Cats
Mating
Pictures of cats
mating,
pictures of lions mating, videos of mating, text describing mating.
It's almost pornographic. You know some cats refuse to mate when a
person is present. Well, I can understand that. It makes you think. Are
cats actually aware of the need for some privacy? Do they feel that the
act of cats mating should be done in private? Maybe that is why we
rarely see it happening, except in a cattery where monitoring of the
process needs to take place.
This is because the
mating process can
become quite violent. If the queen is not far enough into estrus or not
aroused enough she will resist, growl and perhaps try and bite the stud
male. The stud, keen to get on with it, might become aggressive if
resisted (sounds familiar?). The ground work for some violence is in
place.

Cats mating - reproduced under creative commons © lotje
In
the feral cat world cats mating gives the impression of being the
equivalent of a human gang bang. The process begins with the female
coming on heat. She calls the males. They respond to her scent and the
call. There will be male to male arguments as to who has the pleasure.
The male cat in whose territory the female happens to be gets first
call. There is lots of noise, howling and caterwauling. In the lion big
cat world things are pretty similar it seems:

Cats mating - Lions mating, same technique.
photo by imolcho under
creative commons license
As
mentioned above, if one of the males approaches the female too soon
(despite the fact that she is writhing around in what looks to us like
a provocative manner) he gets a swipe from her claws. She runs the show
and will choose the stud. Canny male toms will approach stealthily
while she is not looking and freeze when she turns to see him.
Eventually contact can be made and he mounts her.
It looks like
an act of macho bravado when he sinks his teeth into the scruff of his
neck but it is actually a bit of scientific thought being acted out.
This
video shows the very
active Abyssinian cat doing it!
The
male cat instinctively knows that if he sinks his teeth into the neck
of the female she will be quiet. Quiet enough and for long enough to
allow him to get the job done without getting a clip around the ear
with her claws. He knows or instinctively understands that when cats
are kittens they are carried in the mouths of their mothers. The mother
sinks her teeth into the thick neck skin below the back of the head and
picks up the kitten.
We have all seen it. The mother cat
carrying her kittens to safety by picking them up by the scruff of
their necks, in her mouth. The kitten's reaction is to go utterly
passive to allow the mother to do her job. When the Tom does this
during mating the female has the same in built reaction as she is
temporarily transformed into a kitten again. Voila, job done.
The
queen will flatten the front of her body and raises her rump. This
position is called "lordosis". This tells the tom he can proceed. The
tom mounts her and clasps her sides with his front legs and having sunk
his teeth into the back of the neck her inserts his barbed penis into
her. Ejaculation takes place quickly in about 5-15 seconds (cat
breeders might like to comment on all this as it might take longer).
Yes,
this is terribly undignified but in the name of science I present here
(above) a male cat's penis to show the barbs that cause the pain but
which make the whole cats mating thing work. This photo is published
under an Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs creative commons License
and is by Many
Cats 4 Me
who is a Veterinary Technician in the United States.
When
he ejaculates he growls and the queen makes a piercing scream. The
separation is almost violent. The queen may try and hit the tom or bite
him. The scream of the queen and the striking out is probably due to
the pain suffered at the withdrawal of the tom's penis because as we
know it is barbed and this pain stimulates the queen's vagina to
trigger ovulation that occurs 24 hours later. In other words ovulation
is on demand and not cyclical as in humans.
In the feral cat
world of cats mating the queen will go on looking for more mating
opportunities as long as her period of heat is at a peak. She will mate
with other males in what looks like an orgy to humans. She tires out
the males. There is no chance of her not becoming pregnant after that!
Some cats like a bit of variety and get tired of the doggy position and
go for the classic human position:
After cats mating, see what happens
next.................>>>>cat pregnancy..........
Cats
mating to Lions
mating
Cats
mating -
Sources:
- Cat watching by
Desmond Morris
- Cat Owner's Home
Veterinary Handbook by Drs
Carlson and Giffin
- Common sense
|