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meowing... or not

post #1 of 17
2/11/10 at 8:44pm
Thread Starter 
Does anyone else have extraordinarily quiet kitties? Holland has never been a talker since I've gotten her. She will sometimes make a kind of "trilling" (for lack of a better description) noise in her throat when I feed her, and usually she'll "yell" at me a little bit if I leave her alone overnight but for the most part she is the quietest little thing in the world.
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post #2 of 17
2/12/10 at 5:07am
Shadey is INCREDIBLY quiet. He opens his mouth to meow but nothing ever really comes out. Azizi and Teyah are very quiet, but they will "chirp" occasionally.

Osiris and Elliott will meow but not overly ofter however Imhotep, Nova and Cleopatra II have VERY loud meows. Nova's is the worst... It's very high pitched and mind numbing.
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post #3 of 17
2/12/10 at 5:12am
I have a couple. Sho - who "hrrrms" and Blasa who is strangely quiet for a kitten. She meows, but it's very faint, sometimes she just makes the meowing motions and nothing comes out. She'll softly trill, too. She'll rarely cry loudly when she can't find her siblings.

Though, I actually heard her meowing this morning! She was after a moth.
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post #4 of 17
2/12/10 at 6:59am
Rocko was the last cat I got and I am soooo happy he is quiet! My other two are so loud! ReeRee is the worst.

Rocko will occasionally meow when he is really wanting food. Other than that, nada. Not one sound. He purrs of course but even then he is very frugal with the purring. Unlike Fiona who you look at and she starts to purr.
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post #5 of 17
2/12/10 at 7:05am
My Bibbs (rb 3/05) and Sissy (rb 1/97) were quiet kitties, but the current gang (including Ootay though she's left us for the bridge last May, I am unable to not include her) are all talkers.

Tolly sings, warbles, trills, meaows, brrrupts, mrps, his repertoire is infinite and he never stops.

Mazy cat is full of prrt?s It's her all purpose word but she can put many different meanings to it! She does sing sometimes too.

Jennie also sings sometimes, and has a lovely brrRRUP? that I confess sometimes I will pet her when she is in a deep sleep just to hear that bbbRRRUP?

Jennie though has a terrible gutter mouth. When she first came here the other cats were quite shocked at her language. She has toned it down some but still swears quite a bit, we are all used to it now, and ignore it.
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post #6 of 17
2/12/10 at 7:13am
Our noisy one is Sterling, but Flambe trills everywhere he goes. Ella and Punkin, however, are virturally silent cats.

Funny how much they vary, isn't it?
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post #7 of 17
2/12/10 at 7:24am
I have a mix of almost silent cats and, well, not so silent. Zab, Hissy, Pokey, Jack and Tippy are mostly silent, but Jack will yell if he thinks he is unfarily treated. Streak talks all the time I am out there, Splash is annoying (oww oww oww all the time, and LOUD), Skinny yowls if supper is too slow - he seems to think it should just jump out of the tins. The house cats are noisier. Da Lip walks around trilling constantly, and cusses me quite loudly when he thinks it is cat feeding time and Da Magpie, well, she learned to trill from him, so is almost as bad and she yells too.
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post #8 of 17
2/12/10 at 2:36pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by fifi1puss View Post
He purrs of course but even then he is very frugal with the purring.
I hear ya! I usually have to put my ear to Holland to hear her purring. The only exception is the (rare) occasion where she kneads my leg... she purrs like a mad kitty when she does that.
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post #9 of 17
2/12/10 at 2:46pm
Larry will grace me with a little squeaky meow sometimes, but mostly he's pretty quiet. I think his kitty mom taught him to stay quiet when he was a kitten out on the tough streets of Brooklyn.

If he does make his little meow, I'll meow back at him, or ask him something where my voice goes up at the end, and he'll answer back with his little meow. We'll carry on a little conversation.

I had a cat once, Torfinn, who was orange tabby with some Siamese mixed in. Wow. You could really hear the Siamese. He was a talker. We'd carry on really long conversations.
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post #10 of 17
2/12/10 at 2:52pm
I have conversations with my cats too.

Especially Tolly, my Red Boy. I must crawl around on the floor on my hands and knees every night, after I get home from work, while he weaves in and out under me, bumping his head up for kisses, and allowing me to pet him and pat him while he tells me all about his day, (with aforesaid trills, peeps, meeps, mrps, purrs meows, etc) and I must respond appropriately..
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post #11 of 17
2/12/10 at 3:02pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by otto View Post
I have conversations with my cats too.

Especially Tolly, my Red Boy. I must crawl around on the floor on my hands and knees every night, after I get home from work, while he weaves in and out under me, bumping his head up for kisses, and allowing me to pet him and pat him while he tells me all about his day, (with aforesaid trills, peeps, meeps, mrps, purrs meows, etc) and I must respond appropriately..
That sounds fun!
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post #12 of 17
2/12/10 at 3:44pm
I've had several very quiet female cats. I have a formerly silent Persian, 15, who talks once or twice a day now — it's a side-effect of her appetite stimulant pills. She makes a soft "complaining" noise for about 20 seconds. And that's it, except for purring. Her little speech often means she wants to play.

Prior to the pills, she would be silent for weeks or months, then have a meowing fit. It would go on for about a minute, with a lot of random-sounding, whiny, little cries. It was as if she'd stored up all her thoughts for too long, and just had to let lose.

Consider yourself lucky. Our male Persian is very loud and loves to talk. We have conversations, which are fun, but he also likes to howl his head off for no reason, usually when I'm talking on the phone or we're trying to sleep. He can sound like he's being fed into a wood-chipper.

So, when he suddenly lost his voice, we raced him to the vet and she found he was ill with a virus that had inflamed his throat. It's the sudden changes in a cat's vocalization you need to watch for, but almost any established pattern is bound to be normal.

My feral female kitten is silent unless she is carrying a toy around in her mouth, when she trills. Aside from that, we only hear her cry if she is in trouble.
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post #13 of 17
2/12/10 at 4:55pm
Thread Starter 
I LOVE that I have a quiet kitty. The most I've ever heard her say was once when my sister came to visit me. My sister wanted to see her, but Holland always runs and hides when someone comes to visit. So I had my sister call me just as she was getting to my place so I could block Holland off from her hiding places. I live in a condo (only about 1,000 square feet) so if I close the bedroom and the bathroom doors there's really no place for her to hide.

My sister came in, Holland took one look at her and shot off to hide under my bed. The look on her face when she saw that the door was closed was priceless. She stopped, sat for the briefest moment (no doubt formulating her plan) and then turned around, walked toward my sister and - there's no other way to describe it - she cursed my sister out. She said more in that minute than she does in 3 months. I wish I had it on video.
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post #14 of 17
2/12/10 at 4:59pm
I think some cats never "learn" to meow. One of my cats talks a lot, especially when it's food time. One of the others will only meow when he's stuffed in a cat carrier. They all make noises, but seldom do what I'd call a traditional meow.
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post #15 of 17
2/12/10 at 8:05pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mystik Spiral View Post
I LOVE that I have a quiet kitty. The most I've ever heard her say was once when my sister came to visit me. My sister wanted to see her, but Holland always runs and hides when someone comes to visit. So I had my sister call me just as she was getting to my place so I could block Holland off from her hiding places. I live in a condo (only about 1,000 square feet) so if I close the bedroom and the bathroom doors there's really no place for her to hide.

My sister came in, Holland took one look at her and shot off to hide under my bed. The look on her face when she saw that the door was closed was priceless. She stopped, sat for the briefest moment (no doubt formulating her plan) and then turned around, walked toward my sister and - there's no other way to describe it - she cursed my sister out. She said more in that minute than she does in 3 months. I wish I had it on video.
Oh dear....... I think kitties should be allowed to hide if they want to. When Jennie was new here and in quarantine in my bedroom (the only other room in the apartment, my apartment is only 500 sq feet.) I wouldn't let anyone in my apartment at all during that time, because Tolly's and Mazy's hiding places (in the bedroom) were cut off.

Having said that, I'm sure it was funny to hear Holland tell your sister off, though.
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post #16 of 17
2/12/10 at 10:24pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by otto View Post
Oh dear....... I think kitties should be allowed to hide if they want to.
Well, gosh, now I feel bad. I just want her to know that I would never let anyone near her who would do her harm.
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post #17 of 17
2/13/10 at 12:06pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mystik Spiral View Post
Does anyone else have extraordinarily quiet kitties? Holland has never been a talker since I've gotten her. She will sometimes make a kind of "trilling" (for lack of a better description) noise in her throat when I feed her, and usually she'll "yell" at me a little bit if I leave her alone overnight but for the most part she is the quietest little thing in the world.

Whimsey meows and "gargles" deep in his chest to express himself. Which is typically when he wants something like being feed or is expressing affection.

Merlin has an opinion about everything and only gets worse when I talk back to him. He talks to me, to his toys, to his fellow felines, to birds; you get the picture.

Fancy, formerly feral feline, is absolutely silent except for a very rare squeek or two.

Magic, Fancy's formerly feral brother, occasionally gives voice to something like a cat caught in a pipe which raises goodbumps in listerners unfortunate to hear him.


So ALL kitties are different; bless their little cat hearts!: heart3:
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