Why does my cat dig at his water bowl?
Edison Volkman
2025-06-10 14:04:16
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: 15
Your cat poking its paw into its water bowl is a perfect example of such questionable quirks. Why is your cat using its paw to drink, don’t cats usually use their tongues to lap up the water. Your cat’s whiskers are very sensitive, they’re rich in nerve endings that aid your cat’s vision and help them sense the environment around them. If your cat’s water bowl is too narrow or deep, their whiskers squash against the sides, this is uncomfortable for your cat. The constant stimulation of those nerve endings overwhelms their senses, resulting in your cat to use their paws instead to avoid discomfort. Cats are very fussy, any change to the status quo can lead to yowls of displeasure and strange behavior, such as paw dipping. If you’re inconsistent in how much water you pour into your cat’s bowl, your furbaby might use their paw to test the depth of the water, checking to see if you’ve topped it up to the level they’re used to. Many cats dislike being backed into a corner, it sounds all kinds of alarm bells inside their brains, if their water bowl is up against the wall, they’ll have their back to the rest of the room while drinking. This makes your cat feel vulnerable if they lower their head to drinking normally, they wouldn’t be able to see the rest of the room, and thus couldn’t look out for potential dangers, as a result, they use their paws instead so they can still keep an eye out.
Lula Hoppe
2025-06-10 11:58:04
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: 8
Pawing at, playing with or even splashing in a water dish is not as unusual for cats as you might think. Though the conventional wisdom might dictate otherwise, some cats love water –– as long as it’s not aimed at them, as it is during a bath, and consider water a fun toy. They love its reflective surface and the way it splashes when they hit it. To some cats, that means moving water is preferable to the sort that sits still in a dish for hours. Cats who splash their water before drinking may, in fact, be attempting to achieve a similar effect.
Curt Bartoletti
2025-06-10 10:59:45
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: 5
A cat has its ancestry in the wild cats who needed to find their drinks from little pools of water covered with fallen leaves and whatnot. Clearing the water of debris gives the cat a water surface that is open to drink from. This would be a case of cat's instincts and there's nothing we can do about it. Finding the actual surface of the still standing water is a challenge best defeated by using a paw to find the plane where air and water meet. One could speculate that it is undesirable to dip your nose into water, so the exact level of water surface is important to find. Some cats even check for ground level first, so scraping around the water bowl is needed to measure the distance between ground and water surface. Digging in the water could indicate a smell in the water or bowl. Chlorine or iron rust can give normal tap water a strong smell that we humans might notice or not. A cat digging around its water bowl could indicate that the cat is not happy with the location of the bowl.
Pete Brakus
2025-06-10 10:00:02
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: 13
They have to paw and splash at the water first. Water might be an essential part of every day life but it seems playing with water is also a big part of every day. But all that poking and prodding does actually serve a purpose. Firstly, dogs and (especially) cats instinctively know that still, stagnant water can be a dangerous breeding ground for bacteria and parasites so that pawing at the water is basically a depth, temperature and water quality check. It also gets the water moving which immediately makes it more appealing to drink. Cats instinctively don’t like putting their head through a space where those highly sensitive hairs touch the side walls. So for bowls with high sides (or that are close to empty) the paw is deployed as a bit of a dipstick.
Larry Abernathy
2025-06-10 08:05:46
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: 16
Your cat's digging could simply be a genetic instinct shared with their big cat relatives. Wild cats tend to bury their food, either to save it for later or to protect it from being eaten by others as well as to deter predators. Cats are short sighted and are unable to see well, making it hard for them to judge where exactly the water is in their bowl. They will use their paws to create ripples making it easier to see the water. If you use a glass or metal bowl, this perpetuates the issue further, so make a switch to a ceramic bowl or one that is patterned. Alternatively, you could consider investing in a water fountain. They particularly appeal to cats as they love drinking from outside water sources.
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