you know a few weeks ago put up a video where i outed my age by quoting a commercial from yes the 1970s [Music] well here's another one for you ready i want chicken i want liver i want tuna please the liver i am in no way endorsing that product but i thought the song was great and it leads right into today's video which is all about the cat meow here are some things that you didn't know about meow [Music] that was fun i like that i remember that commercial so that isn't i remember that commercial you do not i do so it's not the 70s i'm sure he'll throw up the date because he likes to humiliate me but yeah [Music] so the meow is a very specific sound it's that two-syllable meow that's why we call it a meow because that's what it sounds like it does have a lot of variations but here's interesting fact number one the meow is a sound that kittens make to their moms and of course it gets them what they want they meow and they get pushed into mom's nipple and they get the milk they meow and they get cleaned by mom they are taught that the meow gets them something and then they do it with their litter mates but after you know they are adopted out into new families after they grow from kittens into teenagers they stop using that particular communication technique with other cats and reserve it only for humans so the meow is specifically a cat to human relational communicational extravaganza [Music] and it is just limited to that i can only say that so many times because i think it's fascinating that with all of the vocalizations that cats are capable of over a hundred of them only one is directed at their primary caregivers which are humans so in a group of feral cats you'll never hear a meow never unless they're kittens because think about it once a cat hits adulthood what could they possibly gain by making that sound of wanting to be taken care of in one way or another nothing at that point they're hunting they're providing they're part of a whole but that society of cats um has no use for that sound you'll never hear me out except when you the person with a big bag of food meow meow meow meow i want chicken all of a sudden you come in they recognize you and then you're going to start hearing that sound you want treats finger sandwiches oh okay okay well done for instance every night we have this ritual in my house where uh penelope uh is waiting at the catio door and once the dogs go to bed then the cats come in from the the catio and penelope will go right up onto her snuffle mat and wait for her treats and will squeak she doesn't meow i mean it's a meow to her but to me it just comes out as a squeak in fact now we call her squeaker but we love the squeak we wait for the squeak and then we give her treats so that meow has been perpetuated and i know exactly what that means so really when it comes to if your cat is meowing a lot you want them to stop first tip go to the vet if your cat is doing something they've never done before there's a decent chance it's medical but if it's not take a look at your side of the street on this one there must be something that you're getting out of it in order for your cat to keep doing it it's like any behavior at all now will all cats meow excessively when they're stressed out a lot do some don't some go into hiding some find a really quiet place some seek attention in any case i would recommend my stress stopper i have been making this formula flower essence remedy for over 20 years and the reason i've been doing it is because it works it works for my cats my dogs it'll work for you as well the second amazing fact about the cat meow and this of course is related to the first one why is it that humans respond so predictably to the meow well here it is number one according to suzanne schatz who is a linguist a professor and the author of the secret language of cats she says that it's because of the frequencies that cats use in that meow mimics the frequencies that humans use when they're in distress and bonus it also mimics the frequencies of a baby's cry human babies cry so if we respond to something because it sounds like a human cry we're more likely to respond to it and the cats are more likely to keep doing it the perpetuation of the meow 10 000 years and counting and here's a really interesting fact for you over 70 percent of the people who watch my videos are not subscribed and you may have thought you were already subscribed but you might not be so do me a favor hit that subscribe button so you watch all of our fun videos ring the bell so you know when a video is coming out so now here's a little meow aberration this only really happens with cats that are unspayed and unneutered and both females and males will do this and anyone who has had the distinct unfun experience of dealing with this yet another argument if you needed another one for getting your cats spayed and neutered but when like a female is in heat she gets very amorous and very attention seeking she will roll around on the ground where she will rub up against your leg that's like there is no tomorrow just leaving scent on you and yes meow like crazy seeking attention male cats will also do that with their humans and again a lot of this depends on how much experience they had out in the world were they born as part of a litter in your home those kinds of nature versus nurture even males will do it now this is not to be confused with cater walling which is the sound that these cats will make when in heat seeking mates [Music] they're just letting everybody in the neighborhood know hey i'm available all you got to do is go back to cartoons of cats back in the 50s where you hear like cat calls [Music] wow that you know where it's like the cat wearing like a little straw hat and then you see someone walking down the street and he's like wow that's actually the sound i am so far off topic it has nothing to do with meowing but the first part of this had a lot to do with it now here's where it gets really interesting sarah ellis at al uh did a study for the school of life sciences at the university of lincoln uk and it was really about the concept of can humans identify what meows mean from cats those context-related vocalizations this is really fascinating because when it came and these are like pleasantness ratings urgency uh are they trying to navigate an obstacle and can humans identify what those things are well in in people with their cats in this study about 40 percent could in people who were listening to stranger cats it was it was chance it was a coin toss so that led to the conclusion that cats do not have a context-related repertoire when it comes to vocalizations that humans can identify that's really important and that's for my next important point for any point that you take home thinking about it i took this one home and thought about it because my work is all about not cats but cats and you and your relationship and how sacred that relationship is like any relationship and that's what this study said to me sort of blowing out of the water that we can say just by the length of a meow what the cat is trying to say to you well that depends on a lot of things take this example i'm walking down the street i see somebody i've never met this person before but maybe they know me they start talking to me they talk in a very loud and abrasive and almost kind of in my point of view anyway a little bit of an accusatory tone initially just put on my back foot but that person is just saying hi to me it turns out in my point of view that person was being accusatory and harsh and just a little but i don't know this person the only person who knows this person is other people that this person has a relationship to you see what i'm saying it's all about relationship so of course if one of my cats looks at me and gives me that meow i know what she's doing it for you know mainly because i have allowed that to happen over all these years because i respond to her when she makes that sound but it is all relationship based it's all to say that you have this relationship and that bond is one of a kind it doesn't get translated into any other cat yes the meow is universal but what the meow says to you your cat to her human or his human is in a way sacred like the secrets that you keep with your human partners those are the secrets you keep with your cat and dog and guinea pig and rabbit and hedgehog and bird partners see where i'm going you know in my book anyway what's kept me going for 30 years and counting when it comes to the world of cats is it's just this endless delightful puzzle mystery riddle and the meow is one of those little rosetta stones where we can look at it and go yes i have this relationship with you and it's individual just like the the the slow motion you know the cat i love you the slow blink that way that we know that we're getting through to each other and i just find that absolutely beautiful especially when we think about so many things that are mysterious about cats i mean there wouldn't be over 350 videos on this channel if it weren't for that mystery and speaking of which if you're on your 349th video and you haven't subscribed yet damn please hit that button subscribe to the channel over 70 of people who watch these videos are not subscribed and subscriptions make this channel tick so do me a favor hit the button ring the bell and i will see you next time all light all love all mojo to you meow [Music] meow