Happy Thursday:

• 🐱 A cat on a walk solved a mystery

• 🤔 Is your cat picky or bored?

• 😸 How teachers can save money this school year

• 🐈 Cat of the day, Snowy

• 😺 Is it time for a new phone?

Did You Know?

Food puzzles and treat balls encourage natural ________ behavior instead of simply eating from a bowl.

(scroll to the bottom to find the answer!)

Pili and Nick take their cat, Coco, on a walk around their Dublin neighborhood most evenings. The routine is usually calm, with Coco sniffing around bushes while her parents chat nearby. One night, though, Coco started letting out urgent, frantic meows they'd never heard from her before.

The couple followed the sound to a tree, where a tabby cat sat perched on a branch. Coco, who normally puffs up around strange cats, was completely gentle with this one, leaning in to sniff noses and chirping softly like she was checking on him. That was the moment Pili and Nick realized something wasn't right.

They'd brought Coco's carrier along, so they tried to coax the tabby down. He beat them to it. Before they'd even figured out a plan, he hopped from the tree, trotted over, and walked straight into the open carrier on his own. They drove him to the emergency vet, where a microchip scan turned up a chip that unfortunately wasn't registered.

Determined to find his family, Pili eventually spotted a lost cat post on a community app and got in touch. The tabby was reunited the very next morning. As it turned out, he was a well loved escape artist who'd simply never had his missing notice taken down, and he liked wandering the neighborhood making friends. Coco, it seems, was simply his newest one.

Nearly every cat owner knows the routine. Your cat races to the bowl, takes a few bites, then strolls off and leaves what looks like a perfectly good meal behind. It's easy to chalk that up to fussiness, but new research from Japan suggests something more interesting is going on.

Researchers found that as cats get used to the smell of a food, their motivation to keep eating slowly fades, even when they aren't full. Introducing the aroma of a different food brought their interest right back, despite the meal in the bowl staying exactly the same. It comes down to scent, and cats have a lot of it to work with. They have roughly 200 million scent receptors compared to about six million in humans, so dinner has to pass the sniff test long before the first bite.

The pattern makes sense given where cats come from. As descendants of solitary hunters, their wild ancestors caught several small prey throughout the day, each with its own distinct smell. Variety was simply built into how they ate, so a nose that perks up at something new is really just an old instinct doing its job.

So the next time your cat abandons half a bowl, they may not be turning up their nose so much as following one. Sometimes a fresh portion, a slightly warmed meal, or a new flavor is all it takes to make dinner interesting again.

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Thank you to Staples for sponsoring Daily Purr.

Meet Snowy, a cream and white kitten with big curious eyes, submitted by Daily Purr reader Nicole. Rescued at just 3 months old, Snowy is about to celebrate his first birthday on August 14th, and he's already got homework sabotage down to an art. When Nicole's daughter tried to get some schoolwork done, Snowy had other plans, perching himself right in the middle of the action instead.

He's a natural at the classic cat loaf pose too, tucking those paws in tight and looking perfectly content. Here's hoping his first birthday party is just as adorable as he is.

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This week's Cat's Corner has some deliciously named kittens and one big lifestyle transformation:

• 🧀 Meet the Maine Coon kittens named after grilled cheese

• 🏠 Can a feral cat really become a house cat?

Daily Purr is brought to you with love from our cats. We hope they can brighten your day, just like they do ours. ❤️

Love,

Olive, Milo, and Yasmine.

🐱 Bite-Sized Treats

🧐 Did You Know: Food puzzles and treat balls encourage natural foraging behavior instead of simply eating from a bowl. This kind of enrichment can be especially helpful for indoor cats who might otherwise get little natural activity throughout the day.

😸 COTD: Give your kitty the spotlight by submitting them for Cat of the Day. Reply to this email with your best photos of your cat, their name, and a short description for the chance to be featured in an upcoming newsletter!

💌 Reply for a surprise: If you are reading this reply with “meow” for a surprise in your inbox!