🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

Although non-invasive compared with handling or collaring, camera trapping raises ethical considerations around animal welfare, disturbance, and responsible practice. This overview surveys the welfare…

A recurring pitfall in enrichment research is treating an animal's interaction with an item as proof of benefit, when use and welfare improvement are not the same. This overview surveys the methodolog…

Cooling and water conservation can conflict, and this overview reviews how desert cats navigate evaporative water loss. Cats cool partly by evaporation, through panting and through saliva spread by gr…

Synthetic analogues of feline facial pheromones are marketed to reduce stress, marking and conflict, and this overview surveys the evidence for their effectiveness. It examines controlled studies and…

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…

Several reserves have demonstrated that tigers can recover when prey is restored and protection is rigorous. This overview synthesizes case studies in which intensified anti-poaching, recovery of ungu…

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…

The feline commitment to meat is an evolutionary story, and this overview reviews how hypercarnivory and its metabolic specialisations arose in the cat lineage. As cats specialised on vertebrate prey,…

Protrusible, sheathed claws are a hallmark of the cat family and a few relatives, and this overview reviews their evolutionary origin and significance. The mechanism likely co-evolved with the felid s…

This overview reviews how direct experience of livestock loss or a frightening encounter shapes attitudes and tolerance toward big cats, with mixed findings across studies. It synthesises evidence tha…

This overview surveys experimental and computational studies that test how sabertooth canines performed when penetrating flesh and bone. Researchers have used physical models, replica teeth, and simul…

Sabertoothed cats vanished in the late Pleistocene alongside much of the large-mammal fauna, and this overview reviews hypotheses for their extinction and its significance. Proposed drivers include th…

The IUCN Red List provides the standard framework for assessing the extinction risk of the world's cats, guiding conservation priorities and tracking changes in status over time. This overview surveys…

In territorial solitary cats such as leopards, cubs are sometimes fathered by males other than the dominant resident, raising questions about mating dynamics. This overview surveys evidence for extra-…

Beyond gradual trends, extreme events, severe droughts, heatwaves, floods, and harsh winters, can cause abrupt declines in cat populations or their prey. This overview surveys documented cases where e…

Kittens are born with their eyes closed and acquire functional vision gradually over the first weeks of life. This overview surveys the timeline of feline visual development, beginning with the eyes o…

The colour of cat eyeshine varies, and this overview reviews how tapetal structure and composition produce different reflected hues across individuals and species. The layered, crystalline tapetum act…

Cats have scent glands on the face, including around the cheeks, chin, and lips, that deposit pheromones when the cat rubs its head against objects, people, or other cats. This overview surveys these…

Cats are notoriously stoic, but research has shown that subtle facial changes carry information about pain and emotional state. This overview surveys the development of feline grimace scales that scor…

A survey of the conditions under which big cats switch from hunting to scavenging, and what this means for their ecology. Although large felids lack the scavenging specializations of hyenas and vultur…

Standard occupancy models assume that detections are never mistaken, but in practice species can be misidentified, a particular risk when automated classifiers or volunteers confuse similar-looking ca…

Because the entire wild Amur leopard population is confined to one small area, conservationists have long studied the feasibility of establishing a second, geographically separate population as insura…

Measuring estrogen metabolites in feces allows researchers to follow follicular development and estrus in cats without restraint or blood collection. This overview describes how fecal estrogen profile…

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…

Much pacing in captive big cats clusters in the period before scheduled feeding, suggesting that predictable meal times generate anticipatory arousal expressed as repetitive walking. This overview sur…

The presence of cats in South America results from the Great American Biotic Interchange, when the Isthmus of Panama connected the Americas and allowed northern mammals to disperse south. This overvie…

A survey of how the teeth, jaws and bite mechanics of cats are adapted for killing prey and how these features scale with prey size. Felids dispatch prey with a precise canine bite to the neck or skul…

Cats move through a sequence of gaits as speed rises, from a walk to a trot, then to bounding and galloping forms. This overview describes the footfall patterns, duty factors, and energetic and stabil…

An overview of how predation by cats can influence the spread and prevalence of disease in their prey populations. By selectively removing sick, weak or behaviorally abnormal individuals, predators ma…

An overview of the central role small mammals play in the diets of small and medium cats and of big cats during prey shortages. Species such as wildcats, jungle cats, sand cats, ocelots and many other…