Feline Frolics

I have two cats and they drive me absolutely nuts. Always demanding and always getting in trouble. Today was no different. I had need of some thyme for my spice cupboard, so I snuck out at lunch and stopped by my favorite health food store that has a huge array of dried herbs and spices in bulk. I bought an ounce of thyme and some other goodies and stopped off at home to put them away. No sooner did I drop the bag on the kitchen floor and head to the 'little chemists room' did my biggest pain in the ass, Sam, discover a new toy. Yes, a small little plastic bag of thyme. By the time I got back to the kitchen, he had ripped the bag open and was squirming around on the floor in a big mess of herbs! *sigh* You'd think it was catnip or something, the way he was carrying on. Out of curiosity, I dug up information on the compound found in catnip. It turns out to be nepetalactone. Nothing I could find indicated that thyme contains this terpene. So what was Sam all worked up about? Well, the major volatile constituent of thyme is the terpene thymol. Very different structure than nepetalactone. Although thyme does not contain nepetalactone, catnip does contain significant amounds of thymol. Interestingly, thymol is also used as in ingredient to repel feral cats. Sam sure is odd.