Larger feline predators often target their smaller relatives, including domestic cats. While all members of the cat family, Felidae, share a common ancestry, their interactions are governed by a strict size hierarchy. In nature, the relationship between different species of cats is one of competition and survival. This dynamic determines whether a smaller cat is viewed as a rival, a threat, or a potential meal, prioritizing resource acquisition and dominance over familial recognition.
Yes, It Happens: The Ecology of Inter-Felid Predation
Larger cats prey on smaller cats, a behavior known as intraguild predation. This involves predators killing and consuming other predators with whom they share food resources. A larger species often views a smaller species as a competitor for prey, and eliminating the rival secures resources. This interference competition uses direct interaction, like killing, to gain an advantage.
Smaller cats are not typically the primary prey for apex predators like lions or tigers, but they become targets of opportunity, especially when resources are scarce. Tigers have been known to kill and consume leopards. To a large cat, a smaller cat represents protein, and the instinctual drive for food overrides the concept of genetic family.
Factors Increasing Predation Risk
The likelihood of a large cat preying on a small cat is significantly increased by environmental and human-driven factors that force their interactions. Habitat overlap is a primary driver, particularly where human development encroaches on wildlands, pushing wild predators closer to human settlements. This urbanization increases the opportunity for interspecific interactions between wild felids, such as pumas and bobcats.
Resource competition further compounds the risk, especially when the main prey animals of the larger cat become depleted. When primary prey is scarce, the diet of an apex predator can broaden to include a wider range of animals, including smaller carnivores like other cats. This scarcity forces the larger predator to consider smaller, less energy-efficient prey to survive.
Human activity also plays a direct role by introducing domestic cats into the territories of wild predators. Free-roaming domestic cats often live adjacent to natural areas, placing them squarely in the path of native wild predators. This mixing of populations due to human expansion creates a high-risk scenario for the smaller felines.
Small Cat Vulnerability: Wild Versus Domestic Victims
Vulnerability differs significantly between wild small cat species and domestic cats. Wild small cats, such as ocelots or bobcats, have evolved behavioral strategies to mitigate the threat posed by larger predators. These species often utilize “competition refuges,” adjusting their movement and activity patterns in space and time to avoid dominant species like pumas or jaguars.
Domestic cats, however, lack the necessary evolutionary training and often the fear response to recognize the danger posed by a large predator. Their domestic nature and relative lack of concern for large rivals make them easier targets, especially when they roam outdoors near wild habitats. In North America, cougars, also known as mountain lions or pumas, are known to prey on domestic cats with some frequency.
The size difference between a typical domestic cat, weighing around 4 to 5 kilograms, and a large cat like a lion, which can exceed 250 kilograms, makes the domestic animal extremely vulnerable. Keeping domestic cats indoors is the most effective way to eliminate this specific predation risk.