Haramura, Takashi

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RIGHT:URL:CITATION:AUTHOR(S):ISSUE DATE:TITLE:Social System of Feral Cats (Feliscatus) Inhabiting a Small Area withMany Feeding SitesHaramura, TakashiHaramura, Takashi. Social System of Feral Cats (Felis catus) Inhabiting a Small Area withMany Feeding Sites. Memoirs of the Faculty of Science, Kyoto University. Series of biology.New series 2006, 18(2): 87-912006-12http://hdl.handle.net/2433/258949Mem. Fac. Sci. Kyoto Univ. (Sen BioL), 18: 87-91, Dec., 2e06Social System ef Feral Cats (Felis catus) Inhabiting a Sn}all Area with                         Many Feeding SitesTAKASHI HARAMURA'Laboratory of Ecology and Systematics, Faculty of Science,               Nishihara, Okinawa, 903-e213 Japan                 (Received November 27, 2006)University of Ryukyus,Abstract The social system of feral cats (Felis catus) feeding at several garbage collectionsites (feeding sites hereafter) conceRtrated in a small range was investigated. Cats visitedseveral feeding sites, and females intensively utilized one feeding site more frequently thanmales did. In interaction behaviour among cats at feeding sites, tolerance behaviour was ob-served more frequently than aggressive behaviour. I also observed the waiting behaviour atfeeding sites (one cat waited outside of the feeding site until another cat finished eating). Femlcats in the present study area seem to share feeding sites using waiting behaviour, and thissocial system may be tolerance.Key words Feral cat, Social system, Feeding sites, Interaction behaviourIntroduction   Many field studies have been conducted oR feral cats (Felis catus) living in a varietyof habitats, and some aspects of their social systenl have been discussed (Liberg l980;Jones & Coman 1982; Izawa etal. I982; Izawa & Doi 1994; Natoli 1985; Macdonald etal. 2000). The social system of feral cats is very flexible, ranging from solitary to living ina kind of group (Turner & Bateson 20oo). Some studies have shown that the social systemvaries principally with the abundance and distribution of the food resource (Macdonald1983; Macdonald et al. 2000). Feral cats living in an urban area are heavily dependentupon human beings for their food, either directly by obtaining food provided by cat lov--ers, or indirectly by obtaining food by scavenging garbage (Izawa & Doi 1994). The foodresource at a garbage site is stable, patchily distributed, and is enough to sustain largenumbers of cats (Yamane et al. 1994). Previous studies on the social system of feral catsinhabiting urban area mainly focused on quantity of food resource in one feeding point(Liberg 198e; Izawa etal. 1982; Natoli l985; Yamane etal. 1994). To fully understand thesocial system of feral cat, it is necessary to understand the social system in a case ofdistribution pattem of food resource that littie feeding sites are studded with smal1 range.The aim of the present study is to clarify the social system of cats inhabiting aii area withsuch feeding sites. I focused on the interaction behaviour between cats at feeding sites,'Present Address: Department of Zoology, Graduate School of Science, Kyoto University,Sakyo, Kyoto,606-8502 Japan88 TAKASNI HARAMURA            XV(Ciili}i>>x.                  X::J:J            .. sx Z..F •:J-•"      .-'.A D';J:;i.l'i])ijl.[/2'?"' -Xxii:f{ii:;i'liil.',l:;-;g..:',IJ",'; i•ie"Li   X. i::.-   >A//   S'--.---..:•i •lNli a,eegfitss!aeiillJlt, l x eq 'S>IXN           Ne-•otsn 1-Fig. 1. Map of the study area. Bold line shews the outllne of study area. The le{ters (A-J) indicate eachgarbage collection site. Black squares show houss, and dotted }ines show the road.which is hardly known (Izawa et al. 1982; Yamane et al. 1997), and because social inter-action is considered to be an important component of the social system.Materials and Methods   Present study was conducted at a housing complex (27,360 m2), ChatanÅího, OkinawaPrefecture, JapaR (26" 20' N, 1270 45' E). There are le garbage collection sites in this area,situated 12.6m to loom apart (Fig. 1). They were made of wire-mesh fmme frame (2.2 mÅ~ 3.2 m Å~ 2.1 m high). Cats could get in and out the site through the opening and exclu-sively obtained their food from these garbage sites (Hararnura personal observation). Thus,these garbage sites are referred to as feeding sites hereafter.   A field study was carried out from September 1998 to October 1999. A direct obser-vatioA was made from 18:OO h to 24:eO h because feral cats are generally more active atnight (Izawa 1983; Jones & ComaR 1982). Observations were conducted eight or ninenights each month, for a total of 105 nights. Cats coming to feeding sites were observedfrom the inside of a car, which allowed me to observe detailed behaviour without distur-bance. Each cat was identified by pelage pattem, sex, and body size. Recording of interac-tion behaviours among cats at feeding sites was started when cats approached the feedingsites. The duration of each observation at each feeding site was at least 30 minutes. Whencats had beeR foraging for feeding sites and encountered other ca{s, I observed them unti1they finished the interactioR behaviour. To record the IRteraction behaviour among cats atfeeding sites, I divided it into four categories. 1: eating together at a feeding site, 2: onecat was waiting out of the feeding site until another cat finished eating (waitiRg behaviour:see Yamane et al. 1997), 3: fighting, 4: one cat left the feeding site when another cat waseating. In a case of encountering severa1 cats at the same time (three cats present), I re-corded the interaction behaviour between two cats at a time. Interaction behaviour be-tween a mother and her kittens was not included in this study.Secial System of Feral Cats 89   Data were anaiyzed usifig StatView version 5.0 (SAS Institute Inc.), a statistical anaiy-sis software. I used Mann-wnimey U-test to compare the number of utilized feeding sitesbetween sexes, and also to compare the utility ratio of one feeding site between sexes.Utility ratio was the maximum number of visits at one feeding site (which is the mostfrequency utilized feeding site among some feediRg sites)1 tota1 number of visits in allfeeding sites by one cat. Because {he sample size of each interaction behaviour amongcats was smail, I aRaiyzed behavior 1 and 2 as toleraRt behaviour and 3 and 4 as aggres-sive behaviour. Interaction behaviour between sexes vvas analyzed by using Fisher's exacttest. The level of statistical significance was set aÅí P = O.05.Results   Twenty-seveR adult feral cats (15 males, 12 females) were individuaily identified inthis study, and 23 of them (85.2 9o; 13 males, 10 females) utilized more than one feedingsite for feeding. The mean number of utilized feeding sites of the males and females was4.3sk2.7 (rkSD; range 1 to 9) and 3.3Å}l.8 (range 1 to 6), respectively. There were no sig-nificant differences with sex in the Rumber of utilized feeding sites (Mann-Whitney U-test, U :73.0, P>O.05).   The utility ratio of one feeding site was analyzed for the 23 cats that visited severaifeeding sites. Feral cats that utilized oRly one feeding site (utility rate was 1oo9o) vvereexcluded. Females utilized ene feeding site more frequently than males did (male: 55.I59ovs. female:73.259o, Mann-Whitney U-test, U :34.0, P<O.05).   At feeding sites, thirty-four interactions were observed in the present study. Interac-tioR behaviour between females was not observed. Tolerant interaction behaviour wasmore frequently observed. However, interaction behaviours were not sigRificai}tly differ-ent (Fisher's exact test, p>O.05, Table 1).DEscasssioit   Several interesting findiRgs were obtained on the sociai system of feral cats. One wasthat most feral cats inhabiting this area utilized severai feeding sites, and the utility ratio[lhble 1. Interaction behaviour of fera1 cats at feeding sites. Interaction behaviour was divided lnto tolerantbehaviour and aggresive behaviour. In{eraction behaviour between females was not observed. Fisher's exacttest P<O.OS.Tolerancebehaviour AggresivebehaviourMale vs male 5 4Male vs female 21 490 TAKASHI HARAMURAof one feeding site showed a sexual difference. Cats inhabiting an urban environmentobtain the food resource from humans, such as a garbage site or feeding site provided bycat lovers. There are several studies about social system of feral cats inhabiting an urbanenvironment (Izawa et al. 1982; Dards 1983; Natoli 1985; Calhoon & Haspel l989). Forexample, in Ainoshima Island where feral cats formed a feeding group (Izawa et al. 1982),males utilize several feeding sites but females genemily utilized one feeding site (Izawa etal. I982; Yamane et al. 1994). Yamane et al. (1994) concluded that males utilized somefeeding sites to visit females in other feeding site groups, but females defended one feed-ing site. Similar results were reported in carnivores and feral cats inhabiting other habitats(Sandell 1989; Tumer & Bateson 2eOO). In the present study area, female cats utilizedsome feeding sites similar to those utilized by males. This means that one feeding site didnot contain sufficient amounts of food resources though feeding sites provided stablefood resources. Females of polygynous or promiscuous mammai species including feralcats apply strategy to maintain breeding resources (food and breeding site; Davies 1991).Femaie cats in the present study area also would utilize more frequently one feeding siteto maintain stable breeding resources.   Another interesting subject is that the interaction behaviour among cats in the presentstudy area was tolerance, and that waiting behaviour was observed at the feeding sites.There are few studies on the interaction behaviour among cats at feeding sites. Izawa et al.(l982) reported that femi cats formed groups inhabiting a fishing village and fed togetherwith other cats. The feeding site iR a fishing village is open and large with an abundaRtfood resource to suppert many cats (Izawa et al. 1982; Yarr}ane et al. 1994). In the preseRtstudy area, the feeding site was small and closed in wire nets. Therefore, it seems to bedifficult to feed together with other cats at the same time. Yamane et al. (1997) havereported a similar situation at feeding sties in a field experiment. They investigated thefeeding order of group-living feral cats using a plastic container with food, which pre-vented more than one cat from feeding at the same time. In their experiment, they ob-served that cats are waiting until the first cat became satiated and left the container whenthe first cat was eating (Yamane et al. 1997). Whether or not there was a feeding order forthe feral cats in the present study area was unknown. I concluded that the cats in thepresent study area shared the food resource exhibiting waiting behaviour at feeding sites.Acknowledgments   I am very grateful to M. Izawa for her extremely valuable comments on the manu-script. I also thank M. Imafuku and A. Mori for improving the manuscript. This work wassupported in part by a Grant for the Biodiversity Research for the 21st Century COEResearch, Kyoto University (A14).Social System of Feral Cats 91RefereilcesCalhoon, R. E & C. Haspel 1989 Urban cat populations compared by season, subhabitat and     supplemen{al feeding. J. Anim. Ecol. 58: 321-328.Dards, J. L. 1983 The behaviour of duckyard cats: interactlons of adult males. Appl. Anim. Ethol.     10: 133-153.Davies, N. B. 1991 Mating system. In: J. Krebs & N. B. Davies (eds.) Behavioural ecology. 3rd.     pp. 263--294. Blackwell, Oxford.Izawa, M., T. Doi & Y. Ono 1982 Grouplng patterns of feral cats (Felis catus) living on a small     island in Japan. Jap. J. lkol. 32: 373-382.Izawa, M. 1983 Daily activites of the feral cat Felis catus Linn. J. Mammal. Soc. Japan. 9: 219-•     228.Izawa, M. & T. Doi 1994 Flexiblllty of the soclal system of the feral cat, Felis catus. In: P. J.     Jarman &A. Rossiter (eds.) Animal societies: Individuals and organisation. pp. 237--247.     Kyoto University Press, Kyoto.JoRes, E. & B. J. Coman 1982 Ecology of the feral cat, Felis catus (L.), ln south-eastern australia     III. Home ranges and population ecology in semiarid north-west vcÅíoria Aust. Wild. Res. 9:     409-420.Liberg, O. 198e Spacing pattems in a populatlon of rural free roaming domestic cats. Oikos 35:     336-349.Macdonald, D.W. 1983 The ecology of carnivore social behaviour. Nature 3el: 379--384.Macdonald, D.W., N. Yamaguchi & G. Kerby 200e Group-living in the domestic cat: its sociobi-     ology and epidemiology. In: D. C. Tumer & P. Bateson (eds.) The domestic cat: The biology     of lts behaviour. 2nd edn. pp. 96-118. Cambridge Universlty Press, Cambridge, UK.Natoli, E. 1985 Soacing patterns in a colony of urban stray cats (Felis catus L.) in the historic     center of Roma. Appl. Anim. Behav. Sci. 14: 289-304.Sandell, M. 1989 The mating tactics and spaclng pattems of solitary carnivores. In: J. L. Gittleman     (ed.) Carnivore bahavior, ecology, and evolutlon. pp. 164-182. Cornell Unlversity Press,     Comstock.Tumer, D.C. & P. Bateson 2000 The domestic cat: The biology of its behaviour. 2nd edn. 244 pp.     Cambrldge University Press, Cambridge, UK.Yamane,A., Y. Ono & T. Doi l994 Home range size and spaclng pa{tern of a feral cat populatlon     on a small island. J. Mammal. Soc. Jap. 19: 9-2e.Yamane, A., J. Emoto & N. Ota 1997 Factors aÅífectlng feeding order afid social tolerance to kit{ens     in the group-living feral cat (Felis catus). Appl. ARim. Behav. Sci. 52: 119-i27.

Social System of Feral Cats (Felis catus) Inhabiting a Small Area with Many Feeding Sites

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Social System of Feral Cats (Felis catus) Inhabiting a Small Area with Many Feeding Sites

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