When a cat drinks milk, the only part of their tongue that touches the liquid is the top, smooth surface of its tongue. As they drink, the smooth tip of its tongue barely touches the top of the milk and then the cat rapidly pulls back its tongue creating a milk column between the surface of the milk and its tongue. This milk column persists until the cat closes its mouth, pinching and stopping the milk column. This special milk column is created by the balance of gravity (the force pulling the milk back towards the bowl) and inertia (the tendency of the milk to continue moving in a direction until another force stops it). Even more surprisingly, cats innately know how quickly to lap and when to close off this milk column. Also, different species of cats from domestic cats to lions, lap more quickly or more slowly to balance off these forces depending on the size of their tongue.
Researchers studied this phenomenon over a range of cat species (large wild cats to domesticated cats). To research this, scientists video recorded various species of cats drinking milk and slowed down the recordings to determine the speed of their tongue and the frequency of lapping. Additionally, they also made a robotic version of a tongue that laps milk using the same mechanism to manipulate these studies with different factors. All in all, their research suggests that cats choose a precise lapping speed in order to maximize the amount of milk ingested per lap.
If you want to read more about this interesting study, click here!
Posted by Abbie Lamarre-DeJesus (2)
I never would have ever thought to look at how a cat drinks it's milk. This is really amazing though. I wonder if they'll put it on time warp.
ReplyDeleteOn a more serious note it'd be interesting to see what muscles are used to create the extra strong tongue and what where they're derived from.
-Peter Lucas
Wow…this is such an interesting finding! I know in class we learned that the family for cats, Felidae, is distinguished by retractable claws. Do you think that lapping could be another unique characteristic of this family? For example, dogs do not lap, so it’s possible this is a trait specific to cats?
ReplyDeletePosted by Katie Kalutkiewicz
I believe that the correlation is between finger length, the claws at the ends of the fingers, and the width of the fingers in relation to foraging. I don't believe hand size will necessarily be affected by foraging success but the fingers certainly have. The Aye Aye is diverged from Madagascar lemurs and lives in an ecology that requires specialized skills: burrowing into soft rotten wood, scraping the husk of fruits, and picking insects from within twigs. I do believe there must be links between patterns of behaviors in correlation with ecology and the timing of their evolution. If they had not split from other well-known lemurs, and inhabited their current niche, I think that natural selection would not have positively selected for their unusual third and fourth fingers. It would be interesting to see a tree representing their diverging traits over time. Thank you for your questions.
ReplyDeletePosted by Shyla Morsbach
I don't know exactly how credible this source is but I found some fun information on the history of lemurs on this site. Perhaps it would interest some of you!
ReplyDeletehttp://news.mongabay.com/2008/0225-madagascar.html
Posted by Shyla Morsbach
Peter- I wonder if muscles even affect this process? I tried researching it some more but all it really talks about is this balance between gravity and inertia that causes this unique phenomenon.
ReplyDeleteKatie- It definitely is a trait that only cats are known to have; however, there probably isn't much research that has been done on other animals and the ways they drink. Dogs definitely don't have this trait but it would be extremely interesting to find if any other species use these kind of mechanics when drinking.
Abbie Lamarre-DeJesus
Do you think the lapping behavior is gradually learned and perfected over time, or an innate quality of all feline species?
ReplyDelete-Himanshu
very interesting article! i looked at the article to find examples of just how much larger felines could lap up at one time and couldnt find it. do you have an approximation of how much milk that is?
ReplyDelete-Ahmed Sandakli
This is really cool! Cats are awesome lol. Anyway, I thought I had heard in the past theat the rough sand paper texture of the tongue helps to keep the liquid on te tongue..Do you know if that's true? Does the milk column work with the texture of the whole tongue, and not just the tip?
ReplyDelete-Katie Cyr
This makes me think of the distinct differences between dogs and cats. I'm a dog person, but I'll be the first to admit my Golden is so messy when he drinks. Cats are the more graceful species for sure. I always wondered if lapping was the most efficient way to drink, and it seems it works fine for cats. I think the rough part of the tongue is meant for self cleansing, but correct me if I am wrong.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing :)
- Meesha Sharma
This is really interesting. It's funny that the J-shaped lapping of milk was assumed, but is actually wrong. This is a cool combination of biology and physics!
ReplyDelete