Can a cat dream?

Cats are notorious “sleepers. Of the 15 to 20 years that the average cat lives, it spends 10 to 13 years in sweet slumber. Many would certainly envy her! In fact, no matter how active this animal is, it knows how to rest. And rightly so: if people knew how to distribute their time of activity and rest in such a way, they would be calmer, and their level of stress would be much lower.

What is a cat doing in its sleep?

Sometimes a cat hears everything that is going on around it while it is sleeping, and sometimes it reacts to almost nothing

While sleeping, a cat seemingly sounds asleep, and “monitors” its surroundings with its ears – it moves them and alarms them at suspicious sounds, as well as when it hears its name being called. The tail of the cat also reacts treacherously to many things going on around. This suggests that the cat’s sleep is not deep – twitching its tail and moving it in different directions from time to time.

But the cat doesn’t always sleep so sensitively – sometimes it falls asleep so soundly that you can take it in your arms or move it to another place, and it just meows lazily without opening its eyes. Scientists have found that a cat’s sleep is akin to a human’s – it is also divided into certain phases.

The change in phases of sleep

“What are you dreaming about…?”

Cats’ sleep phases change in the same way as in humans – the slow sleep stage, when brain activity is low, is replaced by fast sleep, and the brain begins to work in much the same way it does when you’re awake. It is during this time that both humans and cats dream. Sensors during the study showed that the animal’s brain transmits impulses, on the basis of which it can be claimed that the cat at this time is dreaming about something.

Of course, meticulous scientists wanted to know what cats see when they sleep, and eventually, it was found that they dream about the things they do while awake. For example, they see that they are hunting a mouse or chasing a stranger from their territory.

Cats don’t need coffee to wake up

During the rapid sleep phase, cats can behave quite actively

By the way, this is confirmed by observations of their owners – almost all of them have often noticed that cats may move their paws during sleep, as if running away from somebody, sharply moving their head or even shrieking, apparently, experiencing too strong emotions during sleep. Sometimes the animal may even jump up from its seat and only then wake up.

Purring in their sleep, as if the cat is talking to its congeners. In fact, many people also talk in their sleep, and no one considers it something out of the ordinary. But, unlike people, a suddenly awakened cat is able to orient itself very quickly and tune in to its surroundings. While many people need a few more minutes of “rocking”, a cup of coffee or a contrasting shower. Cats, on the other hand, were given this reaction by nature itself, and it has been preserved in the animal, even despite living side by side with humans for centuries.