Portal:Cats

The African golden cat (Caracal aurata) is a wild cat endemic to the rainforests of West and Central Africa. It is threatened due to deforestation and bushmeat hunting and listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List. It is a close relative of both the caracal and the serval. Previously, it was placed in the genus Profelis. Its body size ranges from 61 to 101 cm (24 to 40 in) with a 16 to 46 cm (6.3 to 18.1 in) long tail. (Full article...)

• List of felids – the family Felidae consists of 41 extant species belonging to 14 genera and divided into 92 subspecies.
• List of domestic cat breeds – includes only domestic cat breeds and domestic × wild hybrids
• List of individual cats – includes cats that have achieved some degree of popularity either in their own right.
• List of fictional felines – includes a limited selection of notable felines from various works, organized by medium.

Modern-type Persian cat

The Persian cat, also known as the Persian longhair, is a long-haired breed of cat characterized by a round face and short muzzle. The first documented ancestors of Persian cats might have been imported into Italy from Khorasan as early as around 1620, however this has not been proven. Instead there is stronger evidence for a longhaired cat breed being exported from Afghanistan and Iran from the 19th century onwards.

Widely recognized by cat fancy since the late 19th century, Persian cats were first adopted by the British, and later by American breeders after World War II. Some cat fancier organizations' breed standards subsume the Himalayan and Exotic Shorthair as variants of this breed, while others generally treat them as separate breeds.

The selective breeding carried out by breeders has allowed the development of a wide variety of coat colors, but has also led to the creation of increasingly flat-faced Persian cats. Favored by fanciers, this head structure can bring with it a number of health problems. As is the case with the Siamese breed, there have been efforts by some breeders to preserve the older type of cat, the traditional breed, having a more pronounced muzzle, which is more popular with the general public. Hereditary polycystic kidney disease is prevalent in the breed, affecting almost half of the population in some countries.

• ...that the practice of taking cats aboard ships (pictured) dates back to the Ancient Egyptians?
• ...that Oscar the Cat was featured in the New England Journal of Medicine for his purported ability to predict the impending death of the terminally ill?
• ...that Grand Duke Nicholas Mikhailovich of Russia gave away his cat to one of the soldiers tasked with his execution?
• ...that the Witches of Belvoir supposedly believed a cat named Rutterkin helped them cast spells?
• ...that cats learn by trial and error, observation and imitation? Cats' learning abilities are aided by their good memory. Research has found cats to have memory about two hundred times better than dogs. Cats are even thought to have even better memory than monkeys and chimps.
• ...that, despite the name, Mrs Chippy, the ship's cat on Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition was actually male?