Wikipedia:Today's featured article/September 5, 2005



The cat is a small feline carnivorous mammal of the subspecies Felis silvestris catus. Its immediate, pre-domestication ancestor is the African wild cat, Felis silvestris. The cat has been living in close association with humans for at least 3,500 years, when the ancient Egyptians routinely used cats to keep mice and other rodents away from their grain. Currently, the cat is one of the world's most popular household pets. Purebreds make up less than one percent of the total feline population; cats of mixed ancestry are referred to as domestic longhairs and domestic shorthairs. There are dozens of breeds of domestic cats, including hairless and tailless animals, and they exist in a variety of different colors as well as multicolored. Cats have excellent vision, which aids them in hunting; necessarily carnivorous, they are skilled predators that have been known to hunt over one thousand different species for food. They communicate by calling, purring, hissing, and gesturing. Because the domestication of the cat is relatively recent, cats may also still live effectively in the wild, often forming small colonies.

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