The Cat Breed That Actually Likes Water
Imagine that you're a cat. You're going about your day, lounging about in a feline manner, when suddenly, disaster strikes and you find yourself face to face with your worst enemy. Is it a dog? An overly familiar person who doesn't seem to understand that you're not a rag doll? A poisonous fruit? Another cat, perhaps? No, it's something much worse — water.
Cats are quite famous for hating water. As Kelley Bollen of the College of Veterinary Medicine at Cornell University has told Live Science, there are several potential reasons for this. Cats like keeping their feet on solid surface, so they don't necessarily approve of the floating feeling that comes with swimming. Also, since their hair doesn't dry particularly quickly, it could be that they simply hate the sensation of being covered with wet fur. Wildlife biologist Suzanne Hetts also notes that cats are a lot less likely to be "introduced to water in a pleasant way from an early age" than dogs.
The thing is, this doesn't apply to all cats. On the contrary, many purring felines are actually rather fond of the wettest element.
Some cat breeds are wetter than others
While the Cat Fanciers' Association (via Pet Finder) doesn't name a single cat breed that enjoys water more than others, there are indeed some cat breeds that are more partial to water than the norm. The breeds they namedrop include "the Maine Coon, Turkish Angora, Japanese Bobtail, American Bobtail, Manx, Norwegian Forest Cat, American Shorthair, Turkish Van, and Bengal cats." As LisaBeth Weber of Pet MD tells us, cat behavior consultant Ingrid Johnson names Savannahs, as well as the aforementioned Turkish Vans and Bengals, as some of the most water-loving breeds, while repeating that the Maine Coon is particularly notorious when it comes to affinity with water.
Many of the same breeds, in varying orders, are also mentioned by I Heart Cats, Pet Central, and Cat Time, so ... yeah. Looks like tons of cat breeds like water, after all. Just remember that this doesn't automatically mean every individual cat of that breed is a huge H2O fan, okay?