Pet subjects: quake prediction (Filed: 30/11/2002)

My Syrian hamster, Henut (whose name means "Lady" in ancient Egyptian), predicted the earthquake this autumn. Just before it happened, she decamped and took her bedding to an open space in the cage, where she set up a nest for two days.

On the Tuesday, she must have decided that the danger had passed, because she moved back into her house. She has remained there since.

My house is regularly rocked by tube trains passing by, so it cannot just be vibrations that upset her. I had thought the quake was just another train, until I realised that none would be running at that time and that the shock waves made the room move in a different way.

Henut must have been able to differentiate between the two and have known something was coming a while beforehand. She seems to be aware of sonic sounds (she can hear silent dog whistles), so I wondered if that had been the trigger. R K, by email

When I asked whether animals had predicted the earthquake, I had not the least expectation of hearing about a hamster doing so. She is not the only predicting pet.

"Our nine-year-old Labrador cross has a nightly routine of spending a few minutes out in the garden, then going into a sleeping bag on the sofa for the night," wrote one reader.

"That night, she barked to come in after a few seconds, raced upstairs into a corner of our bedroom and refused to move. We assumed something in the garden had scared her, but afterwards we wondered if she had sensed something."

Another dog that behaved oddly was a terrier. "He is normally very active, but the day before he was hiding under chairs," wrote another reader. "He was so out of sorts that I slept that night on the floor with him."

Finally, Geordie, a cat living in New Zealand some 25 years ago, predicted a quake. "He was on my lap when he suddenly jumped off very hurriedly, giving me a nasty, deep scratch," wrote a reader.

"He dived under the sofa and stayed there - something that was completely out of character. Twenty minutes later, we experienced an earthquake."

This is how we solve the problem of what to do with unwanted mice brought in during the night by any of our cats. First, we remove the cat from the room. Otherwise, it just catches the poor creature again and races out of the catflap, then returns when you have gone back to bed.

Then we get a cardboard tube, open at one end only. We place the tube near the mouse, which has usually made for the skirting-board, so fooling the mouse into thinking the tube is a mouse hole. He runs in and you pick the tube up and put the mouse out. It never fails.

Ginger Tom even brought in a weasel, which was very tricky. The weasel was extremely fierce and tried to fight Ginger, which was three times its size. Nevertheless, we managed to get him to go into the tube, so he was rescued.

We hope this helps other readers who own cats. M H, Rye, East Sussex

Another reader, whose cat Simba is a keen hunter, has installed a humane mouse trap behind the cooker in the kitchen, ready baited with chocolate for the night-time mice escapees. The other possibility is to fix the catflap so that it is the only way the cat can get out, but it can't get back with its victims.

"We have bought a sturdy two-compartment rabbit hutch, which we placed at the back door," says the reader. "Now our cats can go out when they please, but are perfectly happy in their warm hutch, lined with plenty of newspaper and blankets."

Forsham Arks (01233 820229) sells a special outdoor cat "hutch", which is useful for feral outdoor cats, too.

Each autumn, we put some netting across our garden ponds to prevent the falling leaves clogging the water. Last week, our cat must have tried to get a drink from the pond or tried to paw at one of the fish under the netting.

He got his claws tangled in the netting and fell in. Luckily, we saw him struggling in the water and were able to rescue him.

We would like to warn other pet owners about this. A H, by email

Thank you.

# Celia Haddon regrets that she cannot answer all readers' letters personally. All sick animals should, of course, be taken to a vet.

-- Anonymous, December 02, 2002

Answers

I also use the netting over the ponds.... and saw a kittie caught in it!!! thank goodness it was not in the water!!!

-- Anonymous, December 02, 2002