Felis silvestris Schreber 1777
Creators: name: Wilson, Don E.
name: Reeder, DeeAnn
Publisher: name: The Johns Hopkins University Press
Year: 2005
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Chordata
Mammalia
Carnivora
Felidae
Felis
Felis silvestris

description: Felis silvestris Schreber 1777
Felis silvestris Schreber 1777, Die Saugethiere, Vol. 3, 23: 397.
Type Locality: Not given. Fixed by Haltenorth (1953) as "vielleicht Nordfrankreich". Listed by Pocock (1951) as " Germany ".
Vernacular Names: Wildcat.
Subspecies::
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. silvestris Schreber 1777
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. cafra Desmarest 1822
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. caucasica Satunin 1905
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. caudata Gray 1874
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. chutuchta Birula 1916
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. cretensis Haltenorth 1953
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. foxi Pocock 1944
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. gordoni Harrison 1968
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. grampia Miller 1907
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. griselda Thomas 1926
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. haussa Thomas and Hinton 1921
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. iraki Cheesman 1921
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. jordansi Schwarz 1930
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. lybica Forster 1780
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. mellandi Schwann 1904
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. nesterovi Birula 1916
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. ocreata Gmelin 1791
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. ornata Gray 1832
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. reyi Lavauden 1929
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. rubida Schwann 1904
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. tristrami Pocock 1944
Subspecies Felis silvestris subsp. ugandae Schwann 1904
Distribution: Afghanistan, Algeria, Angola, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, China, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, India, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, Lesotho, Libya, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Republic of Congo, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia and Montenegro, Sierra Leone, Slovakia, Slovenia, Somalia, South Africa, Sudan, Swaziland, Switzerland, Syrian Arab Republic, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uganda, United Arab Emirates, USA, Uzbekistan, Western Sahara, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe.
Conservation: CITES – Appendix II; IUCN – Vulnerable as F. s. grampia, otherwise Least Concern.
Discussion: Also see comments under Felis catus. There is some confusion as to the correct species name. Schreber (1775) illustrated a plate as ‘ Felis Catus ferus’, and in 1777 the text listed ‘ Felis (Catus) silvestris’ and ‘ Felis Catus (domestica).’ Opinion 465 of the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature (1957 f) declared silvestris as the specific name for the European wild cat (with the understanding that F. catus and F. silvestris are usually considered conspecific). Revised by Ragni and Randi (1986), who included lybica, and by Haltenorth (1953), who included chutuchta, lybica, and vellerosa. However, Pocock's (1951) revision considered catus as separate and placed chutuchta and vellerosa in bieti, and they probably should be considered incertae sedis. Does not include F. catus (worldwide), which was domesticated from this species (Corbet, 1978 c). Ellerman and Morrison-Scott (1951) argued that lybica Forster (1780), was a lapsus for libyca; however, there is no clear internal evidence that the name was misspelled (Meester et al., 1986). Rosevear (1974), Ansell (1978), Smithers (1983), Meester et al. (1986), and Wiseman et al. (2000) retained lybica as separate from silvestris. Hemmer (1978), Collier and O'Brien (1985), Salles (1992), Johnson and O'Brien (1997) and Essop et al. (1997 b) supported the inclusion of silvestris, lybica and the domestic cat (catus), however Mattern and McLennan (2000) considered silvestris closer to margarita, and consider catus as sister group to lybica. Placed in Felis (Felis) by McKenna and Bell (1997). Subspecies allocated according to Pocock (1951), Ellerman et al. (1953), Smithers (1971), and Kitchener (pers. comm.).
description: Published as part of Wilson, Don E. & Reeder, DeeAnn, 2005, Order Carnivora, pp. 532-628 in Mammal Species of the World: a Taxonomic and Geographic Reference (3 rd Edition), Volume 1, Baltimore :The Johns Hopkins University Press on page 536, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.7316519