Research overview: urban caracals on the Cape Peninsula

Long-term GPS-collar research on caracals around Cape Town has made this population one of the best-studied urban small-cat systems. This overview compiles findings on how caracals navigate a peninsula hemmed by city, ocean, and farmland, using remnant fynbos, vineyards, and wetland edges. Studies document road mortality as a major killer, exposure to rodenticides accumulated through prey, disease, and constrained gene flow in a near-isolated population. The cats nonetheless persist by exploiting urban-edge prey including rodents and introduced species. The project illustrates how a predator survives at the margins of a major city and provides a template for studying contaminant exposure, connectivity, and human-carnivore coexistence in rapidly urbanizing landscapes worldwide.