20120107 - Merry

[plonq]

When you live with little photogenic creatures like cats, you are never without a subject for pictures. This is not to say that cats are always good or willing subjects when you pull out the camera. In fact as soon as they see it in your hand, they either do their best to avoid eye contact with it, or try their hardest to get snot on the lens.

On the other hand if you can catch them in a moment of distraction, such as when they are trying to figure out a way to get onto your lap before you notice, then you can sometimes capture a good shot.

Comments

[neowolf2.livejournal.com]

Well I hope you let him into your lap after that.

[plonq.livejournal.com]

Of course I let her on my lap after this. Who could resist a look like that?

Also she starts to get impatient and begins gently batting my arm if I try to ignore her.

[neowolf2.livejournal.com]

"her"

D'oh!

[plonq.livejournal.com]

S'okay, it's a common mistake. She's a bit of a tomboy.

[dakhun.livejournal.com]

I have a whisker question.
Have you ever seen a cat's whisker that was white at the base, when the rest of the whisker was black? And that would include big cats, house cats, or any species of feline.
Rarely, you see a cat's whisker that is mostly white, except for being black for the lower 1/4 to 1/2 of its length, ie black at the base. But I don't think I have ever seen the reverse colour change, ie white at the base, or black-tipped.
Looking closely at your photo, I think there might be one like that (mostly white whisker, but black tipped), but it is hard to tell - it might just be getting too thin at the end for the resolution of the photo to show it anymore.

Just as an aside, I have seen an instance online of striped whiskers, where the pigment repeatedly fades and comes back, several times along the length of all of the whiskers of a house cat. That could temporarily make a white base on a non-white whisker. But I am thinking that is a little too rare that it must represent some sort of melanin disorder, not something within the norm. And what I am really looking for is a whisker that at least semi-permanantly changes from black to white without falling out in between.

[plonq.livejournal.com]

I have seen them fade from white at the base to black at the tip (you can see that some of Merry's whiskers do that in this shot), and I have seen striped ones like you've mentioned here too.

That said, I've never paid that much attention to the whisker colouring in cats, but now thanks to you I'm going to have to go do a whisker inventory of our cats because you have piqued my curiosity.