Raja and David
Raja is a half savannah and half bengal cat. David met Raja as a kitten in December of 2020 and always planned on leash training her to take on adventures outside. Due to the cold winter and spring, they had to wait until late April to begin venturing outside. David trained Raja to accept a harness and leash and after a few weeks in their backyard, he had trained her to walk alongside himself. They spent the whole summer of 2021 walking around their backyard and didn’t dare venture beyond as Raja was incredibly scared of seeing other people. In early fall, David decided she was ready to go to a quiet local park. They went on a few excursions to the local park before the cold winter set in. David knew that Raja needed some entertainment while being cooped up indoors all winter so he decided to build his own set of five DIY (Do It Yourself) cat shelves on a section of his living room wall. Raja and her older ‘sister’, Nala, loved playing on the shelves. By the time it warmed up, Raja and David were back outside but this time being a bit more adventurous and heading to local parks with people walking around. David noticed how much others loved seeing Raja walking outside and he made a few short videos detailing their outdoor adventures on his personal Instagram page which received views and attention right away. After making some more videos, David knew there was something of value from his cat videos and decided to create a dedicated space for them. In June of 2022 he immediately secured branding for OutdoorSavannah on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and Youtube and began creating more short videos detailing his outdoor adventures with Raja. By fall 2022, David had been creating videos of his adventures with Raja for a few months. He spent nearly all of his time studying how and why his videos performed the way they did, conversing with other people who were making videos, researching any and all information on short form social media and honing his video recording and editing skills.
Raja has always chirped (chattered, ekekeked) at other animals like birds and squirrels and David had recorded a lot of this behavior. One evening in November 2022 while reviewing footage he noticed an uncanny similarity between the tone and rhythm of Raja’s chirping sounds and the sounds of the animals she was engaged with. It appeared as if Raja was imitating the tone and rhythm of the other animals. David did some research and although cat noises are not well studied, there was one interesting article about a wild cat in the Amazon that researchers observed using vocalizations similar to the sounds of a baby monkey. After the adult monkeys high up in the trees heard these sounds they came down to investigate to which the cat leapt at the monkeys from a nearby vine. It seems as if the cat’s vocalizations could have been an attempt to lure the adults closer before pouncing. David created a small compilation of four instances of this mimicry between Raja and other animals and posted it on TikTok. This video quickly picked up attention and became Raja and David’s first ‘viral’ video, fetching 1.2 million likes and 6.5 million views. One year later after recording much more of Raja’s chirping behavior, David created a 60 second compilation of a dozen or so instances of her mimicry which received major attention on all social media platforms and featured in a Newsweek article.
In December of 2022, David decided to record the process of making his own DIY cat shelves, adding on to the five that were previously placed a year prior. Every video he made on this subject generated millions of views and thus he continued adding on to the cat wall that was enveloping in his living room. Raja absolutely loved having more space to run around and perch from and David loved to inspire others to be more active with their cats. After adding more shelves for Raja, he hung up an old carpet rug on the wall which to his surprise Raja immediately took to, zooming up it with ease. He recorded the process of hanging the carpet rug using drywall anchors while Raja watched intently followed by her running up the carpet wall. Carpet Wall for a Cat became Raja and David’s first majorly successful video and motivated David to continue building the cat wall around his living room. Two weeks after installing the carpet wall, Raja and David released their largest video ever, Cardboard Tube Scratching Post for a Cat (aka “I Built A Cat Wall Playground”) which immediately became a viral sensation on every social media platform it was posted on, fetching hundreds of millions of views consistently on each. As of November 2024, this video has been viewed over 1.5 billion times. After this video and its immediate success, David knew that inspiring others to be more active with their cats via video creations and outdoor adventures was his calling and he decided to pursue content creation full time.