New Adoptee--baggy skin in cats

On Tue, 02 Dec 2003 15:05:55 -0500, Orchid
wrote:

On 02 Dec 2003 13:25:40 GMT, olitter (PawsForThought)
wrote:

From: m. L. Briggs

I did read an article once and this sagging skin has a name -- but I
cannot remember it. I wish I had paid more attention, but Princess
lost the sag after a couple of years.

They actually had a short article about this in the most recent Cat Fancy
magazine, calling it a "Spay Sway" I have also read where I believe it was
called a "Primordial Pouch" attributable to the wild desert cats who would
maybe not eat for a couple days, then gorge on food, so the extra skin helped
expand the tummy. I have no idea if either of these explanations is true.

Primordial pouches exist to give the cats extra protection in
that area (cat fights involve a lot of savage kicking with the hind
legs at about that area) and to allow a longer leg extension when
jumping. A primordial pouch is just a flap of empty extra skin
between the hind leg and the torso.
'Spay sways' come from the weight that altered cats put on
because their metabolisms slow down. Add that slowdown to the
American tendancy to overfeed our pets, and you get a primordial pouch
that is filled with fat that shouldn't be there, aka a 'spay sway'.

Felis lybica (the African Wildcat) is actually quite different
from the big cats, predation-wise. Big cats are desgined to gorge and
fast -- they make one big kill maybe once or twice a week. Little
cats, like F. Lybica, are designed to kill many small things
throughout the day, eating every day at least, more often twice or
three times. This is why domestic cats are susceptible to Hepatidic
Lipidosis when they do not eat for two or more days. Their bodies are
deisgned for several small meals a day, not one huge one once a week.
In zoos, big cats are fasted once a week for health reasons --
small cats *never* are.


Very interesting! Thanks for information. MLB