I know the earthquake was small,but is good practice for local authorities incase one comes along that is damaging . I went thru a 3.01 earthquake up in NY state, felt like a wave was rolling underneath the house even lifted under my feet as it rolled by, weird. Glad it was only a minor earthquake.

Jennifer, mine did something like that, too. I had some sort of allergy making my chest constrict, and he came up and started pushing on my chest. Nobody else believed me, but he knew.

I didn't feel a thing and my cat slept right through it, too. But she did predict my anaphylactic shock a couple of years ago (you know, like a seizure dog) so I'm satisfied. You can't have it all, you know.

My neighbor's cat phoned me at 5:00am to let me know about the impending quake. She said she heard about it from the squirrel down the street.

There are dogs in Ballard? :P

The quake didn't wake me up, but my cat was sleeping in a very odd spot when I woke up.That's interesting about talking to cats infnilizing them. Mine's pretty chatty, mostly in back-and-forth conversations with me, but she's also a serial killer, so I think she knows how to zip the lip when there's things that she thinks need killing.

Kim. Nope - no earthquake. Just a really big "imported" dog dropping a really big poop at 5:25.

Hasfrau

my thoughts exactly. i was beginning to wonder if the people blogging on here are really ballard resi's since all i see are dogs in ballard. or maybe everyone else comes to ballard to walk and let their dogs poop all over and ballard is really nothing but a cat neighborhood.

was there really an earthquake?

It woke me up. Short, but the whole house moved very suddenly. If I had a more solid bed frame I'm sure I would have slept right through it.

Bio - Me too! Based on your name I bet we are in the same field.

I felt it - I was not-quite awake and felt gentle sort of shiver/ rumble. And then feverently hoped that the viaduct was still standing...

I thought my male cat, who is a Bombay, yowled because he was anxious or upset about something. He doesn't stomp, but he does druel sometimes. My female cat does none of those. She's an angel.

I don't know if my cats felt this quake because I was sound asleep, but they have felt others and acted up about 1/2 before they hit. The acting up wasn't just yowling. It was running around like they were high on something and it lasted about 30 minutes until the quakes hit.

Barney-
I am a Western scientist, by the way. Plenty of room for superstitions and religions!

It turns out that if you acknowledge verbalization in cats while kittens, you infantilize the cat. He/she always think they are babies. In nature, only kittens meow, normally not the adults. Of course, I found this out way too late, once I had a howling adult. As he got older it got louder and LOUDER. Turns out one of the last times we went to the vet he had turned stone deaf (at 20 years old). No wonder he didn't even blink when I'd yell shut! up! He couldn't hear how loud he was.

Also, I know it seems quacky, but when I lived in LA my other cat would flip out before earthquakes. I always knew about 1/2 hour before time. The other(deaf) one, in contrast, slept through the 94 Northridge quake (6.8? I can't recall the #).

Glad I found this site - I'm finding the content very useful - thanks!

I KNOW (yelling exuberantly)! it is SO true. luckily i don't keep a baseball bat under my bed.

i don't know if my cat can "predict" them- but she sure knows how to duck and cover. unlike me- who tried in the 2001 quake to keep things from falling over.

During the 2001 quake, I had to wake our dog up to get him out of the house, which was swaying pretty well. If he knows things, he ain't telling.

Well, Elle just killed the "boy cat" theory! Ok, Elle, you have yelling and stomping, but can you complete the trifecta? Drooling? I get that, too.

I make him sound awful, but I love him to pieces. :)

Sprika, I have seen that before - I watched it with a catless co-worker, who had trouble believing that that REALLY IS HOW IT IS. She thought I was nuts.

I felt it. It felt like someone gave my bed a good 'push'...then that was it.
Oh and I don't have any cats.

I hate to sound like a kill joy but the thought of cats predicting earthquakes peaked my skepto meter. after a little googling i found this:

"The notion that unusual animal behavior can help people predict earthquakes is dismissed by most Western scientists who tend to put it in the same category as sightings of UFOs and the Loch Ness Monster."

my cat was hiding somewhere when i got up at 6am. she's usually the last one out of bed.

these cat posts cracked me up- reminds me of this video...which i'm sure most cat owners have already seen. sorry it does not demonstrates cat "yelling". http://www.webcastr.com/videos/humor/simons-cat...

ah yes, i guess we have had YELLING the past few evenings as well with my obnoxious cats. :)

my cat is a girl kitty and she yowls. it sounds like she is talking. late night yowling... and she stomps. she is a gem.

By any standards, this was a minor quake. That's why the Swedes called it a "small earthquake". We just get so few, it's bound to be a topic of discussion.

As a lifelong Seattle resident this was a minor quake.

That's it exactly, Chris - great description! Only I don't think I get the "me" part, just the OWWWWWWWWW - leading to the assumption that he was under something heavy. He always sounds so distraught! And yes, 2 am. And if I don't respond, I get a paw in the ear, or mouth, or what have you.

And then the bird wakes up, and makes the cat sound like the quiet one.

Didn't feel the quake, don't have a cat, but if I did I wouldn't find it so cute if it killed birds. But then again, I wouldn't let it outside.

So anybody out there have a dog with premonitions?

@Alonzo Neighbor -

Maybe she/he felt guilty for bringing it in and tried to help with the disposal! :) I have this other vision of them happily climbing through the window, then dropping the bird in fright when the volcano blew.

Our kitties were vocal during quakes as kittens, but seemed to get used to it as they got older. I wish I could remember how they reacted during the huge SF earthquake, but honestly I was so freaked out myself I don't remember.

Thanks Chris.

BlackSheep, no stomping... but my girl cat clicks when she walks.

Rudy (boy kitty) will stand at the opposite end of the house and cry, cry, cry. For an hour! For no reason other than to drive me crazy. But he's just so damn cute...

Possibly just a coincidence, but one of my cats starting meowing and woke me up at 5:30am. The other one was on the bed and slept right though it like I did.

@Liz - it was the toilet part. Nowadays, we find all kinds of critters in the basement, so no big deal.

I would say a kitty yell is nothing like a cute little meow. It's a deep sounding, back of the throat, whole body involed meooooooooooow. It seems to be mostly boy kitties so maybe it is some kind of instinctual mating thing.

Slept through it..

my cats are crazy so who know if the knew..but they are chatting up as storm now.

Okay - I'll bite: What is "kitty yelling"? I've been "squawked" at, hissed at, "mowww"ed at and "ieeeye?"ed at. What does a kitty yell sound like?

We slept through it. Cats and all.

I'll add my male kitty to the yelling list. Every morning about 2am. So annoying.

I felt it! No wait - that was just the Stagg Chili...

I was awake and didn't feel a thing. Kinda bummed too - I'm a SF girl and miss my little quakes. Plus, it would have made the fact that I was awake at 5am a little more acceptable.

Alonzo Neighbor, what's weird about your cat bringing in a bird? Is it the toilet part that wigged you out?

Sorry about the cold, Milo (or Milo's parent, as the case may be). Not fun.

To me, the quake felt like just one sudden thump - exactly the sort of thing that might wake you up without knowing why.

We slept through it, but our cats were acting crazy all morning. Didn't know why until I heard the news. Smart felines!

Wow. I woke up around then too but I thought it was just my annoying cold.

Yesterday, my siamese cat (milo...) was acting like more of a nut than usual. I couldn't figure out what he was squawking about, but I did joke that he was trying to tell me about an earthquake. Either that or something died in the basement.

Slept through it and if the cats were weird, I slept through that too.

We have a kitchen nook that hangs off the back of the house, inside it are some glass shelves. I was up making lunch and couldn't figure out what i had done to cause the shelves to rattle for 10+ seconds, until i came into work and saw the news online. Didn't feel anything in the rest of the house and the dog didn't say anything.

More about weird cat behavior. The morning St. Helens blew in 1983, our cat brought in a Starling through the bathroom window and dropped it in the toilet. Of course, it was still alive and had to be rescued.

Our current kitty yelled at me before 6:00 this morning, but that is nothing unusual. I didn't feel anything and that IS unusual, me being sensitive and all.

Oh, good - I'm not alone! Why all the yelling, why??? But if I'm calling him, or about to trip over him? Not a sound...

Does yours stomp his feet when he walks, too?

I didn't feel a thing.

About the cats being weird... back in the day, BEFORE the one in 2001, a small earthquake happened. My dog was pacing the living room, back and forth, back and forth, the entire evening. They KNOW things, man.

And BlackSheep... my boy cat likes to yell, too. God, it's so annoying!

You can also read about seismicity in the Pacific Northwest at pnsn.org, which is based at UW.

USGS local page. There's a link for reporting. We didn't feel it, but our cats did.

Evan, the 2001 quake was a 6.8.

"We expect up to the minute cat predictions on the blog."

That is an awesome idea.

KOMO is horribly over-dramatic. They scared me once with their drama, which turned out to be nothing - I haven't watched their station since.

I didn't feel it, but I *did* wake up right at 5:25 this morning before falling back asleep.

Slept right through it I guess... What was the magnitude of the 2001 quake again? Does anyone remember?

That is weird about your cats Mr & Mrs G. We expect up to the minute cat predictions on the blog. Maybe a sidebar. :)

“Bet we’re gonna have an earthquake.”

That IS weird, but I've heard that they can tell!

I used to always think we were going to have an earthquake, until I realized that my cat is just always weird. He was yelling enough this morning (about 20 minutes before the earthquake) that I tracked him down and asked what was up, but that's hardly unusual around here. He likes to yell.

Didn't feel it at all, but if you were watching Channel 4, they went into full disaster mode almost immediately. Overkill much?

To clarify - Mr. Geeky Swede slept through it. I was up feeding Kai, but I didn't feel a thing. (side note: I'm a morning person so I'm always up early. I'm not knocking the Mr. for sleeping. He does the late feeding.)

Last night one of our cats was acting really strange. Mr. Geeky Swede says, "Bet we're gonna have an earthquake." Weird.

I did! I was just sitting down to start work, and it felt like somebody shoved the house - once, and hard. I looked up, and the fish were sloshing around...