I have an open question about the biology of the feral cat to anyone researching Urban Ecology, is this done??? My questions revolve around the new modifications of urban environments around "FELINE RESCUE" and thus modulating urban basically wild cat populations. I actually do rescue work so I support it BUT I was wondering if anyone has tried to model the effects of changing the density and viability of MESOPREDATORS like the feral Felis domesticus and how or if it would effect pests, wildlife etc. Secondly how are feral cats evolving in urban areas, a very anecdotal observation many of us Feline rescue folks have made is that some urban kittens, birthed in very noisy industrial environments, often seem to grow up craving high levels of social activity and like noisy environments (my feral LIKEs when we have crowds of people at our house and surround sound explosion movies, finding these activities more relaxing than a quiet room), seems to me some kind of neurological adjustment or genetic adaptations possibly going on??? I am wildly hypothesizing here...
for you first question, there's plenty of published papers about the effects of feral/stray/domestic cats on wildlife (compared with data about cat densities, of course), but very little about the experimental manipulation of their density (see this for a field experiment about it: http://www.publish.csiro.au/?paper=WR98092 ).
I do not think cats prefer noisy places because they were born in noisy industrial environments, but I'm more keen in considering the hypothesis that feral (or free-ranging) cats quickly learn that large human aggregations represent good chances for a free meal
Hi Leonardo!
Thanks for the literature info!
Yes human aggregations would be a cue for food! that is an interesting hypothesis!
I am further contemplating individual phenotypic differences as a result of developmental plasticity, fetal environment influencing the development of the auditory system and possible later behavioral tolerance of loud noises and "noisy" habitats.
A population mean does not answer this question.
I guess I want to know if kittens of a pregnant female cat in a high decibel environment (many ferals we rescue in industrial areas outside) would be different in their tolerance of noise than kittens who were developing in a quiet environment (purebred, rural farm cats).
Urban landscapes are changing how vertebrates produce sounds (singing birds) but what do we know about how urban noise impacts ontogeny of hearing???
Feral cats from noisy industrial environments seem to be more tolerant of "industrial noises" (sirens, banging etc.) compared to cats that are not from noisy birthing environments.
We work with hundreds of individual cats, its still anecdotal since personalities do vary alot but behaviors differ as well as noise tolerance dramatically for some individuals i have observed closely and compared to pure breds.
Human babies are proposed to be "aware" of and perhaps influenced by sounds during their gestation so I am positing this angle of research for another vertebrate. Just curious!
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