We think of cats as territorial and of male cats aggressively fighting each over their territory but humans are infinitely worse. The infographic summarises the situation at 2023. But you can look back in history and see all the wars over territory. The list is too long. Anyway, I don’t need to research it. It is all painfully too obvious.
Cat territories
Cat territories vary tremendously between species. At the top end are the largest cats such as the snow leopard, lion, lion, tiger, leopard and jaguar. At the bottom end we have the domestic cat who is the most adaptable as they have to be. The rusty-spotted cat is smaller than the domestic cat but their home range is probably larger at upwards of several square kilometers as an estimate and depending on the landscape and prey availability.
The snow leopard lives in a place where there is a very low human population density which allows them to claim huge ranges on occasion at around 1,500 square kilometers. Massive. Although a female with cubs might have a territory of around 40 square kilometers in Nepal.
Both female and male tigers in Russia’s Far East (Sikhote-Alin) have estimated home ranges of 200-400 square kilometers and 800-1000 square kilometers respectively.
Domestic cats can adapt to home ranges of about 50 square yards and it will always overlap with other cats in multi-cat homes. This is often the arrangement for indoor cats.
If there is agonistic (strained and argumentative) behavior between indoor cats it is due to territorial aggression more often than not.
But it’ll be growls and slaps. It won’t be mass murder in the many thousands of animals, children, parents, and grandparents as is currently occurring in Ukraine because of Putin’s psychopathic desire to claim Ukraine as Russian at any cost.
Ukraine was part of Russia and many Ukrainians speak Russian or it is their first language but it became an independent, sovereign nation on the breakup of the Soviet Union. Putin can’t accept it.
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Conclusion
The answer to the question in the title is obvious. Humans are far worse than cats when it comes to territorial aggression. But people tend to observe animals and criticize them without thinking that humans are often worse.
This morning my neighbour was saying how aggressively territorial squirrels can be. I was going to say that humans are far worse but I held back as I don’t think she’d have appreciated it. As it happens some squirrels can be territorially aggressive and/or fight over food resources but squirrels are not always inherently territorial. When they do fight, they are no match for the worst examples of human aggression over territory.
