Is there a scientifically professional term for “catloaf”?
meowoaf? 
faoltac 
In the veterinary world they call it: “Why did you cut your cat’s legs off, you monster?”
Ask this guy. He’s been around the world and seen it all.
Surely there is a more technically-minded term other than “loaf”.
Isn’t there a feline branch of veterinary kinesiology, or something?
You took the words right out of my mouth (and saved me cruising the net looking for this cartoon).
My daughter has drawn distinctions among the different types of meat loaf positions and devised a scoring system for them. The one Nano posted at the beginning of the thread would be a perfect 10 lazy meat loaf. This is because there’s no visual evidence of any limbs. The not-lazy meat loaf displays just the toes of the forepaws.
And the Earth trembled beneath his feet.
My wife’s DVM has provided her with no such term.
Let’s make one up.
Feline Isothermic Reaction?
Whole-body Cremasteric Reflex?
Nyuk.
Well, I was thinking more along the lines of the fact that “crouch” doesn’t cover it. To me a crouch is a more hunched, tensed condition, very ready to move. No, the loaf posture is a relaxed, if contained, position. And “sit”? Cats have a number of positions you could call that. There’s the upright sitting,
the hunkering (close to a crouch, true, but it’s matter-of-fact, without the wariness),
and the “sphinx” sitting postures
(to say nothing of those that sit like humans).
I really think Anglophone catfanciers need a more precise nomenclature for the various aspects of feline repose. Chas’s daughter, for one, seems to have arrived at an intuitive grasp of the import of this deficit. I suppose “loaf” could do for the pic in the OP, but the word seems so…I dunno…over-fanciful. Too Food Network. Or something.
Kind of similar to a nesting chicken.
Totally creeped out. Thank God there’s a beagle at the foot of my bed.
It has never bothered me. I must admit, “over-fanciful” is not a term that I’ve ever applied to anything feline related.
I beg your pardon??
Chickenloaf
These are too small to be meatloaves, but they do look like some sort of ellipsoid.
Snow-ball birds?
Not exactly loafing. . .!
Bob