🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

Inside the cat cochlea, different frequencies stimulate different positions along the basilar membrane, and this overview reviews this tonotopic organisation and its high-frequency emphasis. The cochl…

Older cats can develop cognitive dysfunction syndrome, a decline analogous in some respects to human dementia. This overview surveys research on age-related changes in feline cognition and behaviour,…

The cognitive bias paradigm tests whether an animal in a negative affective state judges ambiguous cues more pessimistically, providing a window into emotion. This overview surveys research applying j…

Cognitive enrichment challenges animals to solve problems for rewards, engaging mental faculties and providing a sense of control. This overview surveys the emerging use of cognitive enrichment for ca…

Some cats endure cold climates, and this overview reviews how they tolerate low temperatures. Cold-climate cats rely on dense, insulating fur, including seasonal thickening, on conserving core heat th…

Conservation of the Andean cat has been coordinated through international collaboration spanning the four range countries, and this overview reviews its approach. By pooling researchers and local part…

The remote, transnational range of Pallass cat has spurred coordinated research efforts, and this overview reviews their contribution. Collaborative initiatives bringing together field biologists, zoo…

Fitting a collar is an intervention, and this overview surveys efforts to test whether the device itself alters the behavior, movement, or condition of the animal being studied. Concerns include captu…

Beyond P-22, several GPS-collared mountain lions in the National Park Service Santa Monica Mountains study have made rare, documented crossings of major freeways, including the 405 and 101, each event…

The African golden cat is notoriously variable in coat color, ranging from reddish-golden to grey, with spotted and nearly plain individuals, which historically caused taxonomic confusion. This overvi…

Brightly patterned collar covers, designed to make stalking cats conspicuous to prey with good colour vision, have been tested as a tool to reduce predation. This overview surveys trials of such cover…

Light and noise rarely act alone; in cities they combine with human presence to create a degraded sensory landscape that wildlife must navigate. This overview synthesises research treating sensory pol…

Cities support large populations of commensal rodents fed by human waste, and these rodents form a critical prey subsidy for small and medium urban felids from bobcats to leopard cats and jungle cats.…

Lionesses that give birth around the same time pool their cubs into a communal creche, nursing and defending young cooperatively. This overview surveys how creches form following synchronized births,…

Snow leopards inhabit vast, rugged ranges where direct contact is rare, making indirect communication essential. This overview surveys research on snow leopard signalling, including scrape marks, scen…

Because snow leopards live among pastoralist communities across remote mountains, community-based programs are central to their conservation. This overview surveys research on initiatives that align l…

Effective anti-poaching increasingly depends on cooperation from local communities, including informant networks that provide intelligence on poaching and trafficking. This overview surveys research o…

This overview reviews community-managed livestock insurance schemes for snow leopard depredation in the mountains of northern Pakistan, where herders contribute premiums to village funds that compensa…

Community-based natural resource management, CBNRM, devolves authority over wildlife and habitat to local communities on the premise that local stewardship, backed by tangible benefits, conserves bett…

This overview examines community-run insurance schemes in which herders pay premiums into a locally managed fund that pays out for verified predator kills, an alternative to state or NGO compensation.…

This overview synthesises comparative studies that contrast successful and unsuccessful big-cat coexistence efforts to distil transferable lessons. It reviews analyses spanning lion, snow leopard, tig…

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…

This overview compares the four lynx species, the Eurasian, Canada, Iberian, and the bobcat, highlighting how a shared body plan has diversified across habitats and prey. All share short tails, ear tu…

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…

The tapetum lucidum is widespread among nocturnal and crepuscular vertebrates, but its structure varies, and comparing forms illuminates how cats fit the broader pattern. This overview surveys differe…

Felid species differ in their vocal repertoires, and comparative bioacoustics has sought to map these differences onto phylogeny and ecology. This overview surveys work cataloguing call types across s…

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…

Dogs and cats represent contrasting domestication stories, and comparing them clarifies what domestication means. This overview surveys the differences: dogs descend from wolves through a long, intens…