Researchers unsure why animals turn up with items such as socks and gloves – but agree pilfered items are not presents
The thieves went for particular items. Day after day, they roamed the neighbourhood and returned home to dump their loot. Before long they had amassed an impressive haul: socks, underpants, a baby’s cardigan, gloves and yet more socks.
“We are not sure why cats behave like this,” says Auke-Florian Hiemstra, a biologist at the Naturalis Biodiversity Center, a museum in Leiden. “All around the world there are cats doing this, yet it has never been studied.” He now hopes that will change. The Frigiliana three are repeat offenders, but they are not the only cats to be rumbled. Charlie, a rescue cat from Bristol, was dubbed theafter bringing home plastic toys, clothes pegs, a rubber duck, glasses and cutlery. His owner, Alice Bigge, once woke to a plastic diplodocus, one of many nabbed from a nearby nursery, next to her head on the pillow.
Cats have small stomachs and tend to bring prey to the centre of their territory to feed on when they are hungry. The same instinct might lead them to bring objects home where the reaction they receive encourages the habit. “When you pay attention to the cat, you are reinforcing the behaviour,” Vinke says.
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