Pawing over food dish !

rooster

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What does it mean ? She eats a little, then paws OVER the dish, moves round a bit then paws at the floor again.... this continues for a full circle sometimes !
It looks to me as if shes "burying" the uneaten food.... but what IS she upto ?
 

greeneyes86

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My Maine Coon paws at the floor around her dishes all the time. I think it's some kind of "territory" thing, probably similar to "burying" her food...she also scoops her wet food out with her paw and eats it while standing over her water/dry food...she's a messy eater (to put it mildly!)
 

gingersmom

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In my house it means, "I don't LIKE this kind of food, mum! I think it should be buried, not eaten!

 

snake_lady

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Yup, she's trying to bury the food.... save it for later


Kizzy does this all the time...he'll "bury" it and 1min later he's back eating it, and repeat.

I had to put his food on a place mat because he tries to bury it via digging his claws into my carpet
So now he has an extra large plastic feeding tray, or the dish is on a hard surface so he's not clawing up my carpet
 

wmarcello

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Our cats do this too, but not always for the same reason. If it happens and they come back soon after for more, they are most likely "burying it" to save it for later. If they don't come back and it never gets eaten, chances are they're trying to send you a message that the food isn't very good and they don't want it.
 

aswient

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When mine does that it definitely means they don't like it, they never come back to it.
 

northernglow

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My cats do it too. They are saving it for later. My other cat used to do it even for water bowl and he also "digs it up" sometimes before eating or drinking thinking that there is some invisible thing covering his foods because he remembers he buried the food with it earlier..
 
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