🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

One of the most striking early demonstrations of the cheetah's genetic depletion was that skin grafts exchanged between unrelated cheetahs were accepted rather than rejected, indicating near-identical…

Cheetahs specialize on small to medium antelope, with gazelles forming the dietary core across much of their range. This overview synthesizes kill and scat studies showing that cheetahs favor prey the…

Cheetahs range over very large areas at low density, a trait central to understanding why they are so hard to conserve. This overview surveys telemetry and movement research documenting cheetah home r…

Namibia holds one of the largest cheetah populations, much of it on commercial and communal farmland outside protected areas, and this overview synthesizes telemetry research on how cheetahs range acr…

Efforts to restore cheetahs to parts of their former range, including the introduction of African cheetahs to India, have raised ecological questions about translocation. This overview synthesizes the…

India, which lost its native Asiatic cheetahs to extinction in the mid-twentieth century, has undertaken a project to reintroduce cheetahs using animals sourced from Africa, released at Kuno National…

Namibia holds one of the world's largest cheetah populations, the majority living on commercial and communal farmland where conflict with livestock and game farmers is a primary threat. This overview…

Because cheetahs occur at naturally low densities and avoid areas with high lion and hyena numbers, most cheetahs live outside formal protected areas on farmland and communal rangelands. This overview…

Much of the world's remaining cheetah population lives outside protected areas on farmland, particularly in Namibia, where the ecology differs from the famous plains populations. This overview synthes…

This overview surveys human-cheetah conflict in Namibia, home to a large share of the world's cheetahs living largely outside protected areas on commercial and communal farmland. It reviews patterns o…

Captive cheetahs are notably prone to a severe chronic gastritis associated with Helicobacter infection, a condition far more debilitating in captive than in wild cheetahs, suggesting that stress, imm…

Chronic activation of the stress axis can suppress immunity, impair reproduction and contribute to disease, and several captive cat species show evidence of such chronic stress. This overview surveys…

Cheetahs possess only partially retractable claws and hardened, ridged foot pads, features often likened to athletic cleats. This overview surveys how claw exposure and pad texture provide the tractio…

Understanding why some felids tolerate pathogens that sicken others requires comparing immune function across wild and domestic cats. This overview surveys comparative felid immunology, examining diff…

Cheetah mothers and cubs use distinctive vocal contact to maintain cohesion as they move across open landscapes. This overview surveys research on the bird-like chirp and other calls that reunite sepa…

The cheetah and the extinct American cheetah independently evolved a slender, long-limbed body built for high-speed pursuit, a striking case of convergence given their separate ancestries within the p…

Cooperation is rare among felids, concentrated in the social lion and in cheetah and feral-cat male coalitions, making the family a useful contrast for theories of cooperation. This overview surveys r…

Female cats select sheltered den sites to give birth and protect altricial young during their most vulnerable weeks. This overview surveys how felid mothers choose dens that provide concealment and th…

Cheetah mothers bring live prey to their cubs and release it, apparently providing opportunities to practise capturing and killing. This overview surveys field research on how cubs develop hunting com…

Cheetahs face well-documented reproductive difficulties that intersect with their disease susceptibility and genetic uniformity. This overview surveys the links between disease, immune function and re…

Captive cheetahs experience a striking array of diseases rarely seen at such rates in other felids, including Helicobacter gastritis, kidney disease, and severe coronavirus outbreaks. This overview su…

Cheetahs are largely diurnal, hunting in the cooler parts of the day, a pattern shaped partly by the need to avoid dominant nocturnal competitors. This overview synthesizes research showing that cheet…

A long-standing hypothesis held that cheetahs abandon chases because sprinting overheats them, storing heat faster than they can lose it. This overview examines the evidence, including studies that im…

Elastic tendons can store and return energy like springs, reducing the muscular cost of each stride. This overview reviews evidence for and against substantial elastic energy storage in the cheetah hi…

Collecting semen from nondomestic cats usually requires electroejaculation under anesthesia, a standardized technique that allows evaluation and banking of sperm. This overview surveys how electroejac…

The physical environment of an enclosure, including space, complexity, seclusion, and the ability to avoid disturbance, influences the reproductive function of captive cats. This overview surveys how…

Estimating cheetah abundance is challenging because the species occurs at low density, ranges widely, and is not as reliably individually identifiable from camera traps as boldly patterned cats. This…

Beyond the terminal-Pleistocene crash, researchers have proposed that the cheetah experienced more than one demographic bottleneck, including a possible older, deeper reduction in the ancestral lineag…

Vocal abilities are distributed across the felid family tree in informative ways, and this overview reviews the evolution of cat vocal anatomy. Mapping hyoid structure and laryngeal features onto feli…

Measuring glucocorticoid stress hormones in feces provides a noninvasive way to assess how stress relates to reproductive function in cats. This overview surveys the use of fecal glucocorticoid monito…