Cat domestication & biology

Question 1

domestication

Answer 1

• outnumber dogs 3:1
• Domesticated >10,000 yrs ago in Middle East (more recent)
• For pest control & companion, interwoven history w/ house mouse => cats better hunters of mice than canids
• Crepuscular: most active during dusk/dawn
• Arabian wild cat Felis silvestris lybica, tabby coat => Egyptian population of the African wild cat
• Cats moved w/ humans around the world
• Partially domesticated
  
  • Can survive (not always well) w/o help of people => show similar behavior to wild counterparts
• Must be socialized at young age
  
  • Learn to live with us domestically & tolerate unrelated cats

Question 2

cats are predators

Answer 2

• hunting behavior very important
• Solitary, obligate carnivores
• Small prey, requires several kills a day => Adapted to eat several small meals throughout the day/night
• stalk prey
• Research - adult cats play longer & more intensely w/ toys resembling natural prey (mimicking hunting behavior)

Question 3

social behavior

Answer 3

• Territorial, require own space and resources
• Social, live in groups, important for domestication
• Form strong social attachments w/ familiar people, and conspecifics (close kin)
• spay/neuter after 4 months (sexual maturity), shelters perform early spay/neuter for adoption purposes
  
  • At shelter: ~8 weeks, ~2lbs

Question 4

kitten socialization

Answer 4

• sensitive period 2-9 weeks of age
  
  • Experience w/ new people, animals, places, things
  • Slow, positive, stop if signs of fear/stress
  • Shapes future behavior

Question 5

sleep patterns

Answer 5

• 15-20 hrs of sleep per 24 hr period
• Of all animal species, one of the top ones that need the most sleep
• Multiple short bouts of sleep rather than a long night one
• Nap-like sleep patterns

Question 6

vision

Answer 6

• See the world in blues and greens, lack the cones to see red
• Sees well in dim light, large visual field
• Can see 200° around while we only see 180°
• Better night vision: more rods & have tapetum lucidum
  
  • Pick up more details in lower light
• Poor visual acuity - can’t see great detail
• Track fast moving objects very well but not slow moving ones very well
  
  • further away from face, the better they can track it

Question 7

auditory

Answer 7

• Excellent hearing - large range of sounds
• High and low range sounds, evolved to detect prey
  
  • Notoriously hard to categorize - varies individually
  • Mostly to communicate w/ humans
  • Negative cat-cat encounters
  • Sexual encounters
  • Mother-kitten encounters

Question 8

olfaction

Answer 8

• Primary method of cat-cat communication

Urine
- Spraying: deliberate scent marking, in males & females, can tell when females are in estrus
- Function: unknown as spray marks not a deterrent to cats

Feces
- Includes glandular secretions to convey information
- Research: cats >time sniffing unfamiliar cat feces vs. familiar cat feces = social info gained

• Sebaceous scent glands (9 main areas on body) => release hormones
• Process & detect pheromones and other scents using their nose and vomeronasal organ
• Use flehman response to transfer scent to vomeronasal organ

Question 9

vocalizations

Answer 9

• Communication w/ humans
• Outside of human contexts: agonism, sexual, mother-kitten
• Most common: meow (+), purr (+ & - before euthanization), chirp/trill (+), chatter (+), growl (-), yowl (-), hiss (-)