Your Pet Guide

The domestic cat is probably a significant predator of birds. Current UK assessments indicate that they may be accountable for an estimated 64.8 million bird deaths each year.

Certain species appear more susceptible than others; for example, 30% of house sparrow mortality is linkmd to the domestic cat. In the recovery of ringed robins and dunnocks, it was also concluded that 31% of deaths were a result of cat predation.

On islands, birds can contribute as much as 60% of a cat’s diet. In nearly all cases, however, the cat cannot be identified as the sole cause for reducing the numbers of island birds, and in some instances eradication of cats has caused a ‘mesopredator release’ effect; where the suppression of top carnivores creates an abundance of smaller predators that cause a severe decline in their shared prey.

Domestic cats are, however, known to be a contributing factor to the decline of many species; a factor that has ultimately led, in some cases, to extinction. The South Island Piopio; Chatham Islands Rail; the Auckland Islands Merganser; and the common diving petrel are a few from a long list, with the most extreme case being the flightless Stephen Island Wren, which was driven to extinction only a few years after its discovery.

Some of the same factors that have promoted adaptive radiation of island avifauna over evolutionary time appear to promote vulnerability to non-native species in modern time. The susceptibility inherent of many island birds is undoubtedly due to evolution in the absence of mainland predators, competitors, diseases and parasites.

In addition to lower reproductive rates and extended incubation periods. The loss of flight, or reduced flying ability is also characteristic of many island endemics. These biological aspects have increased vulnerability to extinction in the presence of introduced species, such as the domestic cat.

Equally, behavioural traits exhibited by island species, such as ‘predatory naivety’ and ground-nesting, have also contributed to their susceptibility.

Cats are a cosmopolitan species and are found across much of the world. They are extremely adaptable and are now present on all the continents (including Antarctica) and on 118 of 131 main groups of islands.

Feral cats can live in forests, grasslands, tundra, coastal areas, agricultural land, scrublands, urban areas and wetlands. Their habitats even include small oceanic islands with no human inhabitants. However, this ability to thrive in almost any terrestrial habitat has led the cat's designation as one of the world's worst invasive species.



Despite this general adaptability, the close relatives of domestic cats, the African Wildcat (Felis silvestris lybica) and the Arabian Sand Cat (Felis margarita) both inhabit desert environments, and domestic cats still show similar adaptations and behaviors.

To date, there are few scientific data available to assess the impact of cat predation on prey populations. Cat numbers are growing annually and their abundance is far above the ‘natural’ carrying capacity, due to their population sizes being independent of their prey’s dynamics – i.e. cats are ‘recreational’ hunters.

Population densities can be as high as 2000 individuals per km2[155] and the current trend is an increase of 0.5 million cats annually. Even well-fed domestic cats may hunt and kill, mainly catching small mammals, but also birds, amphibians, reptiles, fish and invertebrates.

Hunting by domestic cats may be contributing to the decline in the numbers of birds in urban areas, although the importance of this effect remains controversial. In the wild, the introduction of feral cats during human settlement can threaten native species with extinction.

In many cases controlling or eliminating the populations of non-native cats can produce a rapid recovery in native animals. However, the ecological role of introduced cats can be more complicated: for example, cats can control the numbers of rats, which also prey on birds' eggs and young, so in some cases eliminating a cat population can actually accelerate the decline of an endangered bird species in the presence of a mesopredator, controlled by cats.

In the Southern Hemisphere, cats are a particular problem in landmasses such as Australasia, where cat species have never been native and there were few equivalent native medium-sized mammalian predators.

Native species such as the New Zealand Kakapo and the Australian Bettong, for example, tend to be more ecologically vulnerable and behaviorally "naive" to predation by feral cats. Feral cats have had a major impact on these native species and have played a leading role in the endangerment and extinction of many animals.

Cats are known for their fastidious cleanliness, spending many hours licking their coats.The cat's tongue has backwards-facing spines about 500 micrometres long, which are called papillae. These are quite rigid as they contain keratin. These spines allow cats to groom themselves by licking their fur, with the rows of papillae acting like a hairbrush.

Some cats, particularly longhaired cats, occasionally regurgitate hairballs of fur that have collected in their stomachs from grooming. These clumps of fur are usually sausage-shaped and about two to three centimeters long. Hairballs can be prevented with remedies that ease elimination of the hair through the gut, as well as regular grooming of the coat with a comb or stiff brush.

In domestic cats, males are more likely to fight than females. In feral cats, the most common reason for cat fighting is when two males are competing to mate with a female: here most fights will be won by the heavier male.

Another possible reason for fighting in domestic cats is when the cats have difficulties in establishing a territory within a small home. Female cats will also fight over territory or to defend their kittens. Spaying females and neutering males will decrease or eliminate this behavior in many cases.

Fighting cats make themselves appear more impressive and threatening by raising their fur and arching their backs, thus increasing their apparent size. Attacks usually comprise powerful slaps to the face and body with the forepaws as well as bites, but serious damage is rare; usually the loser runs away with little more than a few scratches to the face, and perhaps the ears.

Cats will also throw themselves to the ground in a defensive posture to rake their opponent's belly with their powerful hind legs. Normally, serious injuries from fighting will be limited to infections of scratches and bites, though these can occasionally kill cats if untreated.

In addition, bites are probably the main route of transmission of feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV). Sexually active males will usually be in many fights during their lives, and often have decidedly battered faces with obvious scars and cuts to the ears and nose.

The Felids are a rapidly evolving family of mammals that share a common ancestor only 10-15 million years ago. Within this family, domestic cats (Felis catus) are part of the genus Felis, which is a group of small cats containing seven species.


Members of the genus are found worldwide and include:

• Jungle Cat (Felis chaus) of southeast Asia,
• African Wildcat (Felis silvestris lybica),
• Chinese Mountain Cat (Felis silvestris bieti)
• Arabian Sand Cat (Felis margarita).

All the cats in this genus share a common ancestor that probably lived around six million years ago in Asia. Although the exact relationships within the Felidae are still uncertain,both the Chinese Mountain Cat and the African Wildcat are close relations of the domestic cat and are both classed as subspecies of the Wildcat Felis silvestris.

As domestic cats are little altered from wildcats, they can readily interbreed. This hybridization may pose a danger to the genetic distinctiveness of wildcat populations, particularly in Scotland and Hungary.

The domestic cat was first classified as Felis catus by Carolus Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae of 1758. However, due to modern phylogenetics, domestic cats are now usually regarded as another subspecies of the Wildcat Felis silvestris. This has resulted in mixed usage of the terms, as the domestic cat can be called by its subspecies name, Felis silvestris catus.

Wildcats have also been referred to as various subspecies of F. catus, but in 2003 the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature fixed the name for Wildcats as F. silvestris.

The most common name in use for the domestic cat remains F. catus, following a convention for domesticated animals of using the earliest (the senior) synonym proposed. Sometimes the domestic cat is called Felis domesticus, although this is not a valid scientific name.

Cats have either a mutualistic or commensal relationship with humans. However, in comparison to some other domesticated species, such as dogs, cats have not undergone major changes during the domestication process, as the form and behavior of the domestic cat are not radically different from those of wildcats and domestic cats are perfectly capable of surviving in the wild.

Several natural behaviors and characteristics of Wildcats may have preadapted them for domestication as pets. These traits include their small size, social nature, obvious body language, love of play and relatively high intelligence. All the small Felids may also have an inborn tendency towards tameness.

There are two main models for how cats were domesticated. In one model, people deliberately tamed cats in a process of artificial selection, as they were useful predators of vermin. However, some theorists find this implausible, because there may have been little reward for such an effort: cats do not carry out commands and, although they do eat rodents, other species such as ferrets or terriers may be better at controlling these pests.

The alternative idea is that cats were simply tolerated by people and gradually diverged from their 'wild' relatives through natural selection, as they adapted to an agricultural environment.