Those stiff hairs on your cat’s face and legs don’t just add to her cuteness — they have real work to do. Whiskers are GPS and radar systems for your cat.
“They are a powerful and important part of how a cat senses the world,” says W. Mark Cousins, DVM, the founder of a veterinary clinic in New Orleans.
How They Work
Each thick whisker is filled with tiny, supersensitive nerves that help your cat judge distance and space. It’s how she makes decisions like: Is this box too small to get inside? How far do I need to jump to reach that counter?
It’s also how she detects what’s around her. “Cats that are blind can navigate rooms very well by just walking around and letting their whiskers get a sense of where they are spatially,” Cousins says.