Can Cats Tell Time?

I think most cat guardians would argue that cats can, indeed, tell time. Why else would they be waking us up at the crack of dawn, pester us to feed them, or give us the cold shoulder after we’ve been on vacation? But can they really tell time?

A different perception of time

Cats probably don’t experience time in the way we do. They certainly don’t wear watches or look at the clock. Anthrozoologist John Bradshaw, the author of Cat Sense: How the New Feline Science Can Make You a Better Friend to Your Pet, writes that “Humans categorize events by when they happened, but cats probably do not. … We have no evidence to suggest that cats can spontaneously recall memories and place those events as having happened a few days ago, as opposed to a few hours or weeks previous – something we find easy to do.” Bradshaw goes on to say that “cats have a general sense of the rhythm of the day.”

Creatures of habit

Cats are creatures of habit, and get used to having certain activities occur at the same time each day, such as meal time, play time or snuggle time. So in that sense, cats do measure time, even though they probably don’t think about time passing the way we do.That may also explain why they don’t reset their clocks when we change ours to and from Daylight Saving Time.

Night and day

Cats will also take their cues from the onset of daylight and the arrival of night time. And since they do know the difference between night and day, I believe that they also know when a guardian is away. I always tell Allegra and Ruby when I’m going away, and I explain it to them in terms of “it will get dark and light this many times before Mom gets home.” They may not understand what I’m telling them, but it makes me feel better!