Pound for pound the Scottish wildcat is one of the most impressive predators in the world; intelligent, fearless, resourceful, patient, agile and powerful they are genuine superpredators and until as recently as the 1950s were believed to be man killers.

Surviving human persecution for five hundred years more than the British wolf and over a thousand years more than the British lynx or bear, they inspired and terrified the same Highland clans that defied the Roman and English empires. Today the wildcat continues to receive the respect of Highland farmers and gamekeepers, many of them happy to recount tales of the wildcat.

Although wildcats look similar to domestic cats, these are no feral or farm cats run wild. They're Britain's only remaining large wild predator and have walked this land for millions of years before mankind arrived or domestic cats evolved. Every inch a cat in every sense of the word the Scottish wildcat epitomises the independent, mysterious and wild spirit of the Highlands like no other creature.

Description

By appearance the Scottish wildcat resembles a very muscular domestic tabby. The coat is made up of well defined brown and black stripes and usually has a ruffled appearance due to its thickness. The gait is more like that of a big cat and the face and jaw are wider and more heavy set than the domestic. Most apparent is the beautiful tail; thick and ringed with perfect bands of black and brown ending in a blunt black tip. The Scottish form is the largest in the wildcat family with males typically between 6-9kg (13-17lb) and females 5-7kg (11-15lb), around 50% larger than the average domestic cat.

Habitat & Distribution

Once found across the British mainland, they are now confined to the Scottish Highlands. Eye witness sightings of cats in the Borders region and even Northern England are not complete impossibilities but any cats in those areas are likely to be heavily hybridised.

Scottish wildcats are a sub species of the European wildcat (Felis silvestris silvestris) and although similar to the European, the Scottish cat is larger, more heavily camoflaged and hunts across a wider range of habitats. It is also infamously known as the only wild animal that can never be tamed by human hand, even when captive reared.

Behaviour

Like most felines Scottish wildcats are solitary and largely nocturnal creatures; resting up in hidden thickets, dens or forests by day and patrolling and hunting up to 10km across open ground populated by prey at night. Males and females come together solely to mate in mid-winter and for the rest of their lives the cats are alone.

Although physical meetings are rare, wildcats regularly communicate with each other through scent. Territorial boundaries are marked with faeces or spray; these markers are left uncovered in open areas like mounds or pathways where the scent will carry as far as possible, advertising the presence of a boundary to other cats; bodily waste within the territory is usually covered. Wildcats also leave scent by rubbing glands in their cheeks and tail against objects, or by clawing trees to release scent from glands in their feet; behaviour most domestic cat owners will recognise.

Besides marking boundaries the scents also relay other information about sex, age and health; female scents will also let male cats know if they're ready to mate. Vocal communication is extremely rare, saved for displays of aggression or, whilst in heat, females wail loudly to attract male attention and quite possibly the root of many Highland tales about screaming banshees. A silent demeanour is essential for hunting and avoiding larger predators so wildcat kittens will even play in complete silence.

A wildcat will only attack something it's hunting, or something that it feel is hunting it. When threatened their classic strategy is to turn on an agressor hissing, growling and spitting furiously just like a domestic cat. Their hackles raise and the back arches but rather than turn side on to try and look big, they mock charge like a big cat; stamping forwards at you hissing and spitting. The idea is to give you just enough doubt to give them an opportunity to escape. If given no other choice and in fear of its life, perhaps cornered or defending kittens, the cat will attack with all it's fury.

The most common victims of wildcat attacks tend to be over confident dogs used to chasing domestic cats and unprepared to back down, or wildlife park keepers trying to get hold of a wildcat for veterinary inspection. Some vets opt to use a tranquilising blowdart as wildcats are well documented for biting clean through gauntlets and hands.

Diet & Hunting

Ecologically the wildcat plays a role as an important predator and controller of small to medium size prey, and even today is a friend to crop farmers as an excellent controller of alien pest species such as rabbits. They are pure carnivores and eat only meat, consuming almost every part of any kill they make; the coat providing roughage, the bones calcium and the meat everything else. Their favoured prey is rabbit and where rabbit is unavailable rodents and small mammals provide the staple food source. This pure meat diet means that parasitic worms are a common problem and wildcats eat long blades of grass which help dislodge and remove some of the worms from their system, it is also recently thought that the grass provides essential folic acid to their system.

They use a variety of strategies to hunt with stealth, speed and power being the key ingredients. Utilising all their senses to track and find suitable prey the hunting cat will then utilise its camoflage and patience to stalk as close as possible before a full speed sprint, catch and kill. Territories usually cover a few square miles and the resident wildcat will know every inch, so ambush hunting is also often used at places in the territory where prey can be reliably expected at certain times of day; cats are exceptional timekeepers.

Wildcats show a reduced fear of water to domestic cats and are suggested to occasionally fish; diping their paws into shallow burns or loch edges to try and scoop out passing fish. Lizards, eels and frogs are other unusual and minor parts of the wildcat diet.

Undeniably lambs can be in some trouble during season. Though the historical response of killing the guilty cat seems to have taught the modern form to leave livestock off the menu, today most farmers are very proud of having a wildcat sharing territory with them. Mountain hare are an occasional if challenging catch and the wildcat is known to hunt young and small species of deer successfully. Ground nesting birds present an easy target however they make up a small percentage of the total diet Other birds are hunted randomly and only opportunistically; for a wildcat most birds offer a very small meal for considerable effort.

Reproduction

Female wildcats come into heat once a year for a short period in January or February and advertise their readiness for mating through scent marking and nighttime "caterwauling" miaows and wails. If a male is in the locality the pair come together for a brief mating before parting forever. Gestation is 63 to 68 days. Females generally breed once per year, unless the first littler is lost.

Three or four kittens are born in early spring and raised solely by the mother who is exceptional in her care and defence of them as they grow. Within weeks the mother will bring back live prey for the kittens to catch for themselves, teaching them hunting skills, and within a few months they join her on the hunt to observe and learn survival skills before heading out independently around 5 or 6 months of age. They will usually mate for the first time in their second year.

Scottish wild cats probably live 6 - 8 years in the wild, and up to 15 years in captivity.

Wildcats can also mate with domestic cats creating fertile "hybrid" offspring. The commonality of domestic cats (at least 100,000 feral cats are thought to live in the Highlands) compared with the rarity of wildcats means that this is the greatest threat to the wildcat's future. Hybrids can be identified precisely genetically, and also generally by coat markings such as large white patches, a slimmer tail and body or fused and broken up stripes on the flanks. The wildcat genes seem stronger and two slightly hybridised cats seem to always produce purer offspring.

Some hybrids are pure black in colour and have become known as Kellas cats after the village in the Highlands where they were discovered in modern times. At first considered a new species research showed them to be hybrids, though one of the cats studied appeared to be the first recorded melanistic wildcat. Interestingly, Celtic legends include a fairy cat known as the Cait Sith; a large black beast that Highlanders believed was the reincarnation of a witch that only appeared when bad things were about to happen!