This furry fella is Samson aka Catstradamus, aka your new Meow the Cat: a viral-sensation fat-cat currently winning the publicity game. Samson lives in New York with his human, Jonathan Zurbel, who created a special Instagram account for photos of the giant beast – go here to see. Samson has also gotten some good press in the past few weeks, including write-ups in the New York Post, E! Online, The Dodo and Inside Edition. Samson has a better publicist than Lindsay Lohan, let’s just say that. Samson is being billed as “the biggest cat in New York,” and OMG can you imagine living with this cat in a small New York apartment? He would eat you!!!
According to the NY Post and Cat-Daddy Jonathan, Samson is a “purebred Maine Coon,” which I don’t believe for a second. My mom had two Maine Coons and while Samson’s long hair is very Maine Coon, I just have my doubts that this cat is a purebred Maine Coon. I think he’s like a Maine Coon-lynx hybrid or something. He’s some genetic anomaly. He’s like a mutant: X-Men Kitty. Samson is 4 years old and weighs 28 pounds, but he looks bigger because he’s got so much fur. Obviously, Samson’s daddy told the Post: “He plays an excellent game of fetch, and he follows me from room to room and lays nearby, much like a dog.” That’s because he’s not a cat!!! Here’s one of the crazier parts to this story:
Caring for such a colossal kitty isn’t easy. He goes through up to six cans of wet food a day and several bags of dry food every week. He also goes through nearly 4 pounds of litter a week, and requires a $120 grooming every few months to look his fluffy best. Zurbel says the colossal kitty is worth the trouble.
“He’s a very good cat,” he says. “He’s affectionate and sweet.”
But even though he tips the scales at 28 pounds, don’t call Samson a fat cat.
“He is genuinely long, broad, heavy and strong. He’s big and well-proportioned. He’s a real big Maine coon,” says his groomer, Carolyn Ayala. “I have groomed many obese cats but [he’s] not the same . . . He is the Fabio of cats. He’s a gentle giant.”
Yeah, he’s not fat, he’s fluffy! No, after eating all of that food, I think Samson probably is a bit zaftig. Seriously though, Maine Coons are very friendly cats. My mom’s current Maine Coon is so vocal and, dare I say, pushy and overly-familiar. Like, no, Susie, I don’t want your six-toed paw in my dinner. No, I don’t want you to touch my face with your claws out so I’ll pay attention. No, I don’t want you to lick my eyeball. Imagine that… Samson coming for your eyeball.
Photos courtesy of Samson’s Instagram.
https://www.instagram.com/catstradamus/
Not believing Samson only weighs 28 pounds. That animal is huge. And he eats a lot.
My Maine Coon never shuts up. Even when sleeping, she snores.
She is snoring right now. Loudly.
My neighbor has a cat that looks so similar to Samson, though I don’t know if he’s a Maine Coon, and he’s HUGE (his name is Romeo). He does have very long fur, so she claims he’s “only” 22 pounds, but to me Romeo looks like a walking ottoman. There’s only so far you can go when you claim that most of it is fur, hahahaha.
Our Maine Coon is pretty vocal, but our Siamese out vocalizes everyone in the house.
Tell me about it my Siamese is the same way. It’s ten times worse when I go on vacation and he says at my friends house. From the moment I pick him up its none stop meowing for at least a week.
I’ve always heard that Siamese love to talk. I’m in the same boat as you guys in that my younger Scottish Fold NEVER shuts up. He has such a range of different meows too.
Siamese are GORGEOUS kitties BTW (but aren’t they all?) and as a fan of “The Cat Who..” series as a kid, I always wanted a Siamese 🙂
@ Kittien
OMG the range 😅 my cat go from normal meowing to you not paying attention to me I’m dying high pitched meowing 😩 He such a little drama king.
We had a Siamese when I was a kid. She used to sit on the wall at the front of our house and complain to all our neighbours as they passed by.
If we ever pissed her off – and it was very easy to piss her off! – she would get up in our apple tree and from there to the garage roof and from there to the roof of our house. Once right at the top, she would miaow for England pretending she couldn’t get down. We lost count of the times people knocked on the door to ask if we knew there was a cat stuck on our roof. She would wait until my dad was shamed into climbing a ladder to coax her down, then calmly retrace her original route, come in and miaow for some food.
She also walked with me and my brother most of the way to our elementary school every morning (ok, it was only two streets away, but still).
I bawled my eyes out when she died. We planted a plum tree for her!
My Maine Coon watches for me to return home from work from a second floor window each night. In the summer, when the window is open, I can hear her screaming for me from about three blocks away. She brays like a donkey. As I walk along, listening to my cat braying in the distance, I hear passersby wondering what the hell that noise is and where is it coming from.
@lilacflowers i am DYING laughing at your comment. “she brays like a donkey” had me in stitches.
Siamese don’t shut up. Neither do Bengals or Burmese. My former feral mongrel is silent unless he wants to play at 4:00 AM, at which time he can produce an exquisitely scaled escalating whine-groan that would wake the most righteous sleeper.
I have a 4 year old 7 pound tuxedo who we can hear from the corner of our street. We believe she’s got some oriental breed in her though just because she’s so petite. Our huge moggy boy barely makes a peep, what are the odds.
@lilacflowers
Not believing that either. Look at his belly, the cat is clearly overweight!! 🙁 They’re feeding him too much stuff in my opinion, 6 cans a day??? Mine get two pouches a day (for two cats)…. and two bowls of dry food a day…
My boy is about 20 pounds but he’s also very long; he is constantly chirping around the house and he snores too. The girl is a tiny bundle of fluff, she was always small (9 pounds) but she’s super vocal and we wonder where all that voice comes from!!
I have a 90lb bulldog, and my dog doesn’t eat that much! They’re doing that cat a great disservice by feeding him so much.
That seems like waaaaaaaaay too much food for a 28lb cat. Either they are lying about the weight or how much they actually feed him. Something ain’t right!
I think his over feeding his cat, that’s why it so big. Also, my cat goes out on walks with me and my dog.
Yours too, @Lilac? Mine does this combination snore/chirp when she’s sleeping that makes me laugh until I usually wake her up. Then it’s the Maine Coon patented “death stare”.
Sophie’s only a solid 12 pounds, but when she stands against the wall to chase her laser dot, she is over 3 feet tall fully extended. With paws as big as the palms of my hands. And does anyone else’s MC fetch? She does, which is an endless source of amusement for my non-cat owning friends.
@Delphi
My boy fetches, usually paper or foil balls. My girl used to do it as a kitten but then she stopped.
My MC is a mix. I don’t have a pure bred or anything. He doesn’t fetch, but my oriental mix does. My MC cuddles. That’s his purpose in life. Mine is not a super confident kitty, but he’s come along leaps and bounds since I adopted him. I’m constantly amazed at how large he is. He so solid, but he’s very delicate in his actions. His landings are always spot on. He is focused.
My oriental mix is crazy. He’s the one that follows me everywhere, plays fetch, goes outside for walks, learns tricks, gets into everything, etc. His landings are usually a lot more precarious and while he’s tiny and only weighs 8 lbs (to the MC mix’s 15), he’s longer than my MC. I always expect him to be the graceful surefooted one, but he’s the one scrambling on his landings and being all kinds of crazy.
I don’t have a Maine Coon, but my Siamese fetches.
My purebred muttuxedo kitty Lu is much too dignified to fetch. She yowls until you bring it to her.
Mine fetches.
Oh yes! She loves to fetch. She also loves to play soccer. She is really good ball handler. And when she stretches out, she is quite long.
She also likes to sit on the front step like a meerkat so she can see out the front door screen without being seen.
My late, beloved Maine Coon, Sylvia, was never that big, and her ears never sported those really long guard hairs. My bet is that there is a mix of some exotic in Catstradamus, too. He’s a big boy, but really pretty. *slinks off to mourn Sylvia – she snored almost as loudly as PunkDaddy*
Aw, PunkyMomma, I had a Maine Coon as well and was so very sad when he died. It was over 5 years ago, and I still miss him every day!
And if Catstradamus is a pure bred, then he’s really poorly bred! Maine Coone’s have a very distinctive facial type, and his is all wrong for the breed. Definitely some mixing going on, although the owners may not even be aware of it if they weren’t the breeders!
I think it’s a mix of main coon and Norwegian Forest Cat. I had a cat I beleive to be that mix. She had the tufted ears like a Lynx. She was huge and had really green eyes. The vet and groomer said she was a mix of at least two exotic long haired breeds. She had three layers of different fur. I’m convinced that’s the male version of my Mena!
My MC was a talker (and snorer), too. But he was put to shame by my Siamese! lol
Samson looks exactly like our Norwegian Forest rescue cat, actually — who is huge and not fat. She was shaved at the vet with a lion cut for summer two years ago and they were shocked at how slender she was under the fur — she is all smooth muscle, like a horse, and is large enough nose to giant tail to weigh in at 17 lbs. HUGE kitty.
Our 15 yr old Maine Coon is solid and 12 lbs., vet says she cannot lose more weight, we want her stable.
BUT my former Norwegian Forest cat was 23 lbs, no fat, just lean and huge frame, 36 inches nose to tail per vet. Dog size; his best pal was a Bernese Mtn dog. People in the Munich airport or my village took my cat’s picture all the time. One French man dropped his laptop in shock. He once chased a German policeman away from bothering our elderly neighbors about parking one inch on gravel… just chased that policeman up the road. The shocked man ran, never bothered my neighbors again! He was like a bodyguard cat, ha.
SO….I believe it is possible.
I love it! I have always wanted a Norwegian Forest Cat!
That’s just scary and creepy.
I think they overfeed him a bit. I am no cat expert, but it doesn’t seem right the amount of food they give him. Someone correct me if I’m wrong. 🙂
I think they overfeed him a lot. My small Maine Coon gets one small bowl of dry food each morning. My cousin has two large male Maine Coons (20 pounds each) and they also just get one bowl of dry food each day.
Our maine coon gets a small bowl of dry and a tiny bit of wet every day and he’s 23 pounds (he outweighs and outsizes 2 of our scotties). They have been known to get pretty darned big sometimes.
@paranormalgirl
He is too fat. Big doesn’t equal overweight, look at his size around the belly…. that’s huge. Maine Coons are supposed to become big but that means structurally big, bones and joints included. Friend of mine can’t stop feeding her older Maine Coon, he is now 31 pounds… she could not even carry him to the vets in an emergency, they had to buy a trolley.
Both of mine are a lot smaller and I struggle to take the boy to the vets because him and the carrier together weigh 25 – odd pounds.
Oh no… that cat is absolutely fat. I never said he wasn’t. I was, in fact, commenting on how overfed he is, getting 6 cans of food a day. My cat is is not fat. Mine is where he should be weight wise for his size, according to his vet.
Regardless of what *you* feed your cat, they are infamous for smooching up to neighbours or stealing the food of other pets in the area. They might not feed him too much but it’s possible others do!
Yeah, they are overfeeding him. You can tell in pictures that he is overweight. Yes, I’m sure he has a big frame, but his belly is too big. When I first read this story, I thought, “I’m curious what the vet would say about his weight and the amount he’s eating.” Even at a healthy weight, he would still be large, but at the rate they are feeding him, he’s going to have serious health problems.
We had a very tall, very broad 25 lb cat who didn’t eat even close to that much, and he was chubby. Sounds like over feeding to me too.
Maine Coons are the largest domesticated cat breed in the world. It is not unheard of for some males to grow extremely large.
Largest breed: yes. An excuse to over – feed them: no.
That cat is clearly overweight!! Poor kitty, he won’t fair well when he gets old….
I was talking about his length and his height and bone structure. He needn’t be crossbred with any other big cat to reach that size. I agree that Samson has too much body fat and is overweight, which is a separate issue. His human is overfeeding him.
I have a MC, he may not be full blooded, but in his younger years he weighed about 28-30 pounds. He not only follows me around, but he also walks with the neighbors while they are walking their dogs. He talks non stop and is always in bed with me most nights. He sleeps in my nook of my leg, which proves to be difficult if I need to get up. Furthermore, he is quite the hunter. He has brought me gifts, large rabbits, small Hawks, birds and other creatures. I adopted him from the local shelter in 2002 and he is still going strong. He climbs our 12′ brick wall to gain access to the backyard. Our house is situated as a build out in the attic and when my son is on the roof to string lights for the holidays, he is up there with him.
That big belly needs to be rubbed!
That’s what I’m saying! This cat is beautiful. I agree that he might need to go on a diet but gosh is he a pretty kitty 🙂
Yup! He is so damn cute. I’m a cat lady allergic to cats 🙁 so I get my fix looking at other peoples beautiful kitties. That makes me sound like a perv lol. Seriously, he is a gorgeous cat though.
I am allergic to everything, but I am not allergic to cats, I love to see cat men.
From a cat lady…
I think Sampson should have his own button on CB.
I need to hear Samson.
https://youtu.be/2GDfbuAdnXI
He doesn’t talk in this, but the fridge is cute!
Is it wrong to be in love with a cat ?
If so I don’t care, cat shame away.
Not wrong at all!
No not at all! C/B is a place for cat love, no cat shaming here. 😉
Maine Coons are known for playing fetch and wanting to be in the same room as their person/people. They are famous for their “doglike” personalities, which is how a lot of breeders and fanciers describe them. My MC was just that. He even went for walks with me in the forest trails like a loyal pooch. And killed and ate bugs when I called and pointed. BEST CAT. Nothing unusual about Samson there. Textbook!
I’m jealous that yours killed bugs. Mine just sits there looking at the bugs and then looking at the humans like “you gonna take care of this thing? Cuz I’m not.”
My cat used to catch crickets, and would grab flies out of mid air. Now she gives me the look you are describing.
Mine follows bugs around, totally fascinated by them. Last summer, she seemed to be keeping a lady bug as a pet out on our front porch all last summer. She would lick it occasionally but otherwise, leave it alone. She will also walk on a leash and greets visitors at the door, much like a dog.
Yep Godwina, just Maine Coon textbook!!
@paranormalgirl my boy is like your cat, just sitting there. My girl kills all the bugs around though, I don’t have woodlice or spiders or flies that escape her attention. … in the morning I’m sweeping a graveyard of insects.
I have a tiny little black and white girl that must have some Maine Coon in her. She is SO VOCAL, she cannot be separated from her humans if we’re home, she licks us and plays with us like a dog, and sleeps on our chests and paws our faces. She’s short-haired but she has the MC Lynx-like ear tips. Our other two cats are much more standard-issue house cats.
It just occurred to me that my commenting name is in fact the name of the cat I was just describing.
I have had many ordinary domestic short-hair cats over my lifetime but never a Maine Coon. Several of my cats played fetch, all of my cats hung around with me and followed me from room to room, and every cat greeted me at the door when I came home. I never thought they were ‘like dogs.’
My cat has always been top dog in our houseful of dogs. She’s busy training the new dog now.
My mix HATES bugs and he routinely stalks around the house looking for them. He is an amazing bug hunter! I love it. I don’t know how he does it, but he just knows if one is in another room. He doesn’t play fetch but is an expert cuddler.
*turns laptop screen so that Young Cat can’t see this giant*
Hahahahahahahahahaha
Samson is gorgeous! Reason #34,716 I love celebitchy: cat threads!
Also, Kaiser, I feel you on the overly-pawsy cat comment. Neither of my cats are Maine Coons but my snuffly Persian likes to head butt me in the face, and my long-haired tabby eats hair, gives me “loving” claw-pats to the lip, and sticks her paws in my food. And they both like to lie butt-side down on my pillows. #catslave
Ugh, think of cleaning the cat box after that giant has used it.
*Immediately loses cat crush*
Yep and several times a day too, considering how much they feed him. I hope they put his stuff in a separate room lol
I need to know what litter box they use! My 15 lbs cat uses an XL one and that’s almost too small for him.
What a majestic beast
Senior Cat looks like a Maine Coon cat who never grew into his feet. He was probably 12 lbs max in his prime but really fluffy with huge paws and feet. I had never seen such large paws before, I was used to the standard cat paw size. Now he’s quite geriatric and bony, probably only about 7 lbs but happy. Still fluffy enough that other people don’t realize what a lightweight he’s become in recent years. His foster daughter now outweighs him considerably and she’s a normal sized short haired female. I think she now lets him win the boxing and wrestling matches….
I would bet he’s a Norwegian Forest Cat. I have one named Beastie and Samson looks a lot like this breed. The Norwegian Forest Cat is that country’s every day house cat and they are very large kitties. Wegies (as they’re known) are sweet and gentle – I love mine!
Just do a search for them online – you’ll see what I’m talking about.
I have a Wegie cross! He is indeed very sweet and gentle, but also very curious and a bit naughty. He walks on a leash and jumps into the shower with me!
We have tried to walk Beastie, but she doesn’t actually walk. She will lay for a while, jump up and move to another spot. If I lived near the woods and we could do “walkabouts” without a leash, I think it would be ideal. She doesn’t hate the harness, but she doesn’t love it either.
Beastie likes water too. I think she’d love to get in the tub with me!
I am LOVING this controversy. Is he or isn’t he? The public may never know.
Me tooooooo lol
Love him!!
We are looking to get a Maine Coon and one of the ladies I have spoken too has ones that are XXXL. The male is almost 30 pounds and the queen is 24. Those are huge cats, which is exactly what we are looking for. We are also looking into Coon rescue but so far, the only ones that we have found are in the US and getting them to Northern Canada can be difficult. Still, we would love to rescue one so the footwork for that has started too. So excited!
We just adopted two rescue kittens and one is part maine coon. Such an adorable cuddle bug. I’m noticing, however, that he takes after my Labrador when it comes to eating. He is a bottomless pit. I’m indulging it a little right now because he is growing like a weed but that won’t be his forever reality.
I’m revolted by how much Catstradamus is being fed.
I should have added to my post that one of the offspring of the cattery that we have been talking to is almost 40 pounds. He is HUGE and he is gorgeous.
I have two purebred Maine Coons, a red mackeral and a silver classic tabby with white. Ozzy, the red, is about 22 lbs with the big mane and huge tail. Homer, the silver, has very silky hair and is tall and lanky, but only about 14 lbs. He snores like a bulldog. They follows us around constantly and have to be near you, but not necessarily on you. Prolific talkers as well. Homer trills, Ozzy does not. They share maternal genes, but are very different from each other.
We have a cat that, last time we weighed him, clocked in at 20 pounds even. But he’s not fat – he’s very muscular and doesn’t have a great deal of fat on him, as far as we can tell. But that doesn’t stop the vet from saying we really need to put him on a special diet. The problem is that he also own his brother, who, while large, is not anywhere the size of Kang. And he eats regular food, and Kang will absolutely dominate him to get at the regular food, as opposed to the “weight control” stuff we put out for him. So now they have to eat in separate rooms. He also can’t enjoy a single scrap of human food (it’s not routine, but if my husband makes a sandwich, he’ll toss Kodos a piece of lunchmeat occasionally – Kang is now banned from lunchmeat forever because he will kind of attack you for it). So having a big eater cat is NOT always fun!
@Sam, I love the name Kang for a beastly bottomless pit of a cat. Inspired naming 🙂
Seems as if the cat is being fed too much. Our vet would definitely not approve of that much food for one cat a day.
We have two white Maine Coons, brothers. They are 8 years old and the best cats we’ve ever had. They are very dog-like which is great! They are 15 pounds and lean. Beautiful fur, extra toes on their paws, and ‘odd-eyed’ (one blue, one gold). Tuffs of hair on the top of their ears, and very long fluffy tails. They pretty much run the household here. Such a joy to have around!
Articles about animals need to be more of a thing here.
Just not about cats….
My girlfriend’s Maine Coon weighs almost 25 pounds. They are among the biggest if not the biggest of domestic cats.
I have a Maine Coon mix, but she’s only six pounds fully grown. She’s really enthusiastic about human food and gets upset if she sees me giving treats to the dog but no her.
I have a Maine Coon, but he’s not that big. Mine is around 19 pounds. And very, very playful and talkative.
Omg what an amazing cat! Love this post!
That’s a gorgeous cat!
LOVE this kitty!
He’s so FLUFFY!!!!!!! That is one big cat.
Speaking of fluffy kitties my neighbor’s barn cat recently had 4 of the sweetest little kittens, and they love to play on my driveway. My daughter is desperate to have one, but I explained you can’t steal people’s cats. Frankly though Id love to take them. She’s a meanie and doesn’t deserve them. She has on more than one occasion taken our dogs to the pound after they ran on her property. Mind you she knows they are our dogs, they have tags, and her property is directly next to ours. But she drove them 20 miles away to the pound rather than walking up our driveway. Turd. Whatever, sometimes I let her big cats come in and play at our house for a bit before sending them home:) They are big and fluffy and super sweet
Samson is a handsome lad. Also, I’m loving all the cat stories.
I wish I could post a pic. I have 2 Maine Coons, one is slightly bigger than the average house cat and the other is huge. She weighs (yes she) 9.8kg (21.56lbs) and stretched out is over a metre. She has the typical MC tips or what you like to call Lynx ears and she’s solid blue. Her father weighs just over 11 kgs (24.52lbs). She comes from large German lines. Her dad is a German import. My girl is magnificent and vet-certified correct weight for her boning and size. And if I posted a pic, you’d all want her. And I also have 4 rescues, including 2 deaf ones. Crazy cat lady parks here😂😂😂
Does anyone have a cat that drools? Mine did, when there was food, when she was being petted, and when she demanded a chin scratch. She wasn’t much of a cuddler but man was she vocal! Never. Stopped. Talking. Her favourite spot was sleeping on the end of the couch, and she would wake up when I was going to bed and demand a chin scratch. And I’d have to sit there and scratch her chin until she went back to sleep. I miss those nighttime chin scratches! 🙁
I have two!
As per the video ‘so your cat wants a massage’ (can be found on youtube), drooling while being patted is an unconscious form of approval. The cat is enjoying being touched so much that it’s forgetting to swallow.
Could we have the option of sharing pics of our cats (and/or pets in general)? I want you all to see my tabby!
He is gorgeous, but if I saw one strutting across my yard at night, it would be rather alarming.
My cat, who was 20 when he passed this June 26th, was heavier than this guy. Mind you he was all skin and bones at that time.
I very much doubt he’s a lynx hybrid, Maine Coons can just be enormous. I had a shelter kitty who I am positive was part Maine Coon and he was just enormous. He had such a long body that he could stand on his back legs and touch to top of the kitchen counter with his front paws. As in his paws would be over the top of the counter and resting flat against the top surface.
They’re the biggest breed of cat in the world.