exactly which species are susceptible to infection, as well as how common the virus is in different animal populations.

To find out which species are susceptible, many different animals – both domesticated and wildlife species – have now been exposed to the virus in experimental settings. This has provided a comprehensive understanding of exactly which animals can be infected – they include cats, ferrets, deer mice and white-tailed deer. And to find out how common animal infections are, screening for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies is also being used to uncover animals that have previously been naturally exposed to the virus.

Most studies of natural infections in animals have focused on cats and dogs, as these are the species that live most closely with humans. A recent UK preprint (a piece of research yet to be reviewed by other scientists) found that only six out of 377 pet dogs and cats tested between November 2020 and February 2021 had antibodies specific for SARS-CoV-2.

This shows that infection isn’t rife and going unnoticed among most of our pets. Early results from another study in the Netherlands (which is also still awaiting review) found higher rates of antibodies in the animals it tested (54 out of 308 dogs and cats were positive), but probably due to different sampling strategies. The UK research studied blood samples from a random set of animals, whereas the Dutch study specifically sampled pets in the homes of people known to be infected with COVID-19.

16/11/2021

16/11/2021