🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

Cheetahs lose a significant share of their kills to larger carnivores, a major cost of their position in the savanna guild. This overview synthesizes research showing that lions, hyenas, and even leop…

Leopards are flexible in their timing of activity, becoming more strictly nocturnal where humans and dominant competitors are present. This overview synthesizes camera-trap studies showing that leopar…

Lion territory size ranges from tens to many hundreds of square kilometers depending on prey density and water availability. This overview reviews radio-telemetry and GPS studies showing that prides i…

Kruger National Park supports one of the most studied savanna lion populations, offering insight into how large protected areas regulate big cat numbers. This overview reviews how prey availability, d…

As the largest African cat, the lion exerts strong intraguild pressure on cheetahs and leopards. This overview synthesizes research on how lions kill cheetah cubs and steal kills, forcing cheetahs int…

In the seasonally flooded Okavango Delta, lions face a landscape that shifts from dry ground to a maze of channels and islands. This overview reviews how delta prides adapt by wading and even swimming…

Male cheetahs frequently form coalitions, most often of littermate brothers, that cooperate to hold territories and compete for mates. This overview synthesizes research showing that coalition males d…

The length of time a male coalition holds a pride is a master variable in lion ecology because it governs how many of their cubs survive to independence. This overview synthesizes research linking coa…

Female leopards raise cubs alone, hiding them in dense cover and moving them between lairs to reduce the risk of detection by predators. This overview synthesizes research on leopard reproduction, inc…

Where several large cats share a landscape, they coexist by partitioning resources along axes of prey size, habitat, and activity. This overview synthesizes research across continents showing how tige…

Across Africa lions take a wide spectrum of prey but show local specialization driven by abundance and profitability. This overview examines how some prides become buffalo specialists, particularly wh…

Lions are both hunters and scavengers, and their relationship with spotted hyenas is a central feature of African large-carnivore communities. This overview reviews how lions appropriate hyena kills a…

Lions advertise and defend territory through a combination of roaring, scent marking, and scrapes. This overview reviews how the long-range roar communicates presence and group identity, allowing prid…

Beyond killing prey, big cats shape ecosystems through the fear they inspire, altering where and how prey forage. This overview synthesizes research on the landscape of fear, in which the risk of pred…

The lion's mane is one of the most conspicuous ornaments among mammals, and research has explored what it advertises. This overview synthesizes experimental and observational work suggesting that mane…

Before they can win a pride, young male lions endure a nomadic phase after being evicted from their natal range. This overview synthesizes what is known about this risky period: bachelors roam widely,…

Few wild populations have been studied as continuously as the lions of the Serengeti, where decades of records on known individuals have transformed understanding of the species. This overview synthes…

Leopards famously haul their kills into trees, a behavior with clear ecological logic. This overview synthesizes research showing that caching prey in trees protects it from kleptoparasitism by lions,…

Lion hunting success varies enormously with prey species, group size, habitat cover, time of day, and moon phase. This overview synthesizes field studies showing that lions exploit darkness and vegeta…

Cheetahs naturally occur at low densities and require large areas, a consequence of competition, prey, and their hunting strategy. This overview synthesizes research showing that suppression by lions…

This experiment played recordings of one or three roaring strangers to prides and measured how resident females responded. Lionesses were more cautious when outnumbered and more likely to approach whe…

McComb, K., Packer, C., Pusey, A. E. · Animal Behaviour · 1994

This early study documented how takeovers of prides by new male coalitions are followed by the death of dependent cubs, and how females then return to estrus and breed with the incoming males. By trac…

Bertram, B. C. R. · Journal of Zoology · 1975

George Schaller spent three years observing lions on the Serengeti plains and woodlands, producing the first comprehensive natural history of the species. By following recognizable individuals he docu…

Schaller, G. B. · University of Chicago Press · 1972

This influential synthesis explored why carnivores vary so much in sociality, from solitary cats to group-living species, linking social organization to the distribution of food in space and time. It…

Macdonald, D. W. · Nature · 1983

This influential synthesis argued that the loss of large apex consumers, including big cats and other top predators, is among humanity's most pervasive impacts on nature. Drawing on examples across ec…

Estes, J. A., Terborgh, J., Brashares, J. S., et al. · Science · 2011

Testing the long-held idea that lions live in groups to hunt large prey more efficiently, this study compared the per-capita food intake of females in groups of different sizes. The data showed that s…

Packer, C., Scheel, D., Pusey, A. E. · The American Naturalist · 1990

This comprehensive reference compiled the biology, ecology, and conservation status of all the world's wild cat species, from the great roaring cats to the smallest felids. Drawing together field stud…

Sunquist, M. E., Sunquist, F. C. · University of Chicago Press · 2002