Two interesting pieces of feline-news for you today! The first actually takes place at the Denver Zoo!
13 year old male lion named Krueger seems to really like "Obsession," by Calvin Klein! Apparently, if the perfume (or is it cologne? Man-fume?) is sprayed inside of his enclosure, he goes to the same spot and "rubs his cheek on it." When you actually think about it, it totally makes sense. Perfumes and colognes are supposed to attract people due to pheromones inside of them. Animals also use pheromones, mostly to communicate.
Has a cat ever done this to you? Scent glands in the cheeks of cats (as well as in their paws) contain pheromones, used in communication. Each cat has a unique scent, and it rubs off when they rub into things like this. So when your cat greets you, it is partly due to affection, and also partly due to the fact that they are really marking you as their territory. At least they aren't peeing on you! So this explains why Krueger would rub his cheeks against the spots of Obsession sprayed around his enclosure.
Interestingly, the lions seem to enjoy Obsession more than other perfumes, and not all of the lions were attracted to it: only half of them were, in fact! Emily Insalaco, an employee at the Denver Zoo, thinks that the lions like this particular cologne more than others due to the presence of cinnamon, which the lions have seemed partial to in the past. If you want to see a video containing more information, click below.
http://www.9news.com/news/story.aspx?storyid=146948&catid=188
Next up is Sarah the cheetah, one speedy demon from the Cincinnati Zoo in Cincinnati, Ohio! Multiple times has this amazing cat beaten the world record for the 100 meter dash, and once even twice in the same day! The first link below is from Sarah's first world record break, where she broke the world record twice in one day in 2009. The second clip below is from more recently, when Sarah yet again beat the record, in June of 2012.
http://www.thetravelalmanac.com/lists/videos/animals-speed.htm
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/08/120802-cheetah-sarah-cincinnati-zoo-fastest-record-science-usain-bolt-olympics/
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