Variability of coat‐colour and markings system inFelis silvestris

Abstract

Populations of Felis silvestris, the European, Asian and African wildcats, and the domestic cat, are characterized by a variable, genetically controlled, coat‐colour and markings system. Samples of the three Italian cats, the European, the Sardinian (belonging to the African group) and the domestic striped tabby were studied for com position and occurrence of coat‐colour and markings patterns, as well as for their association with craniometric and splanchnometric categories. Intergroup differences in the coat‐colour and markings system were consistent with known metric differences. It was thus possible to distinguish, objectively, the three cats from each other by means of coat patterns, even more clearly than with metric procedures. Distances between taxa, calculated through the relative frequencies of the coat patterns, were fully consistent with those measured from allele frequencies for polymorphic loci. This confirm ed the polytypical species status of Felis silvestris.