Why are some cats especially vocal?

[plan]

Hey!

I searched for other threads on overly vocal cats, and most of what I've found are threads posted by people who are unhappy with their vocal cats and perceived whining/plaintive meowing, etc.

That's not my situation at all.

My cat loves to talk, but the vast majority of the time he's not complaining -- he trills, chirps, makes a sound like "Hhhhmmmmm?"; makes another sound that seems like he's surprised; another that sounds like "hhppoooh!" as if he's found something fascinating; and a sound of joyous anticipation if he sees I have a treat for him, etc. He does the other standards too, including meowing to get my attention if he's hungry, or whining if there's something he really wants but can't have. He also retains a kitten-like mew that sounds like "Come on dad, PLEASE???"

There are so many others, like "BBBRRRRUPP!" when he's overtaken by a burst of energy and about to go rocketing around the house. He even meows in acknowledgement if he blinks at me and I blink back.

What causes some cats to talk a mile a minute and others to stay virtually silent? Does upbringing and socialization have anything to do with it, or is it an ingrained thing like people claim with certain breeds like Siamese? And is there anyone else who actually likes having a vocal cat? I find it entertaining.

 

[mani]

It was so funny trying to replicate your cat's sounds...  They made sense to me as I can recognise them from other cats.  My cats are really quiet, though.

My first cat  would meow at me , I would meow back, he would meow back and on it would go until I stopped.  I think he felt obliged to respond. I was eight years old so of course I kept it going.

I think it would be lovely to have such a wonderfully conversational cat as yours.

 

[MoochNNoodles]

I think they all just have different personalities.  Background affects it of course.  My most talkative cat is a tuxedo.  I know some people don't believe the coat pattern really affects the personality that much; but I have known other tuxies who talk a lot too.  A friend of mine would care for her room mates cats when her room mate traveled. The room mate's cat would sit at the bottom of the stairs and "talk" to her when it was time to go to bed.  

  She said she could plainly understand the cat was saying "it's time for bed."  "Well, are you coming!?"  

  One of my childhood cats was a gray tuxedo and she was less talkative; but extremely friendly.  (My solid gray is a grump unless she wants food.)

 

[artiemom]

Artie is an orange kitty.

We talk all the time! We actually have conversations! 

I will say something to him, he will go: neah! 

or if I ask him something he will either say neah, or nahahah in an upper register voice. .

If I ask his opinion of something, waiting for a yes or no answer, he will give me one or the other...

When I am putting down his breakfast, I ask if he wants this? He answers by a trill.

If he really wants something, he does a howl. 

To wake me up, he jumps on my bed with a trill and meows in my ear....

If I decide to pick him up, and he is not in the mood, he gives a long drawn out meowwowono!

he is so funny, the longer I have him and the more I talk to him, the more vocal he gets....

 

[losna]

Sinbad is very talkative like this, he makes those same sounds. The BBRRUUUUPPP is especially familiar, he makes that as he's just about to run excitedly. I giggled when I read that as I know exactly how it sounds. BRRUUUPP -- everyone stand back and be careful on the stairs, there's about to be a white streak zooming through the house!

We call it all Sinbabble.

Especially the long streams of various syllables, it sounds like he's talking a foreign language rather than meowing. I've gotten rather good at interpreting a lot of it as he's very consistent. There's one sound for he wants play, one for food, one for petting, one for company at the litterbox (he hates to pee/poop alone), another for letting me know his littlebox needs to be cleaned... but he also just likes to talk.

Though apparently he's more vocal with me than my hubby. I'll have back and forth conversations with him, but he only delivers his demands to my hubby, no conversation attempts.

 

Oh - I forgot to answer the actual question. Hahaha. Some of it is situational/learned. Last year we took in my husband's grandmother's cat while she was in the hospital, and when she was released and we brought Lila back to her, she wanted to know what I'd done to Lila - apparently I'd taught Lila to talk!! Hahahaha. I talked to Lila all day as I wandered around the house, first to try to reassure her as she was scared in a new house, but I kept it up as she would reply. But apparently she was a very quiet kitty before that and rarely made any meows at all. So some of it may be personality, but if you respond, they will learn to continue.

 

[PushPurrCatPaws]

I've always wondered if Siamese and the like are more talkative than other cats. One of my rainbow kitties was a lynx point Siamese and she talked all the time. My current kitten is a little tuxedo but with some Siamese genes and, with her, it's like I could have written the OP's post myself! She talks just like Plan's boy kitty. I love it.

 

[Kat0121]

Lilith is a very vocal cat and I love it. 

  She chirps, trills and "talks". Sometimes it sounds like a 2 year old girl is in the house. I'll hear, "Hello?" "Mommy?" when she says hello, i always say it back. She used to do that a lot in my DD's room after she went back to school. 

I love her little voice. It's adorable. Sophie and henry are the strong, silent types. Sophie only makes noise when she wants my attention or when she's having a bath. when she wants my attention (I'm being scolded for something), it's ACK!  When she's having a bath, it's a long, drawn out, very plaintive  MEEEEOOOOOOWWWWWW  

Henry is the king of the silent meow. He does it all the time. He does warble a little and he's picked up Sophie's ACKs but he's pretty quiet most of the time. 

 

[plan]

@Losna  

Yea! The BRRRRUUUP! is a classic. It's like "Watch out! High energy kitteh coming through!"

@PushPurrCatPaws

That's awesome. After searching for this topic and seeing so many people who hated having vocal cats, I'm glad to see there are other people who actually like talkative cats and find it hilarious.

@Mani

Hey, nothing wrong with having conversations with your cat. =P

Thanks everyone for all the great replies! It's funny, when I was first looking around at shelters in late 2013/early 2014, I remember texting with a good friend who has two Siamese and had grown up with cats in the house. I was asking about personalities, and I distinctly remember him telling me: " With dogs, you generally know what you're getting with a breed, but with cats it's a crap shoot. They can have any personality."

Well, Bud is my first cat, and I've never been around litters or had experiences with sibling cats, but I do wonder if a whole litter might share some personality traits, or if a talkative parent means it's more likely the kitten will be talkative. Sometimes I wonder what Bud's siblings are like, and if they're also conducting filibusters and conversing with their humans.

 

[PushPurrCatPaws]

@Losna
 

Yea! The BRRRRUUUP! is a classic. It's like "Watch out! High energy kitteh coming through!"

@PushPurrCatPaws


That's awesome. After searching for this topic and seeing so many people who hated having vocal cats, I'm glad to see there are other people who actually like talkative cats and find it hilarious.

...

Thanks everyone for all the great replies! It's funny, when I was first looking around at shelters in late 2013/early 2014, I remember texting with a good friend who has two Siamese and had grown up with cats in the house. I was asking about personalities, and I distinctly remember him telling me: " With dogs, you generally know what you're getting with a breed, but with cats it's a crap shoot. They can have any personality."

Well, Bud is my first cat, and I've never been around litters or had experiences with sibling cats, but I do wonder if a whole litter might share some personality traits, or if a talkative parent means it's more likely the kitten will be talkative. Sometimes I wonder what Bud's siblings are like, and if they're also conducting filibusters and conversing with their humans.

Well, some of it could certainly be a crap shoot, and some of course could be learned behavior from mom or siblings. Or inherent. All of the above, who can know for certain! My current kitten Milly is a rescue, orphaned at 4 days old (I adopted her at 11 wks), and one of her 3 siblings was an incessant talker (and complainer). She was with that eyeball-rolling-talker for 11 weeks! She could have learned some of that talking from him, and we (husband and I) are weaning her off of the complaining part of it. lol

Her other (boy) sibling had seal-point markings, and he was Dullsville... always sleeping and never saying a word in the cage whenever we visited with them before Milly's adoption.

 

[momto3cats]

I don't know whether Siamese are really more talkative, but they do seem to be louder than other cats. I've had a Siamese mix, and a Cornish Rex (related to Siamese) and they have/had the loudest voices I've ever heard from a cat. I have always talked to my cats, and most of them talked to me, but the ones with no apparent Siamese ancestry have all had much softer, less harsh sounding voices. Honestly, I love having talkative cats, but my Cornish Rex can be hard to take, especially since she's gone deaf in her old age and is now louder than ever!

 

[LTS3]

 
What causes some cats to talk a mile a minute and others to stay virtually silent? Does upbringing and socialization have anything to do with it, or is it an ingrained thing like people claim with certain breeds like Siamese? And is there anyone else who actually likes having a vocal cat? I find it entertaining.

Breed, individual personality, upbringing, etc all are factors. It's the same way with people. Some people don't know when to stop talking. Others are quiet and don't have much to say.

My Abyssinian is pretty vocal, as is typical of the breed. He trills and whines and meows and yowls and screams

My other cat is quiet. She does meow to me and likes to talk to her toys at night. I once asked her if she wanted to sit in her box and she responded with a meow that was unmistakably meant "No".

 

[nora1]

Our kitty is very vocal as well (tabby, we think part maine coon)!! We love how chatty she is!

My theory is that since she is the only animal in the house, she communicates to us, instead of other animals....because there isn't any. We also chat back to her