Can Cats Cry?

For us humans, crying is an important expression of emotions. With pain, fear, grief, or even out of joy, tears flow. But can cats cry to express their feelings? Or do tears in the cats have a completely different cause?

Tears: Do Cats Cry?

Yes, the eyes of cats have a tear duct and can therefore also secrete tears. Just like in humans, tear fluid serves to moisten and protect the eye in animals. The liquid is also used to cleanse the eye and rinse out foreign bodies. From a purely biological point of view, it is, therefore, possible for the cat to cry.

Do Cats Cry When They’re Sad?

Cats feel: They have a wide range of emotions and have been shown to be able to sense emotions. However, they express their emotions differently than humans, because cats do not cry for emotional reasons.

Crying is not part of the cat’s natural communication and is not an emotional response.

This means that they do not respond with tears to feelings such as sadness, pain, frustration, joy, or happiness. They don’t cry but express their emotional states in a different way.

If the Cat’s Eyes Water: Causes

When the cat cries, from a veterinary point of view one speaks of epiphora, an increased flow of tears. Oftentimes, watery eyes are a symptom of eye disease or other health problems in the cat.

If your cat is crying, it is important to investigate the cause.

You should consult a veterinarian at the latest when the epiphora is pronounced, persists for a long time, or other symptoms such as narrowed eyes, swelling or a prolapsed nictitating membrane appear. There are a number of possible causes that can cause watery eyes in cats:

• Drafts can irritate cats’ eyes.
• Allergies are often expressed as watery or sore eyes.
• Conjunctivitis is a painful inflammation of the eyes.
• Injuries to the cornea cause tears to flow in the cat.
• Diseases caused by bacteria or viruses are irritating to the cat’s eyes.
• Foreign bodies in the eyes lead to increased tearing.
• Glaucoma or Horner syndrome can be a cause.
• Cat breeds with flat faces (e.g. Persian cats) often suffer from watery eyes for anatomical reasons.

Bottom Line: Cats Show Their Emotions in a Different Way

If the cat is crying, there are no emotional reasons behind it. Instead, tears often indicate an illness or discomfort of the eyes.

In order to understand the emotional world of the house tiger, it is important to correctly interpret the cat’s body language. Pain or sadness in cats is often expressed in abnormal behaviors such as loud meowing, which is often referred to as a kind of crying.

But also a changed posture, changed pupils, fast tail movements, and loud purring up to aggressive behavior can be signals of discomfort or pain.