Sleep is a very important part of a cat’s life, cats can sleep up to 16 hours a day, with many superficial sleep naps. But cats can also dream when they are in deep sleep.
So, what do cats dream about, in this article I tell you all about cat dreams so that you can understand what cats are thinking about when they dream.
What Cats Dream About: Understanding Their Sleep
Cats have a very split sleep, it is made up of naps and a longer period of deep sleep. The light sleep of their nap allows them to prepare themselves for possible predators, as for deep sleep, it generally happens at night, except when the cat is outside to hunt.
Sleep ranges from 12 to 16 hours on average and varies with age. What does not change is that the phase of their dreams is always the same, it is the REM phase , the shortest and during which the brain dreams to register the most important information and is expressed by images seem to us totally wacky.
How do you know if he is dreaming?
A dreaming cat is easy to detect, it will first of all start twitching its eyelids, because its eyes move during this phase, they can also start purring or meowing according to the experiences lived in the dream.
Even if your cat seems to be having an unpleasant dream, make sure not to disturb it because it will resent you and you will lose its trust. So leave it, the dream will eventually stop and your cat will find another dream or another phase of sleep.
What do cats dream of?
Cats dream of their daily activities, such as their last hunt, times they spent during the day, or things that have negatively affected them recently.
By dreaming, their brain allows them to better learn what they have done, which is vital especially for young hunters, for example, if your cat dreams of hunting, his dreams allow him to better record everything he did, the same if he experienced something that scared him, the brain will anchor it and he can make sure to avoid it in the future.
Why don’t cats dream of extraordinary things?
Cats do not dream of flying, dragons or even teleporting because their imagination is not developed enough. They only dream of things that they have experienced directly. For example, cats at Christmas will often dream of Christmas tree, because cats love Christmas trees , which in addition to being striking, are exceptional.
Cat and dreams: The final word
If your cat is dreaming, he will twitch his eyes and dream of daily activities, such as hunting or the tender moments he spent during the day, cat dreams have some similarities to ours.