Domestic Cats Evolution

Domestic cats are independent, but they are still loving and affectionate. Cats have soft fur and have learned to become friendly to humans, causing humans to want to keep cats as pets. Those furry animals started off all wild and changed to domestic over thousands of years, but domestic cats still think like wild hunters (Bradshaw 7-8). Cats have evolved quite a bit. The evolution1 of cats is a long process that has occurred over several million years making cats better adapted to their environments by changing significantly over time. To begin, one of the oldest known and extinct cats is the sabertooth tiger. The article “10 Huge Prehistoric Cats” says:
“There were at least three species living in both North and South America; the smallest
Saey writes, “Big cats and domestic cats last shared a common ancestor about 11 million years ago. Usually genomes get scrambled as species evolve…cats both big and domestic ‘are very well adapted, successful evolutionary machines’” (4). Since big and small cats are very different in size and habitats, but similar in structure, they are related. They are not that closely related, though, because they have not had a similar ancestor in several million years. They have evolved quite a lot from this common ancestor into what they are
Holland writes, “Previously, the oldest fossil evidence came from Africa and put the big cats at 3.8 million years old. But modern geographical patterns and molecular data—DNA comparisons of ancient fossils with modern bones—suggested Asian origins going back at least six million years” (1-2). The finding of fossils is essential to knowing how long ago modern cats evolved and understanding how and how much they evolved over millions of years. Also, since modern big cats were probably the first modern-day cats to develop and evolve, scientists and researchers need to know how they developed so they can better understand how small cats like housecats evolved. Fossil evidence is very important in figuring out the evolution of cats over time. Moreover, humans loved the little, soft, furry cats, so they took them into their homes. Lusted writes, “Cats probably domesticated themselves: people wanted them, and so they fed them, and cats gradually grew used to people and began living with them” (3). Cats used to be wild and live in the wild, but over the years, they have learned how to get along with humans. They have learned how to live with humans in houses. Cats have evolved over several years into animals that are friendly to humans and domesticated