Biol Invasions (2022) 24:1539–1551

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-022-02734-5

ORIGINAL PAPER

Predation of wildlife by domestic cats in a Neotropical city:

a multi‑factor issue
Isac Mella‑Méndez · Rafael Flores‑Peredo ·
Juan David Amaya‑Espinel · Beatriz Bolívar‑Cimé ·
M. Cristina Mac Swiney G. · Armando Jesús Martínez

Received: 13 February 2021 / Accepted: 18 January 2022 / Published online: 9 February 2022
© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022

Abstract Domestic cats are a potential risk for factors will have a greater effect compared intrinsic
native fauna in the Neotropics. Intrinsic (age, weight, factors due to the innate predatory cat’s behavior.
sex, color) and extrinsic (nocturnal confinement, time We chose 120 cats from 44 households in the city of
spent outside the home, distance to green areas, etc.) Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico. We documented the rich-
factors can influence the type and quantity of prey that ness, dominance and abundance of wildlife species
cats take to their homes. The study goal was to evalu- captured and brought home by cats during March to
ate domestic cat predation in a Neotropical city. We August 2019 and those intrinsic and extrinsic fac-
intend to answer the following questions: (1) Which is tors that modulate their predatory behavior. The cats
the richness, dominance and abundance of prey cap- captured 246 prey items, 35.8% were reptiles, 23.2%
tured by domestic cats? (2) Which are the extrinsic or invertebrates, 17.9% amphibians, 15.4% birds and
intrinsic factors that most influence prey capture by 7.7% mammals. The prey items belonged to 64 taxa
domestic cats? We predict that: (a) cats will capture (17 birds, 17 invertebrates, 15 reptiles, nine mammals
a large diversity of native wildlife and (b) extrinsic and six amphibians). The lizard Sceloporus variabilis
was the most captured prey. Of the prey items, 93.5%
Supplementary Information The online version were native and 6.5% non-native. Five intrinsic and
contains supplementary material available at https://​doi.​ 5 extrinsic factors contributed most to the predation
org/​10.​1007/​s10530-​022-​02734-5. events, of which cat stripe color, time spent by the
cats outside of the home and nocturnal confinement
I. Mella‑Méndez · A. J. Martínez
Instituto de Neuroetología, Universidad Veracruzana, were the most important. These results allow us to
Xalapa, Veracruz, México understand the harmful effect of cats on wildlife in a
Neotropical city.
I. Mella‑Méndez · R. Flores‑Peredo (*) · B. Bolívar‑Cimé
Laboratorio de Ecología, Instituto de Investigaciones
Forestales, Universidad Veracruzana, Xalapa, Veracruz, Keywords Felis catus · Free-ranging cats · Prey
México brought home · Urban wildlife
e-mail: [email protected]

J. D. Amaya‑Espinel
Departamento de Ecología Y Territorio, Pontificia Introduction
Universidad Javeriana, Bogotá, Cundinamarca, Colombia
Domestic cats (Felis catus) are found all over the
M. C. Mac Swiney G.
world, apart from Antarctica (Trouwborst et al.
Centro de Investigaciones Tropicales, Universidad
Veracruzana, Xalapa, Veracruz, México 2020). In 2009, there were an estimated 600 million

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 1540 I. Mella‑Méndez et al.

domestic cats worldwide (Driscoll et al. 2009). The the home (Seymour et al. 2020), it is possible to find
number of domestic cats could be markedly higher a partial representation of the species most affected
today, especially if unowned and feral cats are con- by the cats’ predatory behavior (Krauze-Gryz et al.
sidered. In cities, one of the most worrying impacts of 2019; Legge et al. 2020).
cats is predation of wildlife (Piontek et al. 2021). This Various factors of the urban environment in which
predation threatens 367 species of wildlife, of which cats live have been associated with their preda-
63 have already become extinct as a result (Doherty tory effect and species captured (Lilith et al. 2006;
et al. 2016; Loss and Marra 2017). Thomas et al. 2012; Jaroš 2021). These include
Cats are opportunistic hunters and their predatory extrinsic factors such as: (a) time spent by the cats
behavior is innate, and can persist even if the individ- outside of the home: “more time out = more captured
uals are sufficiently fed (Adamec 1976; Spotte 2014). prey” (McDonald et al. 2015; Hanmer et al. 2017), (b)
Their prey commonly includes wildlife, such as birds nocturnal confinement: “more confinement = fewer
(Dauphiné and Cooper 2009; Woods et al. 2003; captured prey” (Linklater et al. 2019), (c) distance to
Woinarski et al. 2017), mammals (Loss et al. 2013; green areas: “nearby green areas = increased preda-
Krauze-Gryz et al. 2017; Murphy et al. 2019), reptiles tion because these have an effect on the movement of
(Arnaud et al. 1993; Barratt 1998; Woinarski et al. cats” (Barratt 1998; Graham et al. 2012; McDonald
2018), amphibians (Woods et al. 2003; Baker et al. et al. 2015; Woinarski et al. 2019), (d) green area size:
2005; Woinarski et al. 2020) and invertebrates (Gil- “larger areas offer the opportunity to find more prey”
lies and Clout 2003; Medina and García 2007; Wool- (Dickman 1996), (e) number of events and duration of
ley et al. 2020), many of which are native. However, cat-human cohabitation in the home: “more coexist-
most cat predation studies have focused on the birds ence = less predation” (Cecchetti et al. 2021), (f) use
and mammals (Blancher 2013; Mella-Méndez et al. of play towers: “longer playing time = fewer animals
2019; Murphy et al. 2019), with little attention paid caught” (Cecchetti et al. 2021) and (g) type, origin
to other groups like amphibians, reptiles and inverte- and quantity of food: “more foods of animal origin
brates (Seymour et al. 2020; Woinarski et al. 2020). and with meat protein = less predation” (Piontek et al.
In the United Kingdom, for example, cats were found 2021; Cecchetti et al. 2021). Intrinsic factors such as
to be responsible for killing 44 species of birds, 20 the age, weight, sex, color and sterilization status of
species of wild mammals, 4 species of reptiles and 3 the cats, have been similarly associated, although this
species of amphibians (Woods et al. 2003). Similarly, has not been conclusive (Barratt 1998; Woods et al.
other studies in United Kingdom, New Zealand and 2003; Van Heezik et al. 2010; Bengsen et al. 2012;
Australia document a greater preference for mammals McDonald et al. 2015). Even the color of the cat
and birds versus reptiles and invertebrates (Barratt could be an important trait, since large felines such
1998; Baker et al. 2008; Hansen 2010). According to as tigers use stripe color to confuse potential prey and
Caro (1980) and Doherty et al (2016), mammals and increase capture success (Fennell et al. 2019).
birds are frequently used as prey by adult cats to teach Most of the studies that have evaluated predation
hunting techniques to their young, and are also com- by cats have been conducted in temperate regions
mon inhabitants of areas in proximity to human set- with specific taxonomic groups (e.g. birds, mam-
tlements where cats are abundant. mals) (Dickman 2009; Lazenby et al. 2021) or have
A variety of approaches have been used to quan- addressed a particular approach (e.g. biological,
tify cat predation and diet, including kittycams (Loyd social, ethological) (McDonald et al. 2015; Deak
et al. 2013; Seymour et al. 2020), artificial prey et al. 2019; Trouwborst et al. 2020; Jaroš 2021).
(Biben 1979; Markowitz and Laforse 1987), stomach Some of these have been conducted in the USA (Loss
content analysis (Krauze-Gryz et al. 2012) and quan- et al. 2013; Loyd et al. 2013), Canada (Flockhart et al.
tification of prey brought home (Borkenhagen 1978; 2016), United Kingdom (Thomas et al. 2012), Italy
Loss and Marra 2017). Despite the fact that only a (Mori et al. 2019) and Poland (Krauze-Gryz et al.
minority of the prey caught by the cats are ultimately 2017; Piontek et al. 2021), countries in which the
brought to the home, which thus underestimates by ecological diversity is low. The negative effect of cats
about 3–4.5 times the number of prey captured by could therefore be greater in areas of high diversity
excluding that consumed or abandoned away from such as the Neotropics (Morrone 2014). Neotropical

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Predation of wildlife by domestic cats in a Neotropical city: a multi‑factor issue 1541

urban areas harbor a wide variety of wildlife, since areas, as well as water bodies (lakes, streams) and
they present diverse environments, climates and green spaces with ecological parks, unused private
biomes that provide a wide range of shelters, food properties, gardens and tree and shrub vegetation
and habitats (Macgregor-Fors and Ortega-Álvarez in the streets and avenues. Moreover, a high pres-
2013; Morrone 2014). Likewise, these resources ence of domestic cats has been recorded in various
in Neotropical cities can also favor the presence parts of the city, many of which enter the green areas
of non-native species, such as cats (da Rosa et al. and exert an important pressure on the native fauna
2020), since confinement of pets within the home is (Mella-Méndez et al. 2019).
not a common practice among the human popula-
tion (Reece 2005), thus increasing the probability of Experimental design
exerting severe impacts on wildlife.
Given the need to increase the existing knowledge Selection of participants
about the impact of domestic cats in Neotropical
areas using different approaches, the goal of the pre- The homes selected for this study were those in which
sent study was to evaluate domestic cat predation in the hunting cat owners agreed to participate in the
a Neotropical city, including the ecological and eth- project voluntarily, either when they were visited in
ological components. To attain our goal, we seek to their homes by the researchers during February 2018
answer the following questions: (1) What is the rich- or by responding to an advertising campaign of one
ness, dominance and abundance of prey captured by month in duration conducted on television, radio
domestic cats in a Neotropical city? (2) Which extrin- and social networks such as Facebook and Instagram
sic or intrinsic factors most influence prey capture by (Mori et al. 2019). The homes were distributed in a
domestic cats? Based on the information presented, scattered manner at various points in the city (Fig. 1).
we hypothesize that: (1) Neotropical cities such as A total of forty-four homes wished to participate
Xalapa are the habitat of an important native wildlife voluntarily, presenting a total of 120 cats. These
diversity which is vulnerable to predation by domes- households were provided with a descriptive sheet
tic cats, so it is predicted that cats will capture a great containing comprehensive information about the pro-
diversity of native fauna, particularly mammals and ject (Online Resource 1), a consent form, as well as
birds, and (2), predatory behavior in cats is innate plastic bags in which to deposit the prey captured by
and is exhibited despite receiving enough food and is their cats, following the methodology proposed by
independent of age, weight or sex (intrinsic factors), Churcher and Lawton (1987) and Barratt (1998).
so it is predicted that extrinsic factors will have a
greater influence on the frequency of capture. Richness, dominance and abundance of captured prey

For six consecutive months (1st of March to the

Materials and methods 31st of August 2018), corresponding to the repro-
ductive and breeding periods of wild birds and
Study area small mammals (Cruz-Angón et al. 2008; Cebal-
los and Oliva 2005), the hunting cat owners were
The study was conducted in the city of Xalapa in Ver- asked to recover any prey items brought home by
acruz, Mexico (19° 32´ 24″ N, 96° 55´ 39″ W), which their cats and to deposit these in the plastic bags
has an area of 124.4 k­m2 and a population of ca. (Churcher and Lawton 1987; Barratt 1998; McDon-
510,000 inhabitants (4099.6 ind./km2). The elevation ald et al. 2015), as well as to take photographs of
ranges from 1220 to 1557 m above sea level and the the prey when it was not possible to recover the
climate is temperate humid type C(fm) (García 1981). cadaver (Seymour et al. 2020). The records were
The mean annual temperature is 18 °C and mean compiled through monthly visits with the aim of
annual precipitation is 1100–1600 mm (INEGI 2009). keeping the owners engaged with the project. The
Xalapa is located in the Neotropical region and has a prey items were identified by the researcher and
heterogeneous structure of grey areas such as build- classified as birds, mammals, amphibians, reptiles
ings, residential zones, neighborhoods and suburban or invertebrates, attempting to identify them to the

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 1542 I. Mella‑Méndez et al.

Fig. 1  Spatial location of Xalapa Veracruz, Mexico and the study´s selected households. Circles in red show the cats´ activity influ-
ence area (1 ha). The center point represents the home of each cat whose owner voluntarily decided to be an investigation participant

most accurate taxonomic level possible (generally Effect of extrinsic and intrinsic factors
species or genus) using guides for the identifica-
tion of local fauna (Guzmán-Guzmán and Vázquez- To determine the extrinsic and intrinsic factors of
Torres 2011; González-Christen and Ruz-Rosado hunting cats and associate these with their predation
2016) as well as for the birds of Mexico and north- of wildlife, we used a survey modified from those
ern Central America (Howell and Webb 1995), wild used by Thomas et al. (2012) and McDonald et al.
mammals of Mexico (Ceballos and Oliva 2005) (2015), (Online Resource 2). In this survey, informa-
and invertebrates (Llorente Bousquets et al. 2004). tion was requested regarding time spent by the cats
Another classification according to origin (native outside of the home, nocturnal confinement, distance
or non-native) was also included (Loss et al. 2013). to green areas, green area size, number of events
In the case of partially consumed prey, the remains and duration of cat-human cohabitation in the home,
(hair, feathers, scales, exoskeletons) were analyzed use of play towers, type, origin and quantity of food
using a stereoscopic microscope in order to assign a (extrinsic factors) and age, weight, sex, color and
category (generally family). In cases where identifi- sterilization status (intrinsic factors).
cation was impossible, the remains were included in A spatial analysis was conducted in order to deter-
the total count of prey, but excluded from the statis- mine the distance between the cat’s home and the
tical analyses (Krauze-Gryz et al. 2017). closest patch of vegetation (green areas). We used a
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Predation of wildlife by domestic cats in a Neotropical city: a multi‑factor issue 1543

satellite image obtained free of charge through Senti- the Shapiro Wilks test and the categorical variables
nel 2-A of the Copernicus Open Access Hub (https://​ were transformed to a numerical scale (Zar 2010).
scihub.​coper​nicus.​eu) dated May 10, 2018, with a Subsequently, a multi-collinearity analysis was per-
pixel size resolution of 10 m. The supervised clas- formed to verify that none of the predictor variables
sification method was applied using the Algorithm were correlated using the Variance Inflation Fac-
Maximum Likelihood using ArcGIS® 10.5 software tors (VIF) from the package car (Fox and Weisberg
and the extension Patch Analyst 5.2. Eight types of 2019). We excluded five variables (number of events
cover were considered and were grouped into two cat- and duration of cat-human cohabitation in the home,
egories: natural areas (montane cloud forest, pasture, use of play towers, type and origin of food) that pre-
crops, and secondary vegetation of montane cloud sented high VIF (> 3) and were less correlated to the
forest) and gray areas (urban area, bare soil, white response variables (Zuur et al. 2009). As a result,
roofs, streets). To evaluate the accuracy of the clas- ten predictor variables were ultimately included in
sification, the Kappa coefficient was used, construct- the model (five intrinsic and five extrinsic factors
ing error matrices using 49 reference points taken at (Table 1). The models were built by relating the vari-
different points in the city of Xalapa, Veracruz, using ables in an additive effect while the categorical vari-
the WGS84 system and UTM zone 14 projection. An ables were transformed to binary for testing. We con-
area of influence of 10,000 ­m2 (1 ha) was considered sidered homes as a random effect factor (homes with
around the home of each cat, representing its approxi- multiple hunting cats) and a Poisson distribution to
mate home range in urban zones (Kitts-Morgan et al. represent the prey counts, using the package lme4 of
2015; Hanmer et al. 2017). R (Bates et al. 2015).
To define the best model, the function "dredge" of
Statistical analysis the package "MuMIn" of R (Barton 2018) was used,
as well as a classification of models applied based on
To describe the richness, dominance, and abundance the Akaike information criterion (AIC) with a second
of prey captured by cats, the number of species and order correction for the reduced sample size, consid-
their frequencies of capture were represented in ering the accumulated weight of the different AICc
graphs of relative abundance, as well as through a (Burnham and Anderson 2002). The set of models
histogram of the top 20 species most depredated grouped all of the possible combinations of these
by cats. To determine the effect of the intrinsic and explanatory variables. To emphasize the relative
extrinsic factors of the cats on the quantity of prey power of the regression coefficients, the continuous
captured, a generalized linear mixed model (GLMM) covariables were standardized to present a mean of 0
was used (Doherty et al. 2021). First, the normality and a standard deviation of 1 (McDonald et al. 2015).
of the continuous variables was corroborated using Moreover, we interpreted the relative importance of

Table 1  Set of intrinsic Type of factor Name of factor Range VIF

and extrinsic factors of the GVIF^(1/
studied subjects considered (2*Df))
in the generalized linear
mixed model Intrinsic Sex Female–male 1.193
Age 3 months up to 12 years 1.328
Weight 1.5 kg up to 5.3 kg 1.335
Color White-black-grey-brown-striped 1.065
Sterilization Yes–no 1.148
Extrinsic Meals per day 1 up to 7 1.102
Distance between the home 2.8 m up to 94.6 m 1.011
and nearest green area
Size of the nearest green area 75 ­m2 up to 4876 ­m2 1.037
Time spent outside home 0 up to 23 h 1.314
Nocturnal confinement Yes–no 1.23

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 1544 I. Mella‑Méndez et al.

the variables using their accumulated AICc weight 17 were invertebrates, 15 were reptiles, nine were
and their confidence intervals (α < 0.05). We tested mammals and six were amphibians (Fig. 2b). The
the significance of the models with respect to a null histogram shows that four of the ten most captured
model (number of prey items ~ (1 | homes).The good- species were lizards of the genera Sceloporus and
ness-of-fit of the models was assessed by calculating Anolis (Fig. 3). A total of 93.5% of the prey items
the conditional and marginal coefficients of determi- captured (59 spp.) were native, while 6.5% were
nation computed with the function R-squared GLMM non-native (5 spp.) (Fig. 2b).
in the MuMIn package (Barton 2018). The marginal
R-squared represents the variance explained only
by the fixed part of the model, while the conditional Effect of intrinsic and extrinsic factors on the capture
R-squared is interpreted as the variance explained by of prey
the entire model, including both fixed and random
factors (Nakagawa and Schielzeth 2013). This analy- The analysis showed that the cats that spent more
sis only included those cases that identified the cat time outside the home, those that were not spatially
responsible for the prey capture. confined at night and those with striped coloration
were associated with a higher number of prey items
captured (Fig. 4, Online Resource 4). Equally, the
Results relative importance of the variables showed that the
highest accumulated AICc contributions were time
Richness, dominance and abundance of prey captured spent outside the home (c = 1), nocturnal confine-
ment (c = 0.99) and striped coloration (c = 0.95),
High variation was recorded in the amount of prey while the lowest were weight (c = 0.33), distance to
brought home by hunting cats (x̄ = 2.02, SD = 4.39), green areas (c = 0.32), size of green areas (c = 0.31),
in which some cats brought no prey items to their age (c = 0.26), sex (c = 0.26), sterilization (c = 0.09)
homes while one cat captured and brought up to and number of meals per day (c = 0.06).
38 prey. The cats captured 246 prey items, equiva-
lent to about 4 items/cat/year, of which 88 (35.8%)
were reptiles, 57 (23.2%) invertebrates, 44 (17.9%)
amphibians, 38 (15.4%) birds and 19 (7.7%) mam-
mals (Fig. 2a, Online Resource 3). The captured
species belonged to 64 taxa, of which 17 were birds,

Fig. 2  Total percentage of captured specimens by taxonomic group (a) and number of species (b) captured by domestic cats in the
city of Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico

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Predation of wildlife by domestic cats in a Neotropical city: a multi‑factor issue 1545

Fig. 3  Capture frequency

of the twenty species most
captured by domestic cats
in the city of Xalapa, in
Veracruz, Mexico

Fig. 4  Mean β values (± IC

95%) that indicate the direc-
tion and size of the effects
of the intrinsic and extrinsic
variables that contribute
to explaining the quantity
of prey. Asterisk denotes
the factors with the highest
AICc weight in the model
combinations

Discussion since 64 taxa were affected, which means a higher

number compared to other studies carried out in tem-
Richness, dominance and abundance of prey captured perate environments where there was a larger sample
size and more days of monitoring (Baker et al. 2005;
Our hypothesis that Neotropical cities are habitat to Krauze-Gryz et al. 2012, 2017; Thomas et al. 2012).
an important diversity of native wildlife vulnerable to However, the average number of prey captured by
predation by domestic cats was partially supported, hunting domestic cats was appreciably smaller than

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 1546 I. Mella‑Méndez et al.

that reported in most previous studies. For example, the group with the highest number of threatened and
Legge et al. (2020) reported an average of 38.9 items/ extinct species as a result of this predator (Doherty
cat/year from a compilation of 47 studies conducted et al. 2016). This may be related to the fact that the
across the globe using different techniques to those number of bird species that are generalist or tolerant
used in this study, including kitticams and analysis to urbanization is usually greater than that of other
of stomach contents and excreta. This could be due vertebrates such as mammals, reptiles or amphibians
to the fact that predation estimates based solely on the (Cornelis and Hermy 2004; Shochat et al. 2010). This
count of prey brought home tend to greatly underesti- is particularly evident in the city of Xalapa, where the
mate the actual predation quantity, since the cats can richness of birds is around 341 species (González-
return with only 23% (Loyd et al. 2013), 18% (Sey- García et al. 2016), a number that is higher than the
mour et al. 2020) or 10% (Krauze-Gryz et al. 2019) local richness of other groups of vertebrates such as
of the captured prey, while other prey items are con- reptiles, amphibians or mammals (López-Moreno
sumed or left at the capture site. In addition, 61 cats 1993; GEV 2001).
in our sample spent less than an hour per day away Many studies that have evaluated the prey of
from home. Moreover, the patterns observed with cats do not consider the invertebrates (Medina et al.
respect to the prey items captured do not necessarily 2011; Loss et al. 2013; Krauze-Gryz et al. 2017). We
reflect their abundance, but rather could be the result recorded a considerable number of depredated spe-
of the anti-predation responses exhibited by each spe- cies of the orders Orthoptera, Hemiptera, Lepidop-
cies, as well as their habits of displacement in the tera and Coleoptera, as has been reported in other
urban environment, and thus their ease of capture studies (Medina and García 2007; Woolley et al.
(Spencer et al. 2017). This is because cats can cap- 2020). In Xalapa, as with other studies, there is a
ture prey depending on their availability, ease of cap- high richness of invertebrates (Jones and Leather
ture and abundance, for which reason the assemblage 2012; MacGregor-Fors et al. 2015) and the auditory
of their prey could be the result of a combination of and visual stimuli they produce are very perceptible
inter-related variables that is likely to differ among by hunting domestic cats, for which reason, if we add
regions and local species (Coman and Brunner 1972; other characteristics such as their small size and few
Fitzgerald and Turner 2000). anti-predation strategies, they are easily caught prey
In terms of frequency, reptiles (mainly Lacertilia) (Ferreira et al. 2014; Hernandez et al. 2018).
were the most captured group, followed by inverte- One finding of note in our study is that the native
brates, especially of the order Orthoptera. This con- species were subject to greater predation than the
trasts with the prediction raised and the findings of non-native species. This information, while novel
other studies in which birds and mammals were found for Neotropical cities, is very similar to that reported
to be the main prey (Barratt 1998; Baker et al. 2008; by other authors in temperate regions of the USA, in
Hansen 2010). Nevertheless, reptiles are often abun- which it is documented that 67% of the bird species
dant in urban environments and have been reported as captured by cats are native (Loss et al. 2013). How-
prey of domestic cats (Hernandez et al. 2018; Woi- ever, this pattern can vary according to the type of
narski et al. 2020). In particular, the lizard Scelopo- landscape, since non-native mammals are commonly
rus, which was the most captured species, is a gen- recorded in the diet of cats in urban areas, while wild
eralist species in the urban environment, with limited shrews, squirrels, rabbits and mice are more common
locomotion at low temperatures on rocks and soil in suburban and rural areas (Spotte 2014). It is there-
that makes them easily captured prey (Webster et al. fore highly likely that Neotropical cities are attractive
2018). areas for native species, since there is a presence of
Birds and invertebrates were the groups that pre- food sources in the form of urban waste and veg-
sented the highest number of species depredated etation, as well as different refuges and nesting sites
by hunting domestic cats, a finding that coincided (Shochat et al. 2010; Pauchard et al. 2013). However,
with those of similar studies, in which birds are also urban areas could also act as ecological traps, since
reported as one of the groups most affected by cats these organisms can be exposed to pressures unique
(van Heezik et al. 2010; Thomas et al. 2012; Woin- to the urban areas such as those exerted by domestic
arski et al. 2017). At global level, birds constitute cats (Vlaschenko et al. 2019).

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Predation of wildlife by domestic cats in a Neotropical city: a multi‑factor issue 1547

Effect of intrinsic and extrinsic factors on the capture or motivation to hunt, but rather the striped fur favors
of prey its camouflage against potential prey. This strategy
is similar to that of other wild felines such as tigers,
The results support the prediction that extrinsic fac- the stalking behavior of which benefits from cryptic
tors such as the time spent by the cats outside of the coloration, increasing their success in terms of prey
home and nocturnal confinement are related to the capture (Rubio-Gutiérrez and Guevara-Chumacero
quantity of prey captured. This coincides with that 2017; Fennell et al. 2019). More experimental studies
reported by other authors, who state that the more are required with various combinations of immediate
time a cat spends outside of the home, the greater the background and with different prey (mammals, birds,
probability that it will hunt (Robertson 1998). For this reptiles, amphibians) to test the capacity for individ-
reason, confinement or curfew has been a strategy ual reaction under controlled conditions.
implemented with good results in sites in Australia,
by reducing the probability of interactions between
cats and wildlife (Denny and Dickman 2010). How- Conclusions
ever, nocturnal confinement of cats is not appropri-
ate in sites where the majority of native species are In summary, our data suggest that, although we
diurnal (e.g. birds) and the nocturnal species are non- did not record an abundance of prey as high as that
native (e.g. rats) (Gordon et al. 2010). If we consider reported in other studies, a high richness of affected
the fact that the main prey of cats in our study were species was documented, especially native species of
birds and reptiles with diurnal habits, it would be great ecological importance due to their ecosystem
of great interest to expand this type of research into functions, coupled with the fact that a species of rep-
other Neotropical cities in order to evaluate the prey tile (Sceloporus variabilis) was recorded as the most
and their activity patterns using methodologies such frequently captured. The duration of time spent by the
as the use of kittycams (Loyd et al. 2013; Seymour cats outside of the home and nocturnal confinement
et al. 2020) and possibly to recommend schedules of constitute significant extrinsic factors associated with
confinement (Doherty et al. 2015). the capture of prey. Likewise, cat coloration was the
With the exception of the cat coloration, we found intrinsic factor that had an effect, by improving the
no association between intrinsic factors and the quan- camouflage of the cats against their immediate back-
tity of prey captured, although other studies present ground. These findings are of utility to the construc-
different evidence. For example, some studies show tion of a more complete understanding of the preda-
that female cats could capture more prey than males, tory behavior of cats in towns and cities, highlighting
through demonstrating hunting techniques to their the importance of an integral evaluation that includes
young from the fourth week of age (Crowell-Davis ecological and ethological aspects, particularly in a
et al. 2004). Equally, younger cats of lower weight region as diverse and with such growth in urbaniza-
could be more agile and thus able to catch more prey tion as the Neotropics.
(McDonald et al. 2015), non-sterilized individuals
could roam to a greater extent (Turner and Mertens Acknowledgements The authors appreciate the two anony-
1986) and poorly fed cats could present a tendency to mous reviewers for their insightful suggestions and careful
reading of the manuscript. The National Council for Science
catch more prey (Silva-Rodríguez and Sieving 2011).
and Technology awarded a postgraduate scholarship (473645)
However, these intrinsic variables themselves have to the first author. Thanks to the hunting cat owners who facili-
had no effect in other studies (Robertson 1998; Brick- tated this study, as well as to the Laboratorio de Ecología of
ner-Braun et al. 2007; Flux 2007; Loyd et al. 2013), the Instituto de Investigaciones Forestales-UV and its staff for
compiling the field data.
possibly because predatory behavior is innate and can
occur independently of any intrinsic trait of the cat Author contributions IM-M Conceptualization, AJM For-
(Polsky 1975; Adamec 1976; Spotte 2014). mal analysis, IM-M and RF-P Methodology, RF-P Project
Cat coloration is the only intrinsic factor that has administration, RF-P Resources, BSB-C Software, MCMSG,
BSB-C, AJM and JDA-E Validation, IM-M and RF-P Writ-
not been considered as an explanatory variable in
ing original draft, MCMSG, BSB-C, AJM and JDA-E Writ-
other studies and that showed an effect in our model, ing review and editing. All authors have read and agreed to the
since it apparently does not modulate the cat´s agility published version of the manuscript.

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13
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 1548 I. Mella‑Méndez et al.

Funding The authors did not receive support from any Brickner-Braun I, Geffen E, Yom-Tov Y (2007) The domes-
organization for the submitted work. tic cat as a predator of Israeli wildlife. Isr J Ecol Evol
53:129–142. https://​doi.​org/​10.​1560/​IJEE.​53.2.​129
Availability of data and material The datasets generated Burnham KP, Anderson DR (2002) Model selection and mul-
during and/or analyzed during the current study are available timodel inference: a practical information-theoretic
from the corresponding author on reasonable request. approach, 2nd edn. Springer, New York
Caro TM (1980) Effects of the mother, object play and adult
Declarations experience on predation in cats. Behav Neural Biol
29(1):29–51. https://​doi.​org/​10.​1016/​S0163-​1047(80)​
Conflict of interest The authors declare no conflict of inter- 92456-5
est. Ceballos G, Oliva G (2005) Los mamiferos silvestres de
Mexico. Fondo de Cultura Económica, Ciudad de
Consent to participate Participants agreed to participate vol- México
untarily. Cecchetti M, Crowley SL, Goodwin CED, McDonald RA
(2021) Provision of high meat content food and object
play reduce predation of wild animals by domestic cats
Felis catus. Curr Biol 31(5):1107–1111. https://​doi.​org/​
10.​1016/j.​cub.​2020.​12.​044
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