A Michael Broad Blog
It is a thought: can small cats swim? Yes, is the firm answer. The answer is seen in the best-known small cat, the domestic cat. Not particularly keen to be in water but once in a very capable swimmer. It goes against the general belief of many people that cats hate water. When they …
The small wild cats live in a very wide range of landscapes (habitats). They live in deserts in the case of one small wild cat, the sand cat, and they live in trees in forests such as the margay. We will find them in tropical forests, grasslands (Argentina and Brazil) and in arboreal forests …
The unequivocal answer to the question in the title is NO. It’s interesting that the domestic cat has evolved through 10,000 years of domestication to become social but their wild cat ancestor isn’t and the same applies across all the small wild cat species. “As far as is known, the social system of all …
Because the domestic cat is almost identical to the small wild cats morphologically, we can say right away that all small wild cats have whiskers without knowing much about small wild cats. They have about 24 movable whiskers. They appear in four or more parallel rows. They are situated above the upper lip on …
So, how many rusty-spotted cats are left in the world at 2023? We should be able to get the answer from an organisation dedicated to knowing the answer which is the IUCN Red List. The problem is that this organisation is never up to date and the last time they assessed the world population …
Scientists have looked into whether wild cats are smarter than domestic cat. Their study is entitled: “Are domesticated animals dumber than their wild relatives? A comprehensive review on the domestication effects on animal cognitive performance.” I discuss the study below and start off with a general discussion on the difficulties in making a comparison. …
Do caracals eat livestock? Yes, must be the answer but it depends where the caracal lives for obvious reasons because livestock has to be available to be taken. And in some parts of South Africa, the caracal has a reputation for killing livestock. Further, this obviously annoys South African farmers who retaliate. It should …
This is a comparison of the size of home ranges (their territory) of the cat species which includes the domestic cat, feral cat and all the wild cat species. It answers the question as to how big the home ranges are. Although within the domestic cat population there will be huge variations due to …
