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Cat Scans
What are these "cat scans"? These images are made by placing a cat on the glass scanning area of a flatbed computer scanner and then operating scanning software to capture an image of the underside of the cat. I have made several cat scans by placing kittens on my computer scanner, generally limited to three scans per kitten total during its lifetime. Cat scans were popularized on the Internet by Cliff Bleszinski. Adults wishing to learn about Cliff's Page in spite of the very strong language he sometimes uses to respond to some of his critics' flame mail are welcome to write me at: dbbusch@netrax.net.
Do cat scans hurt the cats? This breeder, who is employed as a radiation pathologist, is satisfied that cat scans do not harm the kittens and thinks the kittens would mind a cat bath much more. The light should not cause retinal and corneal burns or other eye damage, but the cats still may find it annoying and doubtless some may confuse something that is annoying to the cat with something that is harmful to the cat. My adult wegies often walk away when I flash a camera at them even though I'm sure the flash is harmless, I think the same applies to cat scans. Anyone who has had a good eye exam has had the experience of a bright light shined into the eye; this caused no harm but may have been annoying. Same principle. The UV output from fluorescent lights, the only product of the light bulb apparently capable of causing injury, is very dim compared to the UV output from sunlight; I know this from talking to a man who has researched light sources putting out UV that could harm xeroderma pigmentosum children, who are born with extreme UV sensitivity that could cause blistering sunburns after a few minutes outside in the shade. The PC scanner's bulb also puts out a little warmth (harmless) and a little visible light (also harmless but possibly annoying).
So cat scans may bother the cats even if they do not harm the cats? I would be a liar if I said I have never seen a feline act unsettled during a cat scan, but I think it is for different reasons, and if the cat is annoyed the disturbance will be very short lived, and very unlikely to be severe. Then the only question is how mean is it to cause a little annoyance for a very brief time (generally no more than three scans of a few seconds in a cat's lifetime in my case); my response is not very mean, compared to the annoyance from cat baths, cat shows, trips to the vet, extra brushings to show off cats to friends, taking flash photos of the cat to send to relatives, etc. So I think the potential for eye injury is ZERO but I don't dispute there is a potential for very brief, rather mild annoyance likely to be much less an annoyance than many other things cats much more frequently experience.
When the scanner first activates and starts pulling the fluorescent light along, the scanner vibrates noticably and this seems to make the cats more restless. This is accompanied by a little sound that some cats may care for less than others. Also, the cat is atop a glass plate with some space between the plate and the innards of the scanner, and may not feel secure, like a baby getting frightened when lying atop a pane of glass way up in the air. And of course the cat may not want the bright light, just as cats don't like camera flashes. Also, the progression of the bulb towards the scanned cat, with bright light very rapidly intensifying, could disturb the kitten. (Cliff advocates putting tiny sunglasses on cats during the scans; that would block out most of the light and certainly would change the cat's view, but the potentially annoying machine vibrations and sound would persist.)
OK, let's see your scans. Here they are (Jadzia's triplets Left, Right, and Center in one photo, followed by individual photos of her quadruplets George, Yoko, Paul, and Ringo). None of our other resident cats have been scanned. All our cats now are too large to be scanned, so no new scans for awhile, sorry.
"Cat scan" of Left, Right, and Center (depicting kittens on computer flatbed scanner). Center is bottom left (obvious tabby); Left is bottom right (white tail tip), and Right is on top. They were restless but did not all jump off the scanner during the scan.
George
Yoko
Paul (prominent umbilical cord remnant)
Ringo
