Where Did Mew Go? Study Answers Where Cats Wander

Ever wondered where cats wander to when they’re let outside? Is there a Zootopia-like Cat-land they visit on daily walks? A recent study seeks to answer these questions. The North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences sought to answer that question with the Cat Tracker Project, which involved around 900 house cats.

The concept is quite simple, as they attach a GPS tracker to the cats and find out where they wind up in. And after six years of tracking the movement of nearly 1,000 cats across six countries, the result comes as a bit of a shock.

According to their findings, most of them spent their time within 110 meters or 330 feet of their yard. But not all were, as seven percent got as far as 25 acres, and some cats had long ranges. The record-setter was a suburban cat Penny who often wandered around the hills at the back of their backyard. That meant that she covered around three square miles. Quite long! 

Another long ranger was a British cat Max who wandered as far as a mile away into a different county. He did it two times out of the six trials they did on him. Even the researchers were mystified as to what fascinated him that far away.

The one thing that can be for sure concluded from this study is that a cat’s mind will, for the most part, remain an enigma to us. A living thought experiment that may continue on for generations to come. Like most of their known behavior, there is not one explanation, and it may take until we’ve mastered neuroscience before we can truly unmask the inner workings.

The Cat Tracker Project also has various other branches that tackle various other areas of the mammal’s personality. Their website can be found here.