The Completely Unscientific Cat Coat Survey

First off: I know this is not science. We all agree on that.

But it could be interesting, which is one of my favorite excuses for doing things.

It came up because I noticed a month or two ago that my cat Mae, whom I have owned/been the personal assistant to for 15 years now, grew a winter undercoat like I’ve never seen this year. She’s a short-haired cat, and for the first time I’m having to comb and even cut mats out of her fur. (You would be correct in guessing that neither of us is happy with this development.)

Anecdotally, I’ve heard that a cat’s undercoat can be predictive of the severity of winter weather, but Mae (and I) lived in Chicago for eight years and she never grew a coat like this. And we’re in Los Angeles now.

I should not that there’s only a 50% rate of unusual undercoating at my place. My other cat, Grendel, is quite sleek. However, he’s half Siamese, a breed not generally known for getting all floofy, and he’s only six months old. What the hell does he know? He can barely deal with seeing rain.

After another session of trying to get all the fur tufts out of Mae’s butt, I tweeted about her new coat and quickly got notes back from two fellow cat owners, one also in California and one in Oregon, whose charges had also gotten crazy huge for winter – and to a degree that the owners hadn’t seen before.

So I’m curious. In the interest of, well, not science, but of anecdotal information that could one day lead to science, or at least something interesting, please tell me:

Is your cat unusually furry this winter?

If not, how’s the fur situation relative to previous years?

Where in the world are you?

What is a song that you love, love, love, but hope no one finds in your music collection?

Wait, are you lying about any significant part of this?

Please leave your response in the comments on this post, right below there, for ease of information gathering and to avoid duplications from Twitter and Facebook and stuff.

I am totally serious about collecting this information into a Feline Fur Index.

Together we will bring important knowledge to the world. Or at least unimportant speculation that could lead to something-or-other. Which is, as I have mentioned, totally worth it.

Thank you.