Difference Between Male and Female Cats

Male vs Female Cats  | Tomcat vs Molly

Cats are attractive and mischievous-looking companion animals of man. The association of cats with humans dates back more than 9,000 years. The ancient Egyptian drawings represent the cultural importance of the cat and their strong relationship with man. However, males and females of cats differ from each other mainly in their anatomy, physiology, and behaviors. People adore males or females depending on their preferences.

Male Cat

The male cat, known as Tomcat, is slightly larger in body size and their temperaments are sometimes strange, and towards the aggressiveness. Testosterone hormone is secreted in males, and that causes their aggression. Aggression more often ends in a fight resulting bruises and wounds. Males usually like to live solitary lives, and as they grow up, roaming becomes more preferred. Generally, the intact males are aggressive than the neutered cats. Most obvious feature of the male is the genital anatomy, which is slightly different from some other animals as their penis has characteristic calcium spikes those help to stimulate the female’s genitals while they are mating. Tomcat bites the dorsal area of the female’s neck, and which is another characteristic behaviour of cats. Usually, males are notorious for their selfish and cunning nature in addition to aggressiveness. Territorial behaviours are more common in males and they urinate to demarcate their territories, both inside and outside houses. Roaming is another male specific behaviour in which, they go out in search of females to mate with. However, neutered males are not aggressive as a result of lack of testosterone production inside body. Therefore, many pet owners sterilize their male cats to have them stuck to homes.

Female Cat

A female cat is called Queen as well as Molly. They are friendly with their owners and attached to home more often than not. Testosterone secretion does not take place hence, queens do not exhibit aggressive behaviours neither towards owners nor others. As a measure of parental care, queen exhibits a strong temperament only during lactating periods. Cats are fast breeders because, queens become reproductively receptive in every three months. When they come to heat, the vocal communications with males have been observed and studied. Usually, a queen does not allow tomcat to mate if she is not in heat. After mating is completed, the queen thoroughly washes her vulva region, and during this time she never lets the tomcat to mate. After about a half an hour the queen is ready to mate with another male, i.e. they are super fecund. Gestation is a little more than two months (9 – 10 weeks), and a female delivers three or four kittens at one delivery. Kittens in one litter may have different fathers because the queen is super fecund. Weaning occurs after about 12 weeks from delivery and the queen will be ready to mate again by that time. Although females are not aggressive, they don’t allow males to mate unless they are in heat.

What’s the difference between Male and Female Cats?

In comparing the major characteristics of male and female cats, the following points are significant between them.