Cat and Golden Retriever Are Outsmarted by Kitchen Mouse at Every Turn
Did you know that some people get their pets to help keep mice at bay? It's true! Known for having a strong prey drive, cats and dogs can sometimes be the best defense against a pest problem. Unless they're one cat and Golden Retriever online who seemed totally befuddled when they saw the vermin running through their house.
If their owner was expecting her cat and dog to "earn their keep" — well, that wasn't going to happen.
In the clip pet owner @frankandmur shared online, it shows the mouse being chased by both the cat and the Golden. It was running circles around them — they didn't stand a chance.
Related: Rescue Cat Adopted To Help with Mice Problem Doesn't Understand the Assignment
"You guys, somebody get the mouse!" their mother urged from behind the camera.
That was a tall order for these two. The Golden Retriever gave chase to the mouse for about...four seconds. But by the end of the clip, the two animals were cautiously sniffing the mouse, while the small mammal had come to a complete standstill.
"Two cats and a dog, not a scratch on the mouse," the woman joked in the caption.
People in the comments section were judging the animals' performance. "Not an ounce of killer instinct between the three of you," joked one person. "They lied on their resume," someone else teased. "You raised lovers not fighters mom, they are adopting him as we speak," chimed in another commenter.
Although one person has another explanation for what's going on. "That mouse maaaayy have toxoplasmosis," they wrote.
Toxoplasmosis in Mice
The commenter might be onto something here. Toxoplasmosis is an infection from a parasite known as toxoplasma gondii. Humans pick up the infection from uncooked meat or contact with cat feces. But in animals, things are slightly different.
A 2013 study in the academic journal PLoS ONE found that when mice get toxoplasmosis they lose their fear of cats. It's true. The infection completely alters something in a mouse's brain. Research showed that even months after the infection had been healed, mice no longer were afraid of cats, leading scientists to believe the change was permanent.
In this case, that probably explains why the mouse was completely nonplussed about the two large animals looming overhead. It didn't even really run, it just sort of looped around. If that is the case, then the Golden and the cat were actually pretty smart. We don't even want to think about what would've happened had they caught the mouse. And we're pretty sure their owner doesn't either.
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