Cat Opens Mouth But No Sound

Hello! Very beautiful cat! In November, we also have kittens. Good luck! All the best! Come for a visit! http://ridolina.ru

Sorry I put my previous comment to Cat Lady instead of Michael, must be away with the fairies today lol

Ah yes the Jacobson’s Organ.
In technical terms when a cat uses that it’s called the Flehman response, which is used to sniff out strange odours especially.
Very different to a silent meow it never fails to amuse me when I see a cat doing it.
I think there is much much more to cats than we humans will ever know and that their mystery is what makes people either love them or hate them.
I’ve lived with cats, worked with cats and volunteered with cats most of my life and I’m still learning about them !
One of my favourite rhymmes is:
I will come when you call,
If I want to.
I will purr,
If I feel so inclined.
And we’ll live side by side
In affection and peace,
But you’ll NEVER know
What’s in my mind.
No idea who wrote it but they obviously knew cats very well.

One of my cats sometimes performs the silent miaow when she summons me to feed her.

I have read that this miaow is pitched above the frequnecy range of human hearing, and that is why it appears silent to us.

Also, this same cat gives out with the tiny explosive sound after the silent miaow, just as Michael has described.

I am glad you have a cat that meows silently too. One thing I forgot to add was that when cats want to smell very accurately they open their mouth and allow air to pass over a gland in the roof of the mouth which aids in smelling.

I am sure you have seen this. Obviously this is not an attempt to meow.

Hello cat lady, lovely to ‘meet’ you.
I loved reading about your two cats, you are obviously ‘one of us’ a true cat lover who appreciates how lucky we are to have them in our lives.

Hi Ruth and Michael
My two black cats both found on the street.
My kittygrl, who’s 11 yrs old, on the thin side , very svelte. also gives me the “silent meow” sometimes it’s a very feeble meow, (esp when she is laying on my bed and I approach her for some affection, it’s almost as if she has a larnygitis type of meow, as if to elicit sympathy, hence more affection from me. Other times it’s from behind the door a much louder, high pitched meow as if to say “let me out there , so I can see who you’re talking to , right now!!” or “how dare you close the door and stay on the other side of the door or even visit your next door neighbor without me” , crying and pleading type meowing and scratching on the door. My Boo , who is a big , hefty boy and nearly 6yrs old, has a deep throaty, singing/mating meow especially before he has to do his “business”. In the morning before I wake up, he does this deep meowing and banging the cabinets to let me know it’s time for me to get up and feed him. I can always tell when he has to do his “biz” he actually sings very loudly, then after he does his “biz” , it’s the run and romp thru the house at top speed. They are such good companionship for me in my 60’s, my two black panthers, 6yrs difference between them both.

It’s very interesting that cats very rarely communicate with each other by meowing, they reserve their ‘speech’ for communicating with us.
It proves to me just how clever cats are !
All those years ago when cats were first domesticated they must have devised that way of ‘speaking’ to humans.
There are so many different meows too and anyone close to their cat can easily tell exactly what the cat is saying.
Sometimes the meow sounds like a word in our language ‘hello’ or ‘now’ or ‘no’
We had a ginger tabby called Felix who worshipped my sister and when she had to be away from home she would phone and they’d have a conversation. I’d hold the phone to his ear and then to his mouth and he always replied to her.
Maybe it’s an honour getting a silent open mouth message sometimes ?
I choose to think so when our boyz do it.
Just like us, cats don’t always need words to convey what they want to say.