Cat bites can be nasty!

I've had 2 cats. One my ex bought at Biggs in Eastgate that picked me as her person. Where ever I was at the cat was usually laying on me. My then toddler daughter would carry it around by the neck or tail, and it never once bit or scratched a soul. We had her 14 years.

The second was a feral that was born on my patio. We took it in and in 13 years it never bit or scratched us...it did bite a friend one time, but he was really weird. That cat jumped in my lap 2 times, and never purred at all. It would hang out with me as long as I left it alone.

My favorite cat!

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Dog people are wired different than cat people.
As a dog person with two Rotts, one of which likes to play rough, I put up with, er... enjoy stuff a cat person would abhor.
The inverse is in effect too. I can't abide a cat on the kitchen counter or pooping and urinating in the house.
 
When I was a young man, I had to remove a cat hiding in the basement of the house left by the previous renters. Although I wore gloves, she managed to claw my left arm while removing her. I washed it with soap and water, thinking nothing more of it. Later that day, while working, however, I started feeling sick. After a bit, I noticed a red line from my wrist area to my elbow and went to the ER for treatment of my Cat Scratch Fever. Antibitotics knocked down the infection overnight.

Many years later, I married a wonderful gal who is the daughter of a large animal veteranarian. She grew up on a farm with dogs, cats, horses, and cattle. She can best be compared to Ellie Mae Clampett when it comes to having "critters" around. We had the dogs and horses, but she wanted cats. Now we have four house cats that have bonded with the dogs. Cats will paw me for attention, and if I don't give them what they want, some light nipping is their fall back. No serious issues, other than when they start raising a fuss, meowing and pouncing on the bed to be fed in the early morning hours.
 
Wow, all my cats, and mom's have bitten several times each, at least, and my one cat has clawed and bitten me badly about a dozen times. A couple of those were probably bad enough that I should have had stitches. I can't imagine putting even the worst of my cats down because of some local law. A cat isn't really domesticated, IMHO, it's just "tamed", and some are a lot tamer than others.

Not really sure where they land on the domestication scale to be honest. They aren't of pack mentality as dogs are, so they do not really seek our approval. If Fido catches a squirrel, if well trained, fido will stand down on voice command to do so.
Fido's maintaining approval in the pack.
Felix on the other hand, is not a pack runner. Felix cares little of approval within the hierarchy. Good luck getting that critter out of it's murder mittens. Yet, when it comes to sitting by, or on you, a cat seems to ask permission out of respect.
Could be the domestication level simply cannot be measured by the same standards.
 
Every cat that has bitten me was because I played too roughly and aggressively with them. Entirely my fault.

From that I learned how they like to be played with and how they don't like to be played with.

 
I don't agree with that as there are many like myself who have or had both cats and dogs and enjoy both.

We have had and enjoyed both. For the last 25 years or so we have only had cats. (Indoor) We have had 6 Maine Coon cats and have found that they have many dog type behaviors and actually seem to like playing and interacting with you.:)
 
Every cat that has bitten me was because I played too roughly and aggressively with them. Entirely my fault.

From that I learned how they like to be played with and how they don't like to be played with.

I've seen a variant of this where the area around the base of the tail was marked "YOU FOOL". Some cats are very sensitive there. One of my gf's mega-moggies ("Charlie-of-epic-whiskers") is. Mine does like having his tummy rubbed.

As to my previous comment about cats having domesticated US, rather than the other way 'round, mine has already this morning (7:35am) reinforced this several times. The usual routine here is that once I'm up (whether at his bidding or not), I let him out via the front door and immediately replenish the food bowls. At some point he will appear at the back door and want to be let in.

(brief pause in typing while I let the cat in...)

He may or may not have a nibble, then go back outside via the cat door at the front, only to reappear at the back door repeating the operation several times, which requires that I get up off the couch to let him in.

As to the cat door, years ago I laboriously hand made one:

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and fitted it into the wall adjacent to the front door....

(brief pause in typing while I let the cat in...)

He will sometimes use it, but much prefers that the indentured servant (me) let him in when hailed at the back door.
 

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You scrunched up the bag. Most cats react badly to that noise. The reaction can be what happened to you, or running away at Warp 9, you never know which is coming.

My other cat doesn't care about the bag scrunching, and my past cat, who weighed over 25 pounds, would just watch me change or scoop the box out so he could get right in there and break it in. I don't know what happened to Wink before I got her, except her eye had to be removed as it was trashed and she was in a lot of pain. Her other triggers are all "hissing", water, computer duster, etc, but the vacuum cleaner just makes her run away. I dropped a lid from a pot in the kitchen yesterday, and she thought, just for a second, about killing me. I saw her eye dialate, and she tightened all up, but it passed. I was ready with a cookie sheet in case she went off. In the bathroom, I just shut the door when messing with the litterbox. Only one time did she flip her lid when I crinkled the bag. Since she couldn't get to me, she went after Timmy, who simply grabs her until she runs out of gas. About 5 minutes is all she has in her tank.
 
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