ABSTRACT
People have a long history with domestic cats (Felis catus) that spans thousands of years. In fact, findings from the early agricultural village of Quanhucun in Shaanxi, China, indicate that cats have been associated with humans for between 5560 and 5280 years (Hu et al. 2014). These findings from China predate previous estimates by more than a millennium, suggesting an even longer-term coexistence with cats than previously thought. In the millennia since early mutualistic coexistence and domestication, cats have accompanied human society as it has moved around the world. In nearly all such situations, some cats have become feral as people leave locations and the cats stay, are abandoned, or simply leave human settlements. As a result, every continent, save Antarctica, has feral cats present on it today, as well as many islands throughout the world. However, because of their near cosmopolitan distribution, feral cats have also wreaked ecological havoc on many ecosystems in which they are present (e.g., Simberloff 2013).
