The cat family, Felidae, has 4 toes on each foot like the dog family, but a detailed track reveals significant differences between cat and dog tracks.
Cats have retractable claws and normally keep the claws retracted.
A cat's heel pad is relatively larger with the toes in a curved row in front of the pad. Domestic cats leave a fairly straight trail of tracks too small to be those of a bobcat and with a rounder outline than those of a small dog. The absence of claw marks and a fifth toe distinguish a cat track from a mink track. The bobcat, which is found throughout the United States, has a track that is slightly longer than wide. The ball pad of a bobcat's foot has a two-lobed anterior border, further distinguishing it from a domestic cat and an imperfect coyote track .