cats and navigation

[matthay]

can cats really find their way home via navigating the stars

[tay_xx]

i believe its more based on scent. when i was younger my dad bought us a cat and when we first let the cat out (mushroom was his name) we put butter on his feet to make sure he would be able to find his way back. personally i have never seen a cat look up to the sky on its way home! i dont believe they can as i dont think they are intelligent enough. xx

[drgnrdr]

I don't think the stars have anything to do with it, but if your cat goes out regularly then he will scent mark as he goes along, cats have a routine that they do when let out they go thru their territory and mark and such, if you let them out away from home they may have some kind of pointing system or they may just wander around or if the scent is on the breeze track it back to the territory it is familiar with and Viola' it finds it's markings or soemthing similar and finds it's way back. Look at certain dogs, they can track a scent on the air for miles, cats have good noses also, not sure how good they are because we can't test them to track something, and they aren't talking..lol

[rio116]

birds use the stars as navigation tools,not cats. Cats use scent.

[Schlomo78]

I saw a program once where they said cats navigate by the moon...I believe it as my sister once had a persian that had never ever been out of the house in all its 5 years, when she went on holiday she took it to my mothers to be looked after and upon escaping a couple days later ended up on my sisters doorstep which was a good 6 miles away! How else did it find its way home?? weird!