🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

While pacing dominates discussion of felid stereotypy, captive cats display a range of other abnormal repetitive behaviours that signal welfare problems. This overview surveys these: route-tracing and…

Allonursing, the nursing of non-offspring, is best documented in lions but reported in other group-living or colonial felid contexts, including domestic cat colonies. This overview surveys research on…

Recovering DNA from extinct cats and historical museum specimens requires specialized techniques to cope with degraded, fragmented, and contaminated genetic material. This overview surveys how researc…

Mitochondrial DNA, maternally inherited and abundant in old specimens, has been central to reconstructing cat history. This overview surveys how researchers define and use maternal haplogroups, includ…

Pregnancy rates from artificial insemination in wild cats remain modest and variable, reflecting the biological and technical challenges of the procedure. This overview surveys reported success rates…

The ocelot has served as a focus for applying assisted-reproduction techniques to a small spotted cat of conservation concern. This overview surveys reproductive research on ocelots, including reprodu…

Some Toxoplasma infections in southern sea otters involve unusual atypical genotypes, including a so-called Type X strain rarely seen in domestic cats. This overview surveys research suggesting that w…

Domestication reshaped cat behavior, reducing fear of humans and increasing tolerance and sociability, and genetics is beginning to reveal the underlying changes. This overview surveys evidence that s…

Comparing the domestic cat with its wild ancestor illuminates how domestication has reshaped behaviour. This overview surveys research contrasting African and European wildcats with domestic cats in t…

Cats retain the ability to taste bitter compounds, supported by a family of bitter taste receptor genes. This overview surveys what is known about the feline bitter receptor repertoire and its likely…

Modern cat breeds emerged recently from broadly distributed random-bred populations, and this overview surveys research reconstructing their ancestry and relationships. It examines genetic studies tra…

The catnip response, a heritable reaction to nepetalactone causing sniffing, rubbing, rolling and a euphoric-seeming state, occurs in many domestic cats and some non-domestic felids. This overview sur…

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…

Felids are relatively susceptible to Yersinia pestis, and infection can progress to acute, severe and sometimes fatal disease, distinguishing cats from more resistant carnivores. This overview surveys…

Cognition has been studied far less in cats than in primates, birds, or dogs, but a coherent picture is emerging across the felid family. This overview synthesises research on object permanence, spati…

The sequencing of cat genomes, beginning with the domestic cat and extending to tiger, lion, snow leopard, cheetah, and others, transformed felid systematics. This overview surveys how whole-genome da…

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…

Feline immunodeficiency virus causes an AIDS-like syndrome in domestic cats yet has long been assumed benign in its wild hosts. This overview examines the evidence for and against that assumption, com…

Cats and dogs differ in how they handle water, and this overview reviews the comparison and its roots in feline biology. Cats, descended from desert-adapted ancestors, tend to have a lower thirst driv…

Genetic tools have become central to small-cat conservation, and this overview reviews their applications. Non-invasive sampling of scats and hair allows researchers to confirm the presence of cryptic…

Across the cat family, similar coat phenotypes such as melanism, pale or white morphs, and spotted-to-striped pattern shifts have arisen repeatedly in different lineages. This overview surveys the evi…

Declawing, or onychectomy, removes not just the claw but the terminal toe bone, and this overview surveys its biomechanical and welfare consequences. Because the claw grows from that bone, eliminating…

The domestic cat traces to a desert-adapted wild ancestor, and this overview reviews how that heritage shapes its water physiology today. Descended from the African wildcat of arid regions, domestic c…

Living alongside domestic cats, dogs and people exposes Cape Town caracals to pathogens and parasites that can affect their health. This overview synthesises serological and disease-ecology research o…

The European wildcat’s recovery is complicated by disease and hybridization stemming from contact with abundant domestic cats. This overview surveys the disease threats facing wildcats, including feli…

Pallass cats are notably vulnerable to certain pathogens, and this overview reviews veterinary research on the problem, especially toxoplasmosis. In captivity, kittens suffer high mortality from Toxop…

The Chinese mountain cat is among the least observed of all felids, restricted to alpine meadow, shrubland, and grassland on the eastern Tibetan Plateau and adjacent margins. This overview surveys wha…

Because the domestic cat and its wild relatives remain fully interfertile, hybridization is a persistent conservation concern, especially for the European wildcat, Felis silvestris silvestris, in plac…

Successive improvements to the domestic cat reference genome have made the species a tractable model for genetics and biomedicine. This overview surveys the development of cat genome assemblies and as…

Free-ranging domestic cats prey on a wide range of urban and suburban wildlife, with documented effects on birds, small mammals, reptiles and amphibians. This overview synthesises predation-rate studi…