German man invents 'cat cam'

June 10, 2007 Do you own a cat? Do you ever wonder what it's up to when you are not around? Well German-American Jürgen Perthold, an inventor, has created the "cat cam."

"I wanted to find out what he gets up to, where he spends his days. He goes out the whole day, sometimes he returns hungry sometimes not, sometimes with traces of fights, sometimes he also stays out all night. It gave me the idea to equip the cat with a camera," said Perthold.

The camera, which is operated by batteries and weighs 70 grams (including the batteries), is hooked onto the cat's collar and records their journeys. Operating for a maximum of two days, the camera takes a picture every minute. Perthold used his cat as a test subject and discovered his cat was visiting the neighbor's female cat on a regular basis. Perthold even wrote his own program to operate and control the camera.

The product currently ships worldwide from the United States for about US$30.00 plus shipping charges.