Feral Cats Are Better Killers in Open Habitats, Revealed by Animal-Borne Video.

ABSTRACT: One of the key gaps in understanding the impacts of predation by small mammalian predators on prey is how habitat structure affects the hunting success of small predators, such as feral cats. These effects are poorly understood due to the difficulty of observing actual hunting behaviours. We attached collar-mounted video cameras to feral cats living in a tropical savanna environment in northern Australia, and measured variation in hunting success among different microhabitats (open areas, dense grass and complex rocks). From 89 hours of footage, we recorded 101 hunting events, of which 32 were successful. Of these kills, 28% were not eaten. Hunting success was highly dependent on microhabitat structure surrounding prey, increasing from 17% in habitats with dense grass or complex rocks to 7

SUBMITTER: McGregor H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4545751 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature