🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

Quirke and O'Riordan tested several enrichment types on captive cheetahs at a breeding park, measuring effects on activity, exploration and stereotypic pacing. Different enrichments varied in effectiv…

Quirke T, O'Riordan RM · Applied Animal Behaviour Science · 2011

Kry and Casey examined whether adding hiding enrichment to shelter cat housing affects both stress and adoptability. Cats with access to a hiding place showed lower stress-related behaviour and were m…

Kry K, Casey R · Animal Welfare · 2007

Gourkow and Fraser compared shelter housing and handling styles, contrasting enriched, basket-style housing with consistent gentle handling against conventional barren cages and inconsistent handling.…

Gourkow N, Fraser D · Animal Welfare · 2006

Lyons, Young and Deag surveyed multiple felid species across enclosures differing in size, complexity and feeding routine to identify what most affects behaviour. They found that enclosure usage and a…

Lyons J, Young RJ, Deag JM · Zoo Biology · 1997

Drawing on long-term Serengeti records, this study analyzed why male lions disperse from their natal pride while females usually remain, producing the strongly female-philopatric, male-dispersing patt…

Pusey AE, Packer C · Behaviour · 1987

This study generated genome-scale data from ancient and modern lions, including the extinct cave lion, to reconstruct the deep evolutionary history of the lion lineage. The analyses confirmed that the…

Marc de Manuel, Ross Barnett, Marcela Sandoval-Velasco, Nobuyuki Yamaguchi, et al. · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2020

Xu and colleagues identified the molecular cause of the white tiger phenotype, mapping it to a single amino-acid change in the pigment gene SLC45A2. Using a captive pedigree and genome analysis, they…

Xu X, Dong GX, Hu XS, Miao L, Zhang XL, Zhang DL, et al · Current Biology · 2013

This range-wide assessment compiled data to show that the cheetah occupies a small fraction of its historical range and is more threatened than previously recognized, with most populations existing ou…

Durant, S.M., Mitchell, N., Groom, R., Pettorelli, N., Ipavec, A., Jacobson, A.P., et al. · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2017

This review argued that the proliferation of animal-borne sensors, including accelerometers, magnetometers, and physiological loggers, had ushered in a golden age in which ecologists could measure not…

Christopher C. Wilmers, Barry Nickel, Caleb M. Bryce, Justine A. Smith, Rachel E. Wheat, Yiwei Wang · Ecology · 2015

Why can lions and tigers roar while domestic cats and cheetahs cannot? This comparative anatomical study examined the hyoid apparatus, the chain of bones supporting the larynx and tongue, across felid…

Gerald Weissengruber and colleagues · Journal of Anatomy · 2002

This widely cited quantitative synthesis estimated that free-ranging domestic cats in the contiguous United States kill billions of birds and tens of billions of mammals annually, with unowned cats re…

Scott Loss, Tom Will, Peter Marra · Nature Communications · 2013

Loss, Will and Marra produced a landmark quantitative estimate of how many wild animals free-ranging cats kill in the United States. Synthesizing data from predation studies through a systematic revie…

Scott R. Loss, Tom Will, Peter P. Marra · Nature Communications · 2013

This landmark quantitative synthesis estimated that free-ranging domestic cats kill billions of birds and many billions of mammals annually in the United States, identifying them as among the largest…

Loss SR, Will T, Marra PP · Nature Communications · 2013

McCune studied how genetics and early experience shape feline friendliness, comparing kittens from bold versus shy fathers and kittens that were handled versus unhandled early in life. Both paternity…

McCune S · Applied Animal Behaviour Science · 1995

Shepherdson, Carlstead, Mellen and Seidensticker tested whether changing how food is presented could enrich the behaviour of small captive cats. Instead of single predictable meals, they provided food…

Shepherdson DJ, Carlstead K, Mellen JD, Seidensticker J · Zoo Biology · 1993

This landmark global meta-analysis showed that mammals across the world, including many carnivores, increase their nocturnal activity in response to human disturbance, becoming more active at night ev…

Gaynor KM, Hojnowski CE, Carter NH, Brashares JS · Science · 2018

A decade after naming the concept, Laundre, Hernandez and Ripple reviewed how the landscape of fear had matured into a framework for understanding nonconsumptive predator effects. They synthesized evi…

Laundre, J.W., Hernandez, L. & Ripple, W.J. · The Open Ecology Journal · 2010

This influential study reconstructed the molecular phylogeny of all living cat species and dated their diversification, establishing the framework of eight major felid lineages used ever since. Using…

Johnson WE, Eizirik E, Pecon-Slattery J, et al. · Science · 2006

Periquet, Fritz and Revilla reviewed the full breadth of interactions between lions and spotted hyenas, the two dominant large carnivores of African savannas. They synthesized evidence on kleptoparasi…

Periquet, S., Fritz, H. & Revilla, E. · Biological Reviews · 2015

Ottoni and colleagues sequenced mitochondrial DNA from more than 200 ancient cats spanning 9,000 years, from Mesolithic Europe through Viking-age ports to Egyptian mummies. They identified two major d…

Claudio Ottoni, Wim Van Neer, Bea De Cupere, et al. · Nature Ecology & Evolution · 2017

Prugh and colleagues synthesized global evidence that the worldwide decline of apex predators has triggered widespread increases in mid-sized carnivores, with far-reaching ecological and economic cons…

Prugh, L.R., Stoner, C.J., Epps, C.W., Bean, W.T. et al. · BioScience · 2009

Humphrey and colleagues experimentally tested the popular belief that slow blinking is a friendly signal in cats. In one experiment, owners either slow-blinked at their cat or maintained a neutral fac…

Tasmin Humphrey, Leanne Proops, Jemma Forman, Rebecca Spooner, Karen McComb · Scientific Reports · 2020

Mishra and colleagues outlined and evaluated community-based incentive programs designed to offset the costs herders bear from snow leopard depredation in the Himalaya. They described mechanisms inclu…

Charudutt Mishra, et al. · Conservation Biology · 2003

Kerbis Peterhans and Gnoske compiled historical, ecological, and anatomical evidence to reconstruct the natural history of man-eating in lions, focusing on the Tsavo case. They reviewed records of lio…

Julian C. Kerbis Peterhans, Thomas P. Gnoske · Journal of East African Natural History · 2001

Two experiments tested whether the narrowed-eye, slow-blink expression functions as friendly signalling between cats and people. When owners slow-blinked at their cats, the cats were more likely to sl…

Tasmin Humphrey, Karen McComb, Leanne Proops and colleagues · Scientific Reports · 2020

Based on radio-telemetry of tigers in the lowland forests and grasslands of Chitwan, Nepal, this study described how tigers partition space through a land-tenure system. Resident females held largely…

Sunquist, M. E. · Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology · 1981

Sunquist's radio-telemetry monograph from Nepal was among the first rigorous field studies of tiger spacing, movements and predation. He documented home-range sizes, land-tenure dynamics and how prey…

Sunquist, M.E. · Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology · 1981

A classic of population ecology, this paper assembled Hudson's Bay Company fur-return records spanning two centuries to document the now-iconic roughly ten-year oscillation in Canada lynx numbers. Elt…

Elton, C. & Nicholson, M. · Journal of Animal Ecology · 1942

This study produced the first reference genome for the tiger and compared it with newly sequenced lion and snow leopard genomes to investigate big cat evolution and adaptation. The authors identified…

Cho YS, Hu L, Hou H, et al. · Nature Communications · 2013

Owners often report that a hungry cat's purr is peculiarly hard to ignore, and this study found why. Acoustic analysis revealed that some purrs contain an embedded high-frequency, cry-like component i…

Karen McComb, Anna Taylor, Christian Wilson, Benjamin Charlton · Current Biology · 2009