(in households with multiple people)

  • krooklochurm@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    5
    ·
    3 hours ago

    Yes. All animals know exactly which human is touching them. They know who every human is, where they live, and their fears.

    If a lion named duke that lives in Kenya ever gets to North America I am FUCKED.

  • Angelevo@feddit.nl
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    5 hours ago

    Yes. I guess it does depend on the pet a little bit – the ants in your ant farm probably cannot. ;)

  • QuinnyCoded@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    11
    ·
    edit-2
    13 hours ago

    my cat absolutely not. She was the runt of the litter and is kinda shy because of it. Anytime she gets touched she will immediately look at what touched her and probably run away if it isn’t me.

    I’m the only thing she really trusts and oh boy is she comfortable around me

    her face shows so many different emotions

  • Manjushri@piefed.social
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    30
    ·
    18 hours ago

    Not always. I was at my sister’s house and her cat was not over-fond of me. That bothered me because cats normally adore me. At one point, the cat was half-snoozing on a stool so I reached over to give him a pet. At first he started to purr and stretched out. Yes! Thought I, finally making friends. Then he looked over his shoulder and saw it was me. He hissed and ran to the other side of the room and started cleaning himself. I’d have been hurt if his expression hadn’t been so funny when he realized that it wasn’t my sister petting him.

  • AlecSadler@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    4
    ·
    12 hours ago

    I feel like my cat can because it rarely looks up and I just snuck up behind it. Either that or it sucks at survival (it doesn’t, it is jumpy beyond reason at almost everything else).

    I assume it’s more than the petnique though, and includes step noise and scent.

  • Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    10
    ·
    16 hours ago

    People often touch vastly differently from one another. I would assume a dog would become familiar with those who pet them often.

  • IntrovertTurtle@lemmy.zip
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    33
    ·
    21 hours ago

    Not the best answer as I’m no biology major, but from my understanding, they can smell just as well. So they likely know who’s closest to them and figure it out.

    • SolidShake@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      13
      ·
      20 hours ago

      I had a deaf cat a while back and when she was just chilling in her tree seat looking out the window and I would let her, she would flip out and bite at me until she could see me lol.

  • RebekahWSD@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    3
    ·
    13 hours ago

    All cats I’ve ever had always looked up to see who was petting them. They usually didn’t mind any of us petting them, but they always looked.

  • dddontshoot@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    4
    ·
    14 hours ago

    My cat could. But only because I would rub my fingers together to make a faint noise, so they could tell where my hand was without looking.

    It significantly reduced the number of surprises, and they felt a lot more comfortable around me.

  • Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    17
    ·
    20 hours ago

    Nope. I lived with a girl, and we got cats. Lived with her for the next 4 years with those cats.

    We fell apart as a couple. I assumed she was going to take the cats. I wasn’t stopping her. But she wanted nothing to do with the cats.

    Which, truth be told, was the outcome I wanted anyways. The cats always loved me more than her.

    But for the next 10 years, anytime they’d be sleeping, and I’d pet them, they always snapped their heads up to see who it is.

    It’s me. It’s always me.

    I can get why they’d have that reaction for the first year. Still in the habbit of multiple people living with them.

    But they ALWAYS checked, everytime, until the day they died. They were happy to see me, everytime, but they still checked.

    • 14th_cylon@lemmy.zip
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      15
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      20 hours ago

      they would do that even if you were single their whole life. if someone touches you, you just look at them, that is natural reaction, that doesn’t mean they wonder who is petting them.

      and that is for cats. asking if dog, who can track 24 hour old track using just nose, knows who is petting them, is just laughable.

  • ComradeSharkfucker@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    9
    ·
    18 hours ago

    My partner and I pet our cat in very different ways and I truly believe that were our cat blind, she would be able to tell immediately.

  • thejoker954@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    3
    ·
    20 hours ago

    I would imagine so - smell alone probably gives them a pretty accurate idea, but people also pet differently (probably not as uniquely as a fingerprint but differently enough)

    Some people are heavy petters some light, some only pet in one direction, some only pet certain areas (head only, flank only, etc.) And so on.