Domestic Cat
A Domestic Cat is a Felinae that is commonly kept as a pet.
- AKA: House Cat.
- Example(s):
- Counter-Example(s):
- See: Domestication of The Cat, Felidae, Ailurophobia, Cats and the Internet, Cat Café.
References
2023
- (Wikipedia, 2023) ⇒ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/cat Retrieved:2023-6-5.
- The cat (Felis catus) is a domestic species of small carnivorous mammal.[1] [2] It is the only domesticated species in the family Felidae and is commonly referred to as the domestic cat or house cat to distinguish it from the wild members of the family.[3] Cats are commonly kept as house pets but can also be farm cats or feral cats; the feral cat ranges freely and avoids human contact.[4] Domestic cats are valued by humans for companionship and their ability to kill small rodents. About 60 cat breeds are recognized by various cat registries.[5]
The cat is similar in anatomy to the other felid species: it has a strong flexible body, quick reflexes, sharp teeth, and retractable claws adapted to killing small prey like mice and rats. Its night vision and sense of smell are well developed. Cat communication includes vocalizations like meowing, purring, trilling, hissing, growling, and grunting as well as cat-specific body language. Although the cat is a social species, it is a solitary hunter. As a predator, it is crepuscular, i.e. most active at dawn and dusk. It can hear sounds too faint or too high in frequency for human ears, such as those made by mice and other small mammals.[6] It also secretes and perceives pheromones.[7]
Female domestic cats can have kittens from spring to late autumn, with litter sizes often ranging from two to five kittens.[8] Domestic cats are bred and shown at events as registered pedigreed cats, a hobby known as cat fancy. Population control of cats may be achieved by spaying and neutering, but their proliferation and the abandonment of pets has resulted in large numbers of feral cats worldwide, contributing to the extinction of entire bird, mammal, and reptile species.[9]
It was long thought that cat domestication began in ancient Egypt, where cats were venerated from around 3100 BC, but recent advances in archaeology and genetics have shown that their domestication occurred in Western Asia around 7500 BC.[10] there were an estimated 220 million owned and 480 million stray cats in the world. the domestic cat was the second most popular pet in the United States, with 95.6 million cats owned and around 42 million households owning at least one cat. In the United Kingdom, 26% of adults have a cat, with an estimated population of 10.9 million pet cats
- The cat (Felis catus) is a domestic species of small carnivorous mammal.[1] [2] It is the only domesticated species in the family Felidae and is commonly referred to as the domestic cat or house cat to distinguish it from the wild members of the family.[3] Cats are commonly kept as house pets but can also be farm cats or feral cats; the feral cat ranges freely and avoids human contact.[4] Domestic cats are valued by humans for companionship and their ability to kill small rodents. About 60 cat breeds are recognized by various cat registries.[5]
- ↑ Linnaeus, C. (1758). "Felis Catus". Systema naturae per regna tria naturae: secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis (in Latin). Vol. 1 (Tenth reformed ed.). Holmiae: Laurentii Salvii. p. 42.
- ↑ Wozencraft, W. C. (2005). "Species Felis catus". In Wilson, D. E.; Reeder, D. M. (eds.). Mammal Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference (3rd ed.). Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 534–535. ISBN 978-0-8018-8221-0. OCLC 62265494.
- ↑ Clutton-Brock, J. (1999) [1987]. "Cats". A Natural History of Domesticated Mammals (Second ed.). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. pp. 133–140. ISBN 978-0-521-63495-3. OCLC 39786571. Archived from the original on 22 January 2021. Retrieved 25 October 2020.
- ↑ Liberg, O.; Sandell, M.; Pontier, D. & Natoli, E. (2000). "Density, spatial organisation and reproductive tactics in the domestic cat and other felids". In Turner, D. C. & Bateson, P. (eds.). The domestic cat: the biology of its behaviour (Second ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 119–147. ISBN 9780521636483. Archived from the original on 31 March 2021. Retrieved 25 October 2020.
- ↑ Driscoll, C. A.; Clutton-Brock, J.; Kitchener, A. C. & O'Brien, S. J. (2009). "The taming of the cat". Scientific American. 300 (6): 68–75. Bibcode:2009SciAm.300f..68D. doi:10.1038/scientificamerican0609-68. PMC 5790555. PMID 19485091.
- ↑ Moelk, M. (1944). "Vocalizing in the House-cat; A Phonetic and Functional Study". The American Journal of Psychology. 57 (2): 184–205. doi:10.2307/1416947. JSTOR 1416947.
- ↑ Bland, K. P. (1979). "Tom-cat odour and other pheromones in feline reproduction" (PDF). Veterinary Science Communications. 3 (1): 125–136. doi:10.1007/BF02268958. S2CID 22484090. Archived (PDF) from the original on 30 January 2019. Retrieved 15 May 2019.
- ↑ Nutter, F. B.; Levine, J. F. & Stoskopf, M. K. (2004). "Reproductive capacity of free-roaming domestic cats and kitten survival rate". Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association. 225 (9): 1399–1402. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.204.1281. doi:10.2460/javma.2004.225.1399. PMID 15552315. S2CID 1903272.
- ↑ Rochlitz, I. (2007). The Welfare of Cats. "Animal Welfare" series. Berlin: Springer Science+Business Media. pp. 141–175. ISBN 978-1-4020-6143-1. OCLC 262679891.
- ↑ Driscoll, C. A.; Menotti-Raymond, M.; Roca, A. L.; Hupe, K.; Johnson, W. E.; Geffen, E.; Harley, E. H.; Delibes, M.; Pontier, D.; Kitchener, A. C.; Yamaguchi, N.; O'Brien, S. J. & Macdonald, D. W. (2007). "The Near Eastern Origin of Cat Domestication". Science. 317 (5837): 519–523. Bibcode:2007Sci...317..519D. doi:10.1126/science.1139518. ISSN 0036-8075. PMC 5612713. PMID 17600185.