Pictures of cats mating, pictures of lions mating, videos of mating, text describing mating. These are what people search for. You know some cats refuse to mate when a person is present. Well, I can understand that. It makes you think. Are cats actually aware of the need for some privacy? Do they feel that the act of cats mating should be done in private? Maybe that is why we rarely see it happening, except in a cattery where monitoring of the process needs to take place.
This is because the mating process can become quite violent. If the queen is not far enough into estrus or not aroused enough she will resist, growl and perhaps try and bite the stud male. The stud, keen to get on with it, might become aggressive if resisted (sounds familiar?). The ground work for some violence is in place.
PLEASE NOTE 29TH SEPTEMBER 2020: AFTER A VERY LONG TIME THINKING ABOUT IT I DECIDED TO REMOVE THE IMAGES ON THIS PAGE AND A VIDEO. THE REASON? BECAUSE THEY ARE DEEMED TO BE SLIGHTLY OBJECTIONABLE TO SOME VISITORS AND IN ANY CASE THE WRITTEN DESCRIPTION ACHIEVES THE DESIRED RESULT. IF YOU WANT TO SEE A PHOTOGRAPH OF CATS MATING I HAVE ONE ON FLICKR.COM WHICH I TOOK MANY YEARS AGO. IT IS A COUPLE OF BREEDING SAVANNAH CATS IN AN ENCLOSURE NEAR PONCA CITY, OKLAHOMA, USA. YOU CAN CLICK ON THIS LINK TO SEE THE PHOTOGRAPH AND THEN RETURN TO THIS PAGE IF YOU WANT TO TO READ ON. THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE AND I APOLOGISE FOR THE NECESSITY OF REMOVING THE PHOTOGRAPHS AND VIDEO.
In the feral cat world cats mating gives the impression of being the equivalent of a human gang bang. The process begins with the female coming on heat. She calls the males. They respond to her scent and the call. There will be male to male arguments as to who has the pleasure. The male cat in whose territory the female happens to be gets first call. There is lots of noise, howling and caterwauling. In the lion big cat world things are pretty similar it seems:
As mentioned above, if one of the males approaches the female too soon (despite the fact that she is writhing around in what looks to us like a provocative manner) he gets a swipe from her claws. She runs the show and will choose the stud. Canny male toms will approach stealthily while she is not looking and freeze when she turns to see him. Eventually contact can be made and he mounts her. It looks like an act of macho bravado when he sinks his teeth into the scruff of his neck but it is actually a bit of scientific thought being acted out.
The male cat instinctively knows that if he sinks his teeth into the neck of the female she will be quiet. Quiet enough and for long enough to allow him to get the job done without getting a clip around the ear with her claws. He knows or instinctively understands that when cats are kittens they are carried in the mouths of their mothers. The mother sinks her teeth into the thick neck skin below the back of the head and picks up the kitten.
We have all seen it. The mother cat carrying her kittens to safety by picking them up by the scruff of their necks, in her mouth. The kitten’s reaction is to go utterly passive to allow the mother to do her job. When the Tom does this during mating the female has the same in built reaction as she is temporarily transformed into a kitten again. Voila, job done.
The queen will flatten the front of her body and raises her rump. This position is called “lordosis”. This tells the tom he can proceed. The tom mounts her and clasps her sides with his front legs and having sunk his teeth into the back of the neck her inserts his barbed penis into her. Ejaculation takes place quickly in about 5-15 seconds (cat breeders might like to comment on all this as it might take longer).
Yes, this is terribly undignified but in the name of science I present here (above) a male cat’s penis to show the barbs that cause the pain but which make the whole cats mating thing work.
When he ejaculates he growls and the queen makes a piercing scream. The separation is almost violent. The queen may try and hit the tom or bite him. The scream of the queen and the striking out is probably due to the pain suffered at the withdrawal of the tom’s penis because as we know it is barbed and this pain stimulates the queen’s vagina to trigger ovulation that occurs 24 hours later. In other words ovulation is on demand and not cyclical as in humans.
In the feral cat world of cats mating the queen will go on looking for more mating opportunities as long as her period of heat is at a peak. She will mate with other males in what looks like an orgy to humans. She tires out the males. There is no chance of her not becoming pregnant after that!
Here is a very short video of a male trying to mate with a female Savannah cat. She wants nothing to do with it and he tries to make her submit!…..
VIDEO REMOVED.
This page on cats mating wouldn’t really be complete without briefly discussing the sexual preferences and characteristics of the domestic cat1.
Cats are very promiscuous. Males aren’t that fussy. A piece of research in France indicated that a single tom cat fathered 63 offspring in one year (one every 6 days!).
If toms are casanova, the girls are nymphomaniacs. And the worst are the Persians and Siamese apparently. It is put down to the medical conditions cystic ovaries and brain damage! (both these breeds are more prone than average to medical problems – see Siamese Cat Health Problems and Persian Cat Health Problems). Persians reach puberty later than average at up to 18 months of age. While Burmese cats are fastest to puberty. Puberty usually starts at 3.5 and 12 months of age.
Toms are active into old age. On one occassion a 27 year old (a true geriatric by human standards) was seen chasing a young female.
In one case of a true Casanova Cat, an Italian tom cat fathered kittens with ten females whose offpsring were 95% his! He ruled that neck of the woods. He was known to be the tom as his offspring had the same particular and unusual coat pattern. Male cats become less fertile when their female partners are unfaithful, which happens a lot (see below). Dominant males are given priority by the females, unsurprisingly.
When a tom has to compete for sex he is more “potent”.
Although females are promiscuous they do vary in their promiscuity. In a sample of 15 females:
| Number | Cats Mating Preferences |
| 6 | mated with all males |
| 3 | mated with more than half the males |
| 6 | mated with less than half the males |
| 15 | had a male as preferred partner with whom they had sex on more than one occasion. |
| 15 | female cats like males that can fight well, are dominant, large and fatter than average. Very much like people then! |
Cats can be homosexual like people. Sometimes males mounting males can be a form of dominance it seems2. Male cats can bring other males to orgasm. In the wild between 27 to 40% of cheetahs live in same sex groups (is this being homosexual though?).
- See some more scientific detail about the domestic cat’s reproduction and development.
- See also: serval cat reproduction and development.
- After cats mating, see what happens next………..cat pregnancy…
Sources – notes:
Because my bro is gay and his friend pees on her gay partner.. do other animals do that?
No, that is human deviant behavior. Only humans do this sort of sex orientated stuff. It has nothing to do with procreation.
“deviant”…. huh
Several years ago I went along on a field trip to the zoo with a group of kids from the one of the schools where I used to teach music. The mountain lions were mating. We were inside, where you could view them through glass walls. They were in a courtyard, so that they were actually outside. Right next to the glass, so close you could almost touch them, they were going at it. The kids were interested. “What are they doing?” “Why is he biting her?” The teachers were visibly uncomfortable, yet couldn’t help but watch the big cats.
Monty mounts his stuffed doggie and prances over it, biting it on the back of its neck. He isn’t actually making contact with it with his genitals, he just prances over it and bites it. I think he is asserting his dominance. To him his stuffed doggie is another male cat, and he is the top cat in that relationship. My husband will play with Monty with his doggie, making the stuffed dog attack Monty or jump on top of him, as if it is asserting dominance over Monty. Shortly after this, almost always on the same day, we will notice Monty mounting Doggie, biting his neck and prancing over him. He reestablishes dominance in the relationship, as if the stuffed toy was really trying to vie for dominance and it wasn’t just Jeff playing with Monty with the toy.
Cat is lovely and flexible active pet I like it so much
As witnessed, many a time, most female mammals do not seem to enjoy the mating experience.
It is my understanding that only human females and female swine experience climax.
I never thought about that but a good point.
I know. I was shocked to discover that not even female apes have a good time of it.
I always contribute it to inept partners. LOL!
Not even Bonobos ? the experts in solving anything with mating ?
I just recently learned that Bonobos and dolphins have recreational sex.
But, those pigs…. females have orgasms lasting as much as 30 minutes. They are my idols.
Hi =)
Can you tell me what the source for this phrase? piece of research in France indicated that a single tom cat fathered 63 offspring in one year (one every 6 days!).
For a school project
Hi Andreia, I can’t tell you the source of that bit if information I am afraid. Sorry, it was written some time ago. But you can trust it because I wrote the article and everything written by me is based on sound sources. If you want to use the information, I’d quote this website as the source.
So you might say (source: pictures-of-cats.org). It is up to you. Thanks for asking and good luck with your project.
Thank you =)
soo stupid.
(: