Research overview: caracal diet across the Cape Town urban gradient

Caracals around Cape Town exploit a broad diet that shifts along the gradient from natural fynbos to vineyards and suburbs, taking native birds and mammals as well as human-associated prey such as introduced rodents, poultry and feral animals. This overview synthesises scat, GPS-cluster and stable-isotope research revealing dietary flexibility that helps explain urban-edge persistence, and the links between diet and rodenticide exposure via poisoned prey. It examines predation on vineyard and small-livestock species that drives some human conflict, and the ecological role of caracals as the peninsula apex predator. The synthesis frames diet as central to both caracal success and conflict near the city.