CSG Species Accounts: Sand cat (Felis margarita)

Description and Behavior
The sand cat is well adapted to the extremes of a desert environment and a psammophilic, or sand-dwelling, existence. It lives in areas far from water sources, and is able to satisfy its moisture requirements from its prey. Its coat is pale yellow to grey; the tail is ringed and there are dark horizontal bars on the legs. Sand cats are prolific diggers, an adaptation not only for hunting fossorial rodents but for constructing or improving upon the burrows in which they shelter, such as those dug by the sand fox (M. Abbadi in litt. 1993). Dragesco-Joffé (1993) notes that the sand cat’s claws are not very sharp, as there is little opportunity to sharpen them in the desert, and that impressions of the claws are often visible in the tracks. The soles of the feet are covered with a thick layer of wiry black hair (Figure 4), insulating the foot pads against extremes of heat and cold and allowing easier movement through sand. Daytime sand surface temperatures in the Sahara during the summer can reach 124°C (Yunker and Guirgis 1969). Day air temperatures range up to 58°C in the shade, but night temperatures are much lower, ranging down to -0.5°C (Cloudsley-Thompson 1984). In the northern parts of the sand cat’s range, it snows in the winter, and temperatures drop as low as -25°C (Heptner and Sludskii 1972).
The sand cat is generally active only at night, according to the results of a radiotelemetry study in Israel (Abbadi 1992), tracks seen in the central Kara Kum Desert (Bilkevich 1934, cited in Ognev 1935), and activity patterns observed in captivity (Hemmer 1977). Sand cats have occasionally been observed above ground in daylight near their burrows (Lay et al. 1970, Abbadi 1992), lying on their backs in a posture which, in captivity, is regularly adopted at temperatures above 30° C and presumably helps to shed internal heat. In captivity, sand cats are very sensitive to humidity (Hemmer 1977), and it is interesting that during six months of radio-tracking, a sand cat was only observed resting outside its burrow in the daytime after several days of rain (Abbadi 1992).

Figure 4. The underside of a sand cat's paw is protected from extreme desert temperatures by a thick covering of fur. The fur also helps spread the cat's weight so it can move more easily over shifting sands. (Harrison 1968, Kitchener 1991).

The sand cat’s ears are large and set widely apart and low on the sides of the head: this trait flattens the sand cat’s profile hunting in barren areas, and may aid detection of movements of subterranean prey (Kingdon 1990), as well as protect the inner ears from wind-blown sand. The tympanic meati (passages from the external ears to the ear drums: up to 10.5 x 6.8 mm in diameter) and bullae (rounded bony capsules surrounding the middle and internal ears: 2.5-3.4 cm³) are greatly enlarged relative to other small felids (Schauenberg 1974). A highly developed hearing capacity is important for locating prey which, in arid environments, is not only sparsely distributed, but also found underground.
There are few data on sand cat prey, in part because their habit of covering their scats with sand (Hemmer 1977) makes them difficult to locate (Abbadi 1992). Examination of 182 (Sapozhenkov 1961a) and 53 (Mambetzhumaev and Palianigazov 1968) stomachs and feces of sand cats from three Central Asian deserts found the major prey species to be a diurnal species of the great gerbil. These gerbils were probably hunted in their burrows at night, which explains the sand cat’s need for keen hearing. Hearing also plays an important role in intraspecific communication: sand cats make a short, rasping bark in connection with mating activity (Hemmer 1974a, Abbadi 1992. P. Quillen in litt. 1993). Their diet also includes birds, reptiles, and arthropods (Heptner and Sludskii 1972, Harrison and Bates 1991, Abbadi 1992).
Dragesco-Joffé (1993) says that the sand cat has a reputation amongst Saharan nomads for being a snake hunter, particularly of horned and sand vipers, which they stun with rapid blows to the head before dispatching with a neck bite. He also notes that sand cats will cover large kills with sand and return later to feed.
The first radio-telemetry study of the species, which monitored four cats for nine months in Israel’s Aravah Depression (Abbadi 1992), found sand cats to be regular in their behavior. At nightfall, they took up a lookout position at their den opening, and surveyed the surroundings for about 15 minutes before leaving. They were active generally throughout the night, hunting and travelling an average of 5.4 km. Before retiring below ground at dawn, the same lookout position was adopted at the mouth of the burrow. Burrows were used interchangeably by different cats, and the animals did not change burrows during the day.
Weights of wild-caught adults from Turkmenistan range from 2.1-3.4 kg for males (n=12) and 1.4-3.1 kg for females (n=5) (Heptner 1970). Hemmer et al. (1976) present morphological data which suggest four distinct subspecies: Saharan (margarita), Arabian (harrisoni), Central Asian (thinobia), and Pakistani (scheffeli). Karyotyping of a single specimen of each subspecies at Seattle’s Woodland Park Zoo has yielded preliminary genetic evidence in support of these populations being separate (L. Werle pers. comm., cited in Sausman 1991). However, the distribution patterns and habitat requirements of the sand cat are still poorly understood. Hemmer et al. (1976) note that there could be a number of isolated sub-populations in the Sahara, centered on the various giant discrete dune complexes (ergs).