Our feline friends have a surprisingly sharp sense of smell. Here’s how it works.
Like other animals, cats have regular olfactory (scent) receptors that pick up the aromas in the air. They also have a second “nose” hidden in the roof of their mouth called the vomeronasal organ (Trusted Source) (aka Jacobson’s organ). The receptors in this organ pick up things that the scent receptors in a cat’s nose can’t. Scientists think the information processed by this special organ serves as a cat’s sense of smell and taste.
Ever notice your cat scrunching its face or curling its lips? Don’t worry, they’re not getting aggressive. You’ve probably just witnessed a scent-sucking mechanism called the Flehmen response. This isn’t just unique to cats. Many animals use this behavior to investigate smells by opening the tiny ducts behind their incisors that lead to the vomeronasal organ.
With almost 40 times more odor-sensitive olfactory cells than humans have, it’s no wonder cats rely so heavily on their sense of smell. They use it for all kinds of things, like determining if food is safe to eat or spoiled. They also use it for:
A powerful sense of smell is one of the best hunting tools in a cat’s arsenal. Outdoor cats use it to determine if other cats have been in the area or if any mice are lurking in the alley behind their house. Indoor cats use it to identify unfamiliar animals, new people, and changes in their environment.
Cats also use their sense of smell as a chemical communication tool. When meeting other cats, they use physical greetings—like a gentle head bump or head bunt—to release pheromones from glands in their faces. These pheromones tell cats a lot about each other, including their sex, how healthy or sick they are, what they like to eat, and what sort of mood they’re in.
A cat’s vomeronasal organ mainly communicates with the part of their brain that deals with mating. It identifies pheromones to provide male and female cats with the information they need to determine if a member of the opposite sex is available. Female cats in heat exude a powerful pheromone that male cats can smell up to a mile away. Females also use their sense of smell to scope out a preferred mate by sniffing males’ territorial markings.
Cats mark places they live and visit with scent glands on their feet, cheeks, face, and tail, as well as with urine. This signals “ownership” to other animals and lets them know the cat was there long after they’ve gone. Cats also mark their territory when they feel stressed or threatened and to advertise sexual receptivity and availability. Marking (Trusted Source) can occur when your cat senses other cats in the vicinity, either outdoors or among the other cats that live in your home.
While dogs certainly have an impressive sense of smell, a cat’s sense of smell is even more powerful.
This has a lot to do with V1R, the scent receptor protein thought to be responsible for giving mammals the ability to distinguish one scent from another. Humans have two forms of this protein, dogs have nine, and cats have 30, allowing them to identify and differentiate between a larger variety of scents.
Cats’ receptor-rich noses – each packing an average of 200 million individual receptors – also make up for their lack of taste buds. In other words, cats smell their meals instead of tasting them. Dogs, in contrast, are thought to be able to taste sweet, sour, salty, and bitter flavors, much like us humans.
In general, cats do have a better sense of smell than dogs. However, there are some dog breeds, like Beagles, Basset Hounds, Belgian Malinois, German Shepherds, and Bloodhounds, that have more nasal receptors than the average cat.
It’s hard to give a precise answer to this question. One study found that domestic cats could find their way back home from a distance of 1.5 to 4 miles, so it’s safe to assume they can at least pick up scents from that distance.
Because our resting faces look the same to cats, they learn to tell us apart using sound and smell instead of sight. Every human has a distinguishable scent to cats.
Cats can recognize each other by smell, but it’s not clear for how long. Littermates exchange scents early in life to recognize each other should they get separated. Older cats use physical greetings to release pheromones from glands in their faces and learn more about each other.
A cat’s sense of smell is incredibly strong. The average cat’s nose contains 40 times more odor-sensitive cells than our own noses and twice as many scent receptors as the average dog’s.
Yes. Like dogs, cats’ acute sense of smell gives them the ability to sniff out chemical changes in both humans and other animals caused by a disease.
