Kitten caracal (steppe lynx)

2024 Author: Priscilla Miln | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 00:21

Kitten caracal today is not available to everyone. At home, they have been trying to breed these wild cats for a long time, but to this day the breed cannot be called common.

It is believed that a caracal kitten is tamed with ease and does not pose a danger to households (including humans). With a tamed steppe lynx (another name for this animal), you can hunt small game - peacocks, pheasants, hares and even antelopes.

By the way, in the East such hunting was very popular in ancient times. True, caracals were caught and kept mostly by the poor, since the rich preferred larger and more powerful cheetahs. Hunting with the steppe lynx is now a rarity.

These cats are beautiful and charming, with the same color - sandy or red-sandy, with a lighter belly and throat. The largest individuals exceed 80 cm in length, 45 cm in height (shoulders). Average weight - 12 kg. The length of the jump when hunting is 4.5 m. A distinctive feature is dark gray, high-set (almost vertically) ears with long black locator tassels (about 5 cm in height). It is thanks to this feature that this animal was called a caracal (translated as "caracal"means nothing more than "black ear"). There are also absolutely black caracals, but these are quite rare specimens.

Caracal kittens (photo below), contrary to popular belief, do not always have spots scattered over a child's fur coat. Often, at a fairly early age, they acquire the color of an adult animal (permanent).

Agree, they are so cute that the question arises: how much do caracal kittens cost? The price, I must say, is very "biting". If, for example, a Maine Coon costs an average of 800 USD, then a Caracal is an order of magnitude (or even two) more expensive - about 9-9.5 thousand USD

Why is a caracal kitten so expensive and so rare in homes as a pet?

Firstly, most caracals (there are several species, but they are all similar) are active in the evening and at night, and this is often inconvenient for humans.

Secondly, the animal feeds on the meat of the game it has caught. And a jar of Whiskas, as you understand, will not be enough for him. It is very difficult to provide adequate nutrition for a feral cat at home.

Thirdly, caracals are not fertile (the female brings one or two kittens) and mature later than ordinary domestic cats. They become sexually mature after one and a half years. The caracal kitten grows slowly, up to one and a half months, eating exclusively mother's milk (there is meat, unlike the same domestic cats, it starts only after 1.5 months). And it is undesirable to wean a baby from its mother earlier than six to seven months (in nature, he lives withup to a year).

Fourthly, a caracal kitten should have enough space for games and walking in the future, so it is not suitable for keeping in an apartment, even if it is large. And since the jumping ability of this animal is quite impressive, there is always a risk of its escape even with high fences.

It turns out that keeping several individuals of caracal for the purpose of captive breeding is not only expensive, but also troublesome. Moreover, diseases of steppe cats (as well as their character) are still very poorly studied. And this means that no one will give you a guarantee of your absolute safety during your stay with a wild (even if tamed) cat…