#acro-cats

Roux demonstrating his piano skills at Meowy Manor Kitten Rescue. From Samantha Martin, founder of the Amazing Acro-Cats and Rock Cats.

You can see our recent video of the Acro-Cats’ visit to San Francisco below.

My husband and I went to an Acro-Cats Circus on May 10th at Fort Mason. We tried to go a few years ago when they were in town but it was sold out. Well, not this time! I pounced on the tickets (pun intended). It was such a fun and amazing show and am so in awe of all the cats performing!

With cats you never know what to expect but Acro-Cats made me realize that cats are trainable. I purchased a kit with a clicker and a training stick with a guide on how to train your cats at home. Milk and Cosmo get ready! 

There were many cats in the circus and they all performed different tricks whether it’s running through hoops, pawing switches (lights up with the word APPLAUSE), pulling strings (a banner falls out that says APPLAUSE), balancing on balls, pushing a shopping cart, bowling competition, and of course, playing musical instruments! The highlight of the show was the ROCK CATS. These cats are really playing drums, keyboards, guitars, flute, etc. There was even a chicken named Cluck Norris on tambourine! You can see it was quite a show..

From Chicago to San Francisco, the Amazing Acro-Cats entertain and educate Domestic and former orphan cats take the stage highlighting remarkable intelligence and curious feline personalities of the Amazing Acro-Cats, and Tuna and the Rock-Cats. Originating in Chicago, the feline troupe travels to stages all around the countryside such as Fort Mason’s Southside Theater in San Francisco, Brooklyn…

June 20 -21, 2015

Every Thursday/Friday I will post a few weekend events that have crossed my WCVE desk and piqued my interest!

Have a great RVA (and surrounding areas) event in mind? Respond to this post with a super short description and link below.

FAMILY FRIENDLY EVENTS

6/20: Fly with a Young Eagles Pilot

I love being an adult, but man would it be cool to fly FOR FREE with my own private pilot. This event is for kids between the ages of 8 and 17.

Tickets: Free

Details: http://bit.ly/1Go4LFr

6/20: Streets Alive in Byrd Park

RVA is jumping on the global trend to shutdown a city street for a few hours to do, well, whatever you want.

Tickets: Free

Details: http://www.sportsbackers.org/events/rva-streets-alive/

6/20: Celebrate African and African American Art: All Good! at VMFA

Along with doing crafts and learning more about African and African American culture, you get to watch a FREE “Step Afrika!” performance. So cool.

Tickets: Free

Details: http://bit.ly/1evOTL0 

FRIEND FRIENDLY EVENTS

6/20: Savor Virginia & Sweet Virginia Food, Wine, Beer, and Dessert Festival on Brown’s Island

What makes Richmond so great? Probably the fact that the city has a food festival almost every weekend! 

Tickets: $15 in advance. $20 at the door. 

Details: http://www.richmond.com/events/savor-virginia/

6/20: Richmond Vegetarian Festival in Bryan Park

I wouldn’t be surprised if this event is held as a response to last week’s ‘Bacon Festival,’ but hey, I like veggies too!

Tickets: Free, but they recommend that you bring a can of veggies as a donation.

Details: http://www.veggiefest.org/

6/20: Taste of India at the Cultural Center of India

So many food festivals, so little time!!! It just seems unfair to have to pick one.

Tickets: Free

Details: http://www.cciva.org/TasteOfIndia.html

6/20: Theatre Production of “Grace and Glorie”

“A heartwarming play about a feisty 90 year-old cancer patient from the Blue Ridge Mountains and her volunteer hospice worker who is from New York.”

Tickets: $20

Details: http://www.lancasterplayers.org/

6/21:  Father’s Day Keg ‘n’ Oyster Fest at Hardywood

Thank you dad for having me (through mom of course) so I can have some delicious beer and oysters!

Tickets: No tickets. Pay separately for food and beer.

Details: http://www.hardywood.com/content/fathers-day-keg-n-oyster-fest-1

6/21: The Amazing Acro-Cats

Cats doing acrobatics. I’m intrigued by the potential, but also acutely aware of a cat’s innate personality traits. We’ll see how this goes.

Tickets:$22

Details: http://www.richmondcenterstage.com/event/amazing-acro-cats

Remember, if you go to any of these events - or are annoyed that I left something awesome out - be sure to message me below. Have a great weekend!

New Post has been published on http://www.kittenswhiskers.com/meet-the-acro-cats/

Meet the Acro-Cats!

Think you can’t really train a cat? Well, think again! The Acro-Cats, billed as Chicago’s only trained domestic cat show, will change your mind. These thirteen cats and one kitten will blow you away as they ride skateboards, walk the high wire, ring bells, roll barrels, jump through hoops, climb ropes, push a shopping cart, and even run an agility course.

One of only four “cat shows” in the United States, the marvelous Acro-Cats are trained by Samantha Martin, a pioneering feline behavioral expert. Samantha uses clicker training, which is usually associated with training dogs, to train her kitties.

Samantha Martin has had a lifetime fascination and truly unique bond with animals inspiring her extensive background including an associate degree in animal husbandry and services, internships at the Brookfield Zoo, studies in animal behavioral sciences and leading advocate of healthy, effective clicker training techniques building better relationships and solving behavioral problems.

A sub-set of the Acro-Cats is the Rock Cats, a rock group of “musical” kitties that play the guitar, the drums, the piano, and a variety of musical instruments. There’s even a chicken, named Gregory Peck, playing the tambourine.

See the Rock Cats in action:

  On Samantha’s cue, the cats perform tricks with various hoops, tumblers, hoisting flags, reading signs, even rolling balls over parallel ropes! This amazing  show also includes performing mice, rats and even a cat vs chicken bowling show-down!

The entourage travels around the US, doing performances to help raise money for animal shelters, and to help get their cats and kittens adopted. Samantha and the Acro-Cats have been responsible for the adoption of 142 cats and kittens, so far.

During her shows, Samantha demonstrates ways of creating closer bonds with your cats. She hopes to inspire people to train their cats, because as she says “they enjoy the training. They want you to work with them”.

We think she’s on to something!

This is kind of a long video (14 minutes), but in just the first 3 minutes, you can see several tricks being performed by the Amazing Acro-cats!