Post #13860

How does a flock of barn cats work? Hierarchy of animals without hierarchy A cat is an independent, proud and fundamentally solitary creature. So it seems to us. Exactly until the moment you discover a yard where a dozen of these “loners” sleep in the same basement, eat according to a schedule and know perfectly well who belongs here and who is out of place. At this moment, the saying about the cat who walks by itself begins to suspiciously come apart at the seams. In fact, the mustachios have long been living in packs, in which the queen rules - and now we’ll tell you how this happened and why! Cats in the basement of a house are familiar inhabitants. But for them the city is an unnatural ecosystem. Animals did not evolve for concrete and trash cans. In the wild, everything is clear: food is obtained through a difficult but fair hunt, territory is defended in fights, and a hungry predator can jump out from behind every bush. But noisy streets and concrete jungles turn the usual rules of survival upside down. First, getting food. A city is a rare case in nature when resources are concentrated in one point and hardly move. Garbage containers, restaurants and markets, basements and heating mains with hordes of rodents and, of course, compassionate grandmothers with bags of chicken heads create relatively stable food supplies. Getting food in the city is easier, much easier, than in the wild. Secondly, the inability to displace neighbors. Woolen people from all over the area flock to the free grub - and it turns out to be a crowd. In the wild, if population density becomes high, cats expand their territory, drive away competitors, or even change location. It doesn't work that way in the city. Not only is the entire territory limited by walls, roads and people, but going far means losing a guaranteed source of food. What's the point? It is also physically impossible to kick out all uninvited guests. It's like fighting windmills - new cats will still come again and again from neighboring areas. Cats are not fools to constantly sort things out. No strength is enough for this. Instead of endless conflicts, they are forming a very interesting form of coexistence - a tolerant matrilineal community. At the core of any stable group of stray cats is almost always kinship. Such communities are formed around several females connected by blood ties - mothers, daughters, sisters, aunts and grandmothers. They occupy one common or several closely located shelters, calmly roam around the same territory and remain nearby for many years. There is no unconditional leader or leader in the group. But there is a soft queen matriarch. This is usually the oldest and most experienced female in the group - the mother or grandmother of all other members of the feline community. Such a madam rarely fights and almost never demonstrates open aggression - she simply does not need to prove anything. Other females themselves give her a place at the feeder and are