A Safe Landing.

I saw my neighbor after months yesterday evening, walking her new baby pitbull. Though some people find pitbulls to be intimidating, I fell in love with them after watching "Homeward Bound" and seeing the movie's mischievous pitbull, Chance. My neighbor's puppy's name is Bubba. He's also a cutie pie.

Well, I reached over to pet Bubba and he was just so jumpy! I decided to pick him up (as I'm used to holding and cradling kittens, bunnies and such), which was NOT the brightest idea. The little dog was as heavy as a sack of bricks, so I decided to drop him back onto the floor. To my sheer surprise, dogs DO NOT land on their feet as cats do. *CLUNK* yeah.

Ok, Bubba wasnt hurt, because it was like a 3 foot drop. I did, however, decide it was time to do some research on cats and their landing abilities.

Here's the jist of what I got: The Cat Righting Reflex is a cat's innate reflex to orient itself when falling to land on its feet, often leaving it ininjured. Cats develop this reflex at 3-4 weeks of age. When a cat is falling, it visually and with the aid of its inner ear determines falling distance/orientation and angles itself upright. In addition, it speads out its body to increase drag and slow the fall. (A falling cat's terminal velocity is 60 mph whereas that of a falling man in a free-fall position is 130 mph.)

...And now I also know why they say cats have nine lives. (Go look it up!) ;)