Top 10 Biggest Cats In The World – Cats are known as small Carnivorous mammal, there are cats like domestic cats and wild cats. Cats are being kept in the house which is used as pets, some are feral cats that move freely and avoid human contacts. Cats are similar to other species, cats come with a strong flexible body, quick reflexes, sharp teeth, and claws.

Cats are most active at dawn and dusk, they are predators; cats see very clearly at night although they have poor color vision, they hear faint sounds which the human ear cannot hear or even high-frequency sounds which is too strong for the human ear to hear. They communicate through the use of mewing, purring, trilling, hissing, growling, and grunting as well as cat-specific body language. Apart from having domestic cats we also have wild cats, this article will cover everything about cats and the top 10 biggest cats in the world.

Top 10 Biggest Cats In The World 2020

  • 1. Liger 

With the name implies, this is a combination of a tiger and lion species. The Liger is a hybrid offspring of a male lion and a female tiger, their history dates to at least the 19th century in India, two liger cubs born in 1837 were exhibited to King William IV and to his successor Queen Victoria, ligers are often believed to represent the biggest cat known in the world, the male ligers reach a total length of 9.8 to 11.8 ft which is bigger than male lions or tigers.

Imprinted genes may be a factor which is being contributed to the ligers that are why they are larger, although, ligers are not known to grow throughout their life due to hormonal issues, female ligers reach 10ft long and are fertile for reproduction and they weigh approximately 320kg.

The largest known Obese Liger which is featured by the Guinness world record is Hercules which weighed 408kg at only three years of age and weighed 418.2kg it was known as the biggest living cat on earth, there was also a male liger at Valley of the Kings animal sanctuary in Wisconsin which weighed more than 550kg.

Ligers live longer than some cats, some live up to the age of 24 years, others 15 years of age. Ligers appear to have a tiger stripe pattern that is very faint, they may inherit rosettes from the lion which are markings, the markings are known to be either dark, black, brown or even Sandy; their actual pattern and colour depending on which subspecies the parents were and on how the genes interact in the offspring. Ligers are very few in the world, less than 100 ligers exist and the USA holds the largest amount of ligers which is 30 while China has up to 20 ligers and they run very fast despite their massive body at 50 miles per hour.

  • 2. Siberian Tiger

Almost going into extinct is the Siberian tiger one of the biggest cats in the world. The Siberian tiger is a tiger population in the Far East which ranged throughout Korea, north China, Russian Far East, and eastern Mongolia.

Siberian tigers are reddish rusty or rusty yellow in colour, they come with yellow black transverse stripes. Siberian tigers have a body length of 60 inches, a wild male killed in Manchuria in the area of the Sungari weighed about 300kg and is 140 inches, some Siberian tigers reach a bodyweight of about 465kg.

Skull of a Siberian tiger is characterized by its large size like that of a lion, male skulls measured ranges from 13.0 to 15 inches, you should know that female skulls are smaller and cannot be that big or heavier than that of a male, female skulls reach up to 11.01 to 12.21inches. Furs of Siberian tigers are moderately coarse, sparse and thick compared to others, their whiskers and hair on the back of the head and the top of the neck is also greatly elongated.

Siberian tigers are known to travel up to 1,000km, they are known to mate any time of the year as they signal the males by leaving urine deposits and scratch marks on trees, the female will spend 5 or 6 days with the male while gestation lasts from 3 to 3½ months, cubs are being born mostly four to six, the female stay longer with their parents than the males and they build their territory close to their offspring, you should know that at the time of birth, Siberian tigers are born blind. The average lifespan for Siberian tigers is 16–18 years while the ones kept in the zoo tend to leave up to 25 years of age.

  • 3. African Lion

Making it to the third spot on the list is the Lion, known as the king of all animals. The lion is termed as a muscular deep-chested cat with a short, rounded head, a reduced neck, and round ears, the males are larger than the females, most males range from 150 to 250 kg while females range from 120 to 182 kg. A lion pride which consists of a few adult males, related females, and cubs. Lions are known to inhabit grasslands and Savannahs but are absent in dense forest, Lions have been used as sculpture, they have been used to act films and even make meanings in terms of strength, dominance and being powerful.

  • 4. Jaguar

Jaguar are wild cats species, they are known to be one of the biggest cats in the world. This spotted cat closely resembles the leopard, but is usually larger and sturdier, it is known to enjoy swimming and is largely a solitary, opportunistic, stalk-and-ambush predator at the top of the food chain, weights of jaguars vary as they are within 56–96 kg but some big males have recorded weight up to 158 kg, females are generally smaller than males, their tail is the shortest of any big cat and length from nose to the base of the tail is 1.12 to 1.85m.

Jaguars tend to have a tan or orange fur covered with black spots arranged in rosettes, however, some jaguars are melanistic.

  • 5. Cougar

Cougar is known sometimes as the Mountain Lion, head of a cougar is round and the ears are erect, has five retractable claws on its forepaws, and four on its hind paws. The adult is about 60 to 90 cm tall while they are about 2.4 m long from nose to tail tip. Cougars can be bigger than jaguars depending on the locality, but this is very rare, Cougar holds the Guinness world record with the animal with many names.

  • 6. Leopard

The leopard is one of the most endangered species on this list, they are mostly found in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. The leopard has relatively short legs and a long body with a large skull, the appearance is similar to the Jaguar but it is known to have a smaller lighter physique and its fur is marked with rosettes similar to that of the jaguar.

Leopards are often mistaken for jaguars and vice versa, their skin colour varies from pale yellow to yellowish-brown or golden, those living in forests are darker than those living in arid habitat, their tails are about 60–100 centimetres.

  • 7. Snow Leopard

Snow Leopards are among one of the endangered species, they are in the ICUN Red List. They are known as one of the toughest animals and love to eat wild goats and sheep, snow leopard’s fur is whitish to gray with black spots on head and neck, but larger rosettes on the back, they weigh between 22 and 55 kg and its tail is 80 to 105 cm, they are known to be living in a cold, mountainous environment.

Snow Leopard body is stocky, its fur is thick, and its ears are small and rounded, features that help to minimize heat loss, you should know that the snow leopard cannot roar they only produce hissing sounds, mewing, and wailing.

  • 8. Cheetah

One of the biggest cats and also very fast, cheetahs are yellowish tan or rufous to greyish white coat is uniformly covered with nearly 2,000 solid black spots, they are mainly active during the day and they have a slender body with a small rounded head, black tear-like streaks on the face, deep chest, long thin legs, and long spotted tail. Cheetahs weigh 21–72 kg and they are the fastest land animals.

  • 9. Clouded Leopard

This animal is known to have one of the longest canines and it is most commonly found in the Himalayan foothills through mainland Southeast Asia into China, the clouded leopard is known for distinctive ‘clouds’ on its coat and has an exceptionally long tail for balancing, which can be as long as the body itself.

  • 10. Eurasian Lynx

This medium wildcat is native to Siberia Central, it has a short body, long legs, and large feels and it is the Least concerned on the IUCN red list. Eurasian lynx is covered with large colour dots, it is not a fast runner and usually hides behind its prey and uses the element of surprise to hunt down them, with the help of sharp claws, they can very easily climb on the trees and even used it for defense against the predators.

Related:

Biggest Wildcats In The World – The wildcat is a complex species which comprises of two small wild cat species, they have the European wildcat and the African wildcat species. The European wildcat evolved about 866,000 to 478,000 years ago, it’s ancestor was the Felis lunensis, it has species like the Forest Wildcat, Steppe Wildcat, bush wildcat, the wildcat is a member of the Felidae, a family that had a common ancestor about 10–15 million years ago.

The European wildcat diverged from Felis about 1.09 to 1.4 million years ago, the African wildcat and the European wildcat has Craniological differences which indicate that the wildcat probably migrated during the Late Pleistocene from Europe.

Wildcats are known to have pointed ears which are moderate in length and broad at the base, whiskers are white about 7-16 inch long on each side and reach 5-8cm, Whiskers are also present on the inner surface of the paw and measure 3–4 cm, it has large eyes with vertical pupils and yellowish-green irise, the eyelashes range from 5-6cm and can number six to eight per side.

The European wildcat is known to have a larger skull than the domestic wildcat and more spherical in shape than the jungle cat, it’s skull is a ratio known as Schauenberg’s index but its dentition is smaller and weaker than the jungle cat, most wildcats species are bigger than the domestic cats and have a more robust body than the latter, apart from this it has long tails which exceed one half of the animal body length and it has longer legs.

The male European wildcat measure 43–91 cm, the females are slightly smaller though and measures about 40–77 cm, both sexes are known to have two thoracic and two abdominal teats, they both have pre-anal glands and moderately sized sweat and sebaceous glands around the anal opening, wildcats have pre-anal pockets on the tail, activated upon reaching sexual maturity, play a significant role in reproduction and territorial marking. Most wildcats are largely nocturnal and solitary, except during the breeding period and when females have young. Below are the top 10 biggest wildcats in the world.

This article has given you information about the top 10 biggest cats in the world, if you are a lover of wildlife, you would love to see these animals and know more about them.

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