Caturday felid trifecta: Polish wildcat nabs Manul World Cup; cats in nativity scenes; a trio of frozen kittens rescued; and lagniappe

December 30, 2023 • 9:30 am

Myt favorite wild cat is the Pallas’s Cat, (Otocolobus manul) also known as the manul. It happens to be the fluffiest cat in the world, but with short ears that are also adaptive in its chilly habitat.  There are sixty zoos that keep them for captive breeding programs, and on manul, in Poland, has been declared the World’s Best Manul (winner of the “Manul World Cup”) after an online voting campaign. Click the article below to go to the piece from the Notes from Poland:

The nooz and a tweet:

A wild cat named Magellan (pictured above) from a zoo in Poland has been named the world’s best manul – the species to which he belongs – following a viral online campaign in Poland that saw a leading politician and even the army join efforts to help him win over 125,000 public votes.

“WE HAVE A CHAMPION!!!!! You are great! Magellan the most important and beautiful manul in the world 2023!!!!!!!!” wrote Poznań Zoo on Facebook.

They were celebrating Magellan’s victory in the Manul World Cup, an informal online contest organised to find the most popular member of the species, which is also known as Pallas’s cat and is native to Central Asia.

Magellan – who is named after the famous Portuguese explorer because he escaped from the zoo in 2020 – received around 127,000 votes in the final, narrowly defeating his rival Bol from Japan, who got around 113,000.

“Now we have to fund him a ship,” Poznań Zoo wrote after the animal’s victory, encouraging people to help raise money for a new enclosure. They noted that among Magellan’s talents is “pretending to be a stone” but that “the rest of the world annoys him”.

Among those to lend their support was Radosław Fogiel, an MP and former spokesman for the Law and Justice (PiS) party that ruled Poland until this week.

Ahead of Magellan’s semi-final against Stubsi, a rival from Germany, Fogiel tweeted: “Magellan needs you! Here’s our chance to beat the German furball in the vote!”

The 1st Warsaw Armored Brigade also encouraged people to vote while STS, the largest Polish betting company, opened online bets on the event.

Malgorzata’s translation of the post above: (with her comments in italics):

Well, it’s a bit stupid plea for donations. As you probably know, this cat, named Magellan, has won an international competition and now the ZOO where he lives wants people to donate money. Here is the translation of the words under his picture:
“I will give you exceptional thanks. Because I need a ship. Magellan without a ship is like …. Magellan without a ship. I’m wise. I know how to pretend to be a stone. The rest of the world irritates me. If I’m now the Best, I now need a ship most of all. For me not to sulk you, my faithful subjects, can exchange your votes into gold*here. Otherwise I will escap[e again.”
And underneath is a bank account where the money can be paid.
I think they wanted to make it funny but, frankly, it’s not funny. Just stupid. I wonder whether anybody will make a donation to the ZOO.

But the zoo loves Magellan. Another tweet, apparently during the voting), translated by Google:

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Here’s a seies of cats in nativity scenes, sent in by reader Grant Palmer. Every such scene needs a cat Jesus!

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And a Dodo story about the rescue of three tiny frozen kittens. In Dodoland, everything always comes out good in the end.

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Lagniappe: A calendar that you can buy here. But get it quickly, as 2024 is about to begin!

h/t: Ginger K., Grant, Malcolm

6 thoughts on “Caturday felid trifecta: Polish wildcat nabs Manul World Cup; cats in nativity scenes; a trio of frozen kittens rescued; and lagniappe”

  2. Fostering kittens must be so hard.

    My kitties follow me everywhere, like the kittens in the Dodo video do with their temporary staff. To the bathroom, onto the back of the toilet (at the most inopportune time), watchfully waiting as I shower, to the bed with me at night, to the walk-in closet, atop the table when I’m typing, and, of course, to the kitchen. But not just that, to the top of the fridge whenever I open it. People think d*gs tightly bond with their owners, but, in my experience, the bonding of some cats with their staff exceeds that of average dogs. My older kitten spends the part of his day he’s awake and not playing with his little brother, staring at me. He must know at all times where I am. Until recently, he would scream when I’d leave the apartment. (That’s why I got him a brother….)

    What’s also remarkable is that they tell me what they want. The older kitten even tells me what *type* of food he needs. (I keep the dry food in the bathroom and the wet food and treats in the kitchen. He’ll sit by what he wants when he wants it.) They pat my head if they want under the covers with me and threaten to knock over lamps, which they know they aren’t supposed to touch, if I don’t play with them on demand.

    I’m pretty sure I’m their mother to them.

    And they love each other. On the unfortunate occasions when their paws get soiled and a b*th is in order, the younger kitten will cry to protect his brother, as if to say, “Mama, that’s enough, Mama. Leave brother alone!”

    So, I think I’d have a very hard time fostering babies that followed me around, and even harder time separating kittens that are pair-bonded, like those three in the Dodo video.

    (Love Dodo!)

  3. Cool cat! My guess is that the Pallas Cat doesn’t make a good pet. Its face looks stern, not cuddly. Incidentally, there a quite a few animals named for Peter Simon Pallas according to Wikipedia, and even a meteorite is named after him. His cancellation is forthcoming.

  6. Magellan gets my vote!

    I would love to have a manul as a companion but that’s not going to happen. The nearest my wife and I got was, as a reward for having made a donation to our local zoo, we were allowed to spend a supervised half an hour in an enclosure with the zoo’s three manuls. We weren’t allowed to touch although I dearly wanted to hold out my hand for them to sniff and then scratch them behind the ear.

    We thoroughly enjoyed it but I have no idea what the manul’s thought. They stared at us with what looked like great curiosity but they could have been wondering why jerks like us kept being brought into their home without so much as a bye your leave.

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