At the venerable age of 26 years and 329 days, Flossie, a splendid brown and black furred kitten who lives in Orpington, a suburb in south-east London, can officially boast the title of oldest living feline in the world. Current owner Vicki says Flossie is still curious and loves to play despite her deafness and low vision.
Flossie’s life was daring. In fact, her known story of her begins way back in 1995 when she was adopted by an employee of the Merseyside hospital where she lived, stray, together with a colony of cats.
After having lived for ten years with her new family, when the owners died, she was adopted by the sister of one of them. When, 14 years later, the second owner also died, Flossie found herself homeless again.
She was 24 at the time and for three years the son of the previous owner took care of her. When he was no longer able to look after her he made the difficult decision to entrust her to the volunteers of Cats Protection’s Tunbridge Wells who found her new accommodation.
Flossie has found the companionship and love of Vicki who has experience caring for senior cats. Her previous cat, Honeybun, told the Guinness World Records website, lived to be 21: “I’ve always wanted to give older cats a comfortable life.”
The absolute record belongs to Creme Puff, the world’s oldest cat ever. Born in Texas on August 3, 1967, he died on August 6, 2005 at the extraordinary age of 38 years and 3 days.
