Cats are known for the whiskers on their faces. However, if you look closely, you can see that they also have whiskers on their legs. So why do cats have leg whiskers?
To answer why they're useful, it's important to understand what whiskers are. Technically known as vibrissae, whiskers are specialized hairs that are stiffer and several times thicker than other hairs. Although whiskers themselves do not contain nerves, their bases are rooted in specialized receptacles loaded with nerve endings, making whiskers very sensitive.
"Facial whiskers are as sensitive as human fingertips," Robyn Grant, a sensory biologist at Manchester Metropolitan University in the U.K., told Live Science.
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