🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

This study in Nagarahole, southern India, examined how three large predators, the tiger, leopard, and dhole, partition a shared prey community. By analyzing kills and prey availability, the authors sh…

Karanth, K. U., Sunquist, M. E. · Journal of Animal Ecology · 2000

As apex predators, big cats can exert top-down control that ripples through ecosystems via trophic cascades. This overview synthesizes evidence that lions, tigers, leopards, pumas, and jaguars influen…

Camera trapping has become the primary method for studying snow leopards, exploiting their habit of traveling and marking along ridgelines. This overview synthesizes how researchers place cameras at s…

The cheetah's celebrated speed is the centerpiece of a hunting strategy built on daytime pursuit of fleet prey. This overview synthesizes research on how cheetahs stalk to within range before launchin…

Climate change poses a distinctive threat to snow leopards by altering the high-mountain habitats they depend on. This overview synthesizes research projecting how warming may push the treeline and fo…

Leopards have perhaps the broadest diet of any large cat, recorded eating a vast array of species from large antelope to rodents, birds, reptiles, and invertebrates. This overview synthesizes scat and…

Conserving big cats in a human-dominated world depends on applying their ecology to the challenge of coexistence. This overview synthesizes how understanding prey requirements, ranging, dispersal, and…

In the mountains of Asia, common leopards, snow leopards, and tigers can occur along elevational gradients, partitioning the landscape by altitude and habitat. This overview synthesizes research on ho…

Snow leopard populations are distributed across a network of mountain ranges separated by valleys and basins, and genetic studies probe how connected they remain. This overview synthesizes work using…

Big cats select habitat at multiple scales, balancing the need for prey, cover for stalking, water, and shelter against the risks posed by competitors and humans. This overview synthesizes research sh…

The advent of GPS collars and biologging sensors has revolutionized the study of big-cat movement, hunting, and energetics. This overview synthesizes how high-resolution location data revealed kill si…

Leopards coexist with larger, dominant carnivores by avoiding them in space, time, and behavior. This overview synthesizes research showing how leopards select denser cover, shift activity to avoid pe…

Big cats not only compete for prey but kill one another, and intraguild predation shapes the structure of carnivore communities. This overview synthesizes research on how dominant cats such as lions a…

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…

Leopard home-range size and density vary enormously, reflecting the species' adaptability. This overview synthesizes telemetry and camera-trap studies showing that leopards occupy small territories at…

Leopards often survive in small habitat fragments and human-dominated mosaics where other big cats vanish, but fragmentation still imposes costs. This overview synthesizes research on how leopard popu…

Leopards are remarkable among big cats for persisting in close proximity to dense human populations, including the edges of major cities. This overview synthesizes research, notably from India, on how…

In the rainforests of Central Africa and Southeast Asia, leopards occupy a very different niche from savanna populations. This overview synthesizes research on forest leopards, which hunt primates, du…

In the arid Kalahari, leopards survive with little surface water across vast, sparsely vegetated terrain. This overview synthesizes long-term observations of desert leopards showing how they range ove…

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…

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…

Estimating how many big cats occupy an area is a central and challenging task in their ecology and conservation. This overview reviews the main methods, from individual-identification camera-trap capt…

In the rugged mountains of the Middle East and Central Asia, leopards persist as rare, threatened populations adapted to arid, rocky terrain. This overview synthesizes what is known about the Arabian…

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…

Snow leopards are exquisitely adapted to life at high altitude in bitter cold. This overview synthesizes what is known about their dense fur, long thick tail used for balance and warmth, enlarged nasa…

Reducing livestock losses is central to securing snow leopards, and predator-proof corrals are among the most effective tools. This overview synthesizes research and program experience showing that re…

The number of snow leopards a mountain landscape can hold is set largely by the abundance of wild ungulate prey. This overview synthesizes research linking the density of blue sheep, ibex, and argali…

Snow leopard reproduction is shaped by the brief alpine summer and the harshness of the high-mountain environment. This overview synthesizes what is known about their breeding season, the use of shelt…

Solitary snow leopards communicate across their vast ranges through scent marks placed at conspicuous sites. This overview synthesizes research on how snow leopards spray scent on overhanging rocks, m…