With the Lunar New Year approaching under the Zodiac sign of the Tiger🐯, it is the perfect occasion to talk about cats. Our species today is not quite a tiger, but rather another smaller Felidae living in a different part of the world.🐱
The margay, 𝘓𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘥𝘶𝘴 𝘸𝘪𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘪 (Schinz, 1821) is a small Neotropical cat species that is widely distributed in South and Central America as far as North Mexico. People often confuse them with ocelots (𝘓𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘥𝘶𝘴 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘥𝘢𝘭𝘪𝘴 (Linnaeus, 1758)) due to their relatively similar appearance. Generally, the major distinguishing feature is their size. The ocelot is a larger cat with weight between 11 and 16 kilograms and body length up to 101 centimeters whereas margay is a smaller cat with weight between 3 to 9 kilograms and maximum body length of 79 centimeters. Apart from that, the margay has prominent eyes, salient nose, larger paws, shorter head and longer tail and legs. It is strongly associated with the forest🌳habitat. Due to the tiny size, it preys on small vertebrate species such as birds, reptiles, frogs, squirrels and even monkeys!
The margay spends most of the time on trees and hence it is a skillful climber, almost as good as a monkey.🐒 The large claw aids to grip tree bark when jumping from tree to tree and the long tail helps them to balance in the treetops. One astonishing morphological feature of this species is their ability to rotate their hind feet up to 180 degrees due to flexible ankles. It helps them to hang onto the tree branches from their hind feet efficiently or even suspend themselves during descent just like a squirrel.🐿️ It allows the margay to be one of the few cats to descend vertical trees head down first.
But even with such abilities, how are margays able to catch agile monkeys?🤔 Well, it has an incredible hunting strategy. Instead of chasing prey, they have been known to mimic the prey species vocalization instead. What a clever tricker! A study observed that the margay would disguise its voice, imitating the calls of monkeys known as pied tamarin (𝘚𝘢𝘨𝘶𝘪𝘯𝘶𝘴 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘰𝘭𝘰𝘳 (Spix, 1823)). It is a wise skill to reduce the energy expenditure during hunting. Also, the mimicking technique can attract the monkeys to lure them into a trap. Yet, it has certain difficulty in successful hunting since monkeys are more familiar with their territory.
At the HKBM, we have two specimens of this discreet and clever cat🐈that you can appreciate, along with thousands of other fascinating animals and plants. Let’s wish that the year of the Tiger will be a great year for the conservation of many cat species around the world through the protection of their habitats and populations, so for many generations we could learn more and appreciate their astonishing ecology!😊
Text: Edmond Lee
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