As Halloween approaches, not everyone is ready to get into the spooky spirit. A ginger cat from San Francisco has left people in stitches after he reacted to his family’s spooky feline decor.
Zoe, who didn’t give a surname, put up her Halloween decorations which included a festive black cat cut-out on the wall. But the family’s 9-year-old cat Milo wasn’t so sure.
At first, Milo’s tail puffed up in fear as he cautiously approached the decoration mounted on the living room wall. But the startled cat soon found his courage, reaching out to tap—and even bite—the “scary new cat.”
“He noticed the decoration about 10 minutes after I put it up,” Zoe told Newsweek. “My boyfriend and I were watching Tremors, and I had just taken a bite of a cookie when I looked over and saw Milo all puffed and slowly approaching the scary cat decoration. I love when his tail is puffed so I scrambled for the camera.”
According to feline behavior experts, when a cat’s tail suddenly “poofs” with its fur standing on end, this reflex—called piloerection—is a classic sign of alarm or self-defense. As one article from the veterinary site PetMD explains, the puffed-up tail usually appears when a cat is “startled or frightened by a sudden, severe threat… the hair stands on end so the cat can appear larger.”
To make sure everything was in order, Milo proceeded to “attack” the black cat on the wall, giving it a few well-placed pats and even trying to bite the leg.
“Right after he attacked it, he realized it wasn’t a threat and hasn’t paid attention to it since,” Zoe said. “He did cuddle me right after, and he seemed like he was proud of himself.”
The moment has gained more than 500,000 views on Instagram, leaving people in stitches in the comments.
“He really showed him,” said one commenter. While another joked: “What a brave boy.”
“Don’t let that paper kitty get away with hanging around,” said one commenter. While another cat lover wrote: “Biting the leg is cracking me up.”
One cat owner even shared their own story about their pet’s reaction to a decoration. “We put up the same decoration and our orange boy also went into puffed-tail kill mode,” they wrote.
Milo has since returned to his usual, unbothered self, but the moment has delighted viewers and served as a reminder that spooky decorations aren’t just for humans.
This isn’t the first time a Halloween decoration has proved a little bit to much for a pet. Like one cat who had a daily fight with her owner’s spooky decor, or when one woman was forced to hide her spooky decoration from the family’s golden retriever.