Thursday, June 16, 2011

Cats of Japan

When my cousin and I arrived at our hostel - Happy Neko, or Happy Cat - in Beppu the first thing we saw were three adorable black, tiny, bob tail kittens. Sadly, I have no photographs of them, as they were a tad feral and skeedaddled as soon as I tried to play with them. I saw a couple of other strays in the area of the Happy Neko - whose owners apparently put out food for the neighborhood strays. They all had either bob tails or 3/4 length tails.

The only other cats I saw during my trip to Japan were in Fukuoka near the Shinto shrine we visited. I did get photos of them - all bob tailed, or with shorter than normal, oddly shaped tails. Here in South Korea, cats with bob tails or bent tails are very common. (The tip of Charlie's tail is bent, although you can't see it in photos. Her father has about a three inch bob tail.) I once had a vet tell me that the prevalence of bob tails in Korea is purely genetic (not due to mistreatment or disease). It would seem that this trait is present at least on the Japanese island of Kyushu as well.

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