Cats generally do not travel large distances around their territory. But, when they are lost, some achieve exploits. How to explain it?
When you lose a cat, in addition to the means put in place to report its disappearance and search for it, you can have the hope that it will find its way back on its own. After all, these little felines have a good memory and a great sense of direction. We therefore think that they are capable of returning to their territory, whether they left it on their own or because their family took them elsewhere, for vacation or following a move. But what is it really?
First of all, you should know that healthy cats who have access to the outdoors have the capacity to travel an average of 1 km per day, but they generally do less. In the most exceptional cases, they can reach 5 to 10 km. But it is very rare and, most often, the distance traveled by the animal in a day is within its territory. For example, a study at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU) followed 92 cats for a month in a restricted area of 1.1 km, using GPS collars. 79% of the time, the felines stayed 50 m from their house or less, and traveled a maximum distance of about 352 meters on average.
“The majority of the time, when cats get lost, they will stay within a three-block radius.”explains feline behaviorist Joana Lagarrigue to TF1. But the fact remains that incredible situations do occur, where animals travel very long distances to return home! In 2022, Coxi was found at her former home in Meuse, having traveled 600 km in 13 months from her family’s new home in Orne. And, in the summer of 2024, Rayne Beau, a cat lost while her family was camping in Yellowstone National Park (United States), was found 1,287 km away, in California, two months later.
How can we explain that some cats travel such distances? Well, we don’t really know. According to Joana Lagarrigue, it would be a mixture of their great spatio-temporal memory, their very efficient sense of smell and their hearing. When they get closer to their territory, they will recognize the smells, including the pheromones they used to mark it, the noises, etc.
Veterinarian Marisa Parlermo also explains to El PaÍs that there are theories on the fact that they would use other means to orient themselves, such as the earth’s magnetic fields, like other animals such as certain birds, turtles, sharks or foxes, even if nothing has been proven yet. But in all cases, this long journey exhausts them: both Coxi and Rayne Beau were found exhausted and emaciated.