Reports of Larry’s rodent-catching skills vary, though he has been photographed snagging the occasional mouse — and, once, a pigeon, which escaped.
“He’s more of a lover than a fighter,” Ng said. “He’s very good at what he does: lounging around and basically showing people that he’s very nonchalant.”
Larry has cohabited, sometimes uneasily, with prime ministerial pets including Boris Johnson’s Jack Russell cross Dilyn and Rishi Sunak’s Labrador retriever Nova. He is kept well away from current Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s family cats, JoJo and Prince, who inhabit the private family quarters while Larry rules the working areas of Downing Street.
He had a volatile relationship with Palmerston, diplomatic top cat at the Foreign Office across the street from No. 10. The pair were caught tussling several times before Palmerston retired in 2020. Palmerston died this month in Bermuda, where he was serving as “feline relations consultant” to the governor.
Meanwhile, Larry abides. He is 18 or 19, and has slowed down a bit, but continues to patrol his turf and to sleep on a window ledge above a radiator just inside the No. 10 door.
He is British soft power in feline form, and woe betide any prime minister who got rid of him.