(Latin: Felis serval, Leptailurus serval) bush cat. Serval inhabits throughout Africa, except the extreme south of the Sahara and the continent. Places of habitat located north, east and south of the Sahara.

 

For a number of morphological features similar to lynx serval. Serval - slender long-legged cat of medium size.

Its body length of about 90-135sm, tail 30-40 cm Weight ranges from 8 to 18 pounds. Head small with huge ears, which gives it a rather amusing sight. The neck is long. The tail seems shorter, but it is much longer than that of a lynx. Sickle-like claws are drawn into the pad feet.

 

Color serval resembles a cheetah color - dark spots and stripes on a yellowish-gray background. Abdomen, face and chest - white. Ears on the outside black with yellow transverse spot.

 

Color servals from different geographical habitats are different. In the steppe and forest areas are found small animals with large spots on a light background. In tropical rain forests, animals are painted in a darker color, stain less in size. In the mountains there are completely black specimens. White animals with a silver-gray spots known only in captivity.

 

serval inhabits in open areas with shrubs and herbaceous shrubs, near the water. Avoid deserts, dry plains and tropical rain forests, keeping their edges.

 

serval eats small prey - mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish. In small quantities, eat vegetation.

 

Serval is crepuscular lifestyle. The peak of his hunting activity in the 4-5 am and 10-11 pm. You can see serval hunting in the afternoon. Perfect pitch helps him hunt down small prey, and long limbs make it easy to progress in the tall grass. He can jump vertically up to 3 m in height, thus, knocking off from the land of birds.  Serval can not long stalk their prey. He hunts conceal, that is stealing the victim in the tall grass, serval makes one jump and caught the victim of his front paws claws, crushing her under. On larger prey, like a leopard jumps. It is easy to dig out of their burrows of rodents. It climbs up trees. Swim, but prefers to hunt in shallow water for frogs, wading birds and fish. Serval very dobychlivy predator. More than half his attacks end up catching the prey. In times of danger or flee prefers hiding.

 

Outside the breeding season serval has a solitary lifestyle. The area of ​​an individual plot the male is 40 - 72 km2. Lots of females is much smaller - 2.9 km2. Plot the male overlaps with areas of several females.

 

pairs are created only during the breeding season. Within a few days with a pair of servals hunt and rest. For female labor is old burrows aardvarks or make a nest in the grass.

 

On the propagation of serval in the wild, little is known. Pregnancy lasts 65-75 days. Female bears 03.02 kitten. Kittens appear once a year from February to April. Mothers reared their milk for seven and a half months. As soon as the kittens begin hunting on their own males, the mother expels them from his site. Females remain near the mother a little longer.

 

Despite the fact that the skin has a serval is a beautiful color, it, nevertheless, has no real value. However, animal meat is highly valued among the local population. In addition, the local population uses some body parts for rituals, ceremonies and traditional medicine. Sometimes serval attacks on poultry. For these reasons, to continue to hunt serval.

 

Once a man has a kitten, serval fairly easy to tame and attached to the man. In our time, servals hand - not uncommon.

 

view is not in critical condition. But nevertheless, it is rare. Northern subspecies of the serval is listed in the International Red Book.

 

Photo serval.

 

See more photos serval.

 Everything about your pets. Subject - intramuscular injection cat  "Cats from A to Z", sheet 1 of 24: the library FictionBook