IUCN / SSC Cat Specialist Group - Digital Cat Library |
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| Campbell, R. | |
| Spatial ecology of the Scottish wildcat | |
| Full Book | |
The Scottish wildcat _Felis silvestris grampia_ is threatened by introgression with the domestic cat _F. s. catus_ and by persecution from gamekeepers (Macdonald et al. 2004). Based on current knowledge, Macdonald et al. (2004) calculated that off an estimated 3,500 wild-living cats in Scotland, as few as 400 of these may be pure wildcat, with the remainder consisting of feral domestic cat and cats that are hybrid between domestic cat and wildcat. The wildcat is facing similar threats across its range in mainland Europe (e.g. Nowell & Jackson 1996; Pierpaoli et al. 2003). Very little is known about the hybridization process between domestic cat and wildcat. A better understanding of this process will aid conservation of wildcat by targeting efforts to break the link in the causal chain of introgression. If, furthermore, we cannot evict all domestic cat genes from wild-living cats in Scotland (as seems likely, Macdonald et al. 2004), we need to establish, on the domestic cat . wildcat spectrum, where a line can be drawn that distinguished domestic cats from functional 'wildcats'. To do this, we need to compare the behavioural ecology of cats from across this spectrum within the same geographical area. |
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