🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

Excavating the Neolithic village of Shillourokambos on Cyprus, Vigne and colleagues uncovered a complete cat skeleton deliberately buried within centimetres of a human grave, the two interred together…

Jean-Denis Vigne, Jean Guilaine, Karyne Debue, Laurent Haye, Patrice Gerard · Science · 2004

This study uncovered a general relationship between the population density of carnivores and the availability of their prey, showing that across species roughly the same amount of prey biomass support…

Carbone, C., Gittleman, J. L. · Science · 2002

Hosey proposed a conceptual model of how relationships form between zoo animals and the humans around them, distinguishing the effects of unfamiliar visitors from those of familiar keepers. He argued…

Hosey GR · Applied Animal Behaviour Science · 2008

This comprehensive revision, produced by the Cat Classification Task Force of the IUCN Cat Specialist Group, synthesized morphological, molecular, and biogeographic evidence to propose a consistent, e…

Kitchener AC, Breitenmoser-Wursten C, Eizirik E, Gentry A, Werdelin L, Wilting A, et al. · Cat News Special Issue · 2017

Riley and colleagues combined radio-telemetry with genetic analysis of bobcats and coyotes split by a major Los Angeles freeway, showing that the road acted as both a physical and a social barrier to…

Seth P. D. Riley, John P. Pollinger, Raymond M. Sauvajot, Eric C. York, Cassity Bromley, Todd K. Fuller, Robert K. Wayne · Molecular Ecology · 2006

This influential study used feline immunodeficiency virus as a fast-evolving genetic marker to reconstruct the population history of its puma hosts in the American West. Because the virus mutates far…

R. Biek, A. J. Drummond, M. Poss · Science · 2006

Tobler and colleagues assessed how effectively camera traps inventory the terrestrial mammal community of a Peruvian rainforest, quantifying sampling effort needed to detect species and how detection…

Mathias W. Tobler, Samia E. Carrillo-Percastegui, Renata Leite Pitman, Rosa Mares, George Powell · Animal Conservation · 2008

This long-term study screened bobcats across the urbanizing landscape of southern California and found pervasive exposure to second-generation anticoagulant rodenticides, with the great majority of te…

Serieys LEK, Armenta TC, Moriarty JG, Boydston EE, Lyren LM, Poppenga RH, Crooks KR, Wayne RK, Riley SPD · Ecotoxicology · 2015

Carlstead, Brown and Seidensticker conducted an early, influential study using non-invasive hormone measures on small felids. They manipulated the housing of leopard cats, adding and removing hiding p…

Carlstead K, Brown JL, Seidensticker J · Zoo Biology · 1993

Miller and colleagues proposed that the diversity of behaviours an animal performs, not just the presence or absence of specific behaviours, can serve as an indicator of positive welfare, with higher…

Miller LJ, Vicino GA, Sheftel J, Lauderdale LK · Animals · 2020

Watters, Margulis and Atsalis advocated systematic, ongoing behavioural monitoring of individual zoo animals as a foundation for evidence-based husbandry. They described how regularly recording behavi…

Watters JV, Margulis SW, Atsalis S · Zoo Biology · 2009

This influential review synthesised how animals adjust behaviour to survive in cities, organising responses into categories such as altered activity timing, boldness, foraging on anthropogenic food, a…

Lowry H, Lill A, Wong BBM · Biological Reviews · 2013

This widely cited review examined how carnivores exploit cities, surveying which traits predispose species to urban living and how urban carnivores differ in diet, ranging, activity and behaviour from…

Bateman PW, Fleming PA · Journal of Zoology · 2012

This review summarized the reproductive physiology of the domestic cat, which serves as the principal model for understanding felid reproduction. The authors described the follicular phase and estrous…

Tsutsui T, Stabenfeldt GH · Journal of Reproduction and Fertility. Supplement · 1993

This influential comparative study estimated bite forces across a broad range of living and extinct mammalian carnivores using dry-skull dissection methods and lever modelling, then scaled the results…

Wroe, S.; McHenry, C.; Thomason, J. · Proceedings of the Royal Society B · 2005

This study measured or estimated bite forces across many carnivoran species and related them to body size, skull shape, and feeding ecology, building predictive relationships between morphology and pe…

Christiansen, P.; Wroe, S. · Ecology · 2007

This study estimated body mass across the species of Smilodon using regression relationships between skeletal dimensions and body weight in living felids. The analysis confirmed that the South America…

Per Christiansen, John M. Harris · Journal of Morphology · 2005

Wang and Macdonald applied camera-trap capture-recapture to tigers and leopards in the high-altitude mountains of Bhutan, documenting the surprising presence of tigers at unusually high elevations and…

Sherub Wang, David W. Macdonald · Biological Conservation · 2009

Clubb and Mason analysed comparative data across 35 carnivore species to ask why some thrive in zoos while others pace and breed poorly. They found that wide-ranging species with large natural home ra…

Clubb R, Mason G · Nature · 2003

Bond and Lindburg compared feeding captive cheetahs whole carcasses against conventional processed diets, assessing both behaviour and oral health. Carcass feeding prolonged feeding time, increased sp…

Bond JC, Lindburg DG · Applied Animal Behaviour Science · 1990

Montague and colleagues produced a high-quality domestic cat reference genome and compared it with wild felids and other mammals to find the genetic footprint of domestication. They detected selection…

Michael J. Montague, Gang Li, Barbara Gandolfi, et al. · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2014

This study validated and applied fecal steroid hormone assays to track ovarian activity in multiple felid species without restraint or blood sampling. The authors characterized how estrogen and proges…

Brown JL, Wasser SK, Wildt DE, Graham LH · Biology of Reproduction · 1994

This review compiled what was known about reproductive hormone patterns across the cat family, drawing heavily on noninvasive fecal and urinary steroid monitoring developed for zoo animals. The author…

Brown JL · Theriogenology · 2006

Skibiel, Trevino and Naugher systematically compared categories of enrichment, including food-based items, spices and scents, and novel objects, for captive cats to see which most effectively boosted…

Skibiel AL, Trevino HS, Naugher K · Zoo Biology · 2007

Donadio and Buskirk tested what predicts the intensity of interactions among carnivores, including both killing and avoidance. Analyzing a broad dataset, they found that intraguild predation and aggre…

Donadio, E. & Buskirk, S.W. · The American Naturalist · 2006

Terborgh and colleagues exploited a natural experiment created by a Venezuelan hydroelectric reservoir that isolated land-bridge islands lacking large predators such as jaguars and pumas. On predator-…

Terborgh, J., Lopez, L., Nunez, P. et al. · Science · 2001

Margulis, Hoyos and Anderson examined the relationship between how active captive cats are and how long visitors watch them. Observing several felid species, they found that visitor interest, measured…

Margulis SW, Hoyos C, Anderson M · Zoo Biology · 2003

In this widely cited book chapter, Carlstead reviewed how captivity alters the behaviour of wild mammals, examining feeding, social, reproductive and anti-predator behaviours and the development of ab…

Carlstead K · Wild Mammals in Captivity (University of Chicago Press) · 1996

This camera-trap study examined how a community of carnivores, including bobcats and pumas, was distributed across an urbanisation gradient in southern California, relating species occurrence and rich…

Ordenana MA, Crooks KR, Boydston EE, Fisher RN, et al · Journal of Mammalogy · 2010

This review synthesized progress in applying in vitro fertilization, embryo culture, embryo transfer, and cryopreservation to nondomestic cats, using the domestic cat as a research model. The author s…

Pope CE · Theriogenology · 2000