Scottish Wildcat

On my living-room wall I have a painting of a wildcat by John Holmes of which I am extremely fond. It depicts a snarling, spitting animal, teeth bared and back arched: a taut coiled spring ready to unleash some unknown fury.

However, the physical differences are tangible. The wildcat is a much larger animal, weighing in some cases up to seven kilos, the same as a typical male fox. The coat pattern is superficially similar to a domestic tabby cat but it is all stripes and no spots. The tail is thicker and blunter, with three to five black rings. The animal has an altogether heavier look.

The Scottish wildcat was originally distinguished as a separate subspecies in 1912, but it is now generally recognised that there is little difference between the Scottish and other European populations. According to an excellent report on the wildcat printed in 1991, the animals originally occurred in a variety of habitats throughout Europe.

It was during the nineteenth century, with the establishment of many estates used by landowners for hunting, that the wildcat became a nuisance and its rapid decline really began; 198 wildcats were killed in three years in the area of Glengarry, for example. However, things were later to improve for the species.

The future is by no means secure, though, and recent evidence suggests that the wildcat is particularly vulnerable to local eradication, especially in the remoter parts of northern and western Scotland. This is a cause for real concern, given that the animals in these areas have less contact with domestic cats and are therefore purer.

Part of the problem stems from the fact that the accepted physical description of the species originates from the selective nature of the examination process by the British Natural History Museum at the start of the century, and this has been used as the type-definition for the animal ever since. Animals that did not conform to that large blunt-tailed ‘tabby’ description were discarded as not being wildcats. In other words, an artificial collection of specimens was built up, exhibiting the features considered typical of the wildcat.

The current research aims to resolve this potential problem. It is attempting to find out whether there are any physical features which characterise the so-called wild-living cats.

But what of his lifestyle? Wildcat kittens are usually born in May/June in a secluded den, secreted in a gap amongst boulders. Another favourite location is in the roots of a tree.

Rabbits are a favourite prey, and some of the best areas to see wildcats are at rabbit warrens close to the forest and moorland edge. Mice, small birds and even insects also form a large part of the diet, and the animal may occasionally take young deer.

The wildcat is one of the Scottish Highlands’ most exciting animals. Catch a glimpse of one and the memory will linger forever.

Taking Dinosaurs Apart

Pulling apart limbs, sawing through ribs and separating skull bones are activities usually associated with surgeons rather than museum staff. However, that is exactly what is going on at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington DC, USA. Renovations to the museum’s dinosaur hall, which started recently, have necessitated the dismantling and removal of its collection of dinosaur and extinct mammal skeletons, some of which weigh as much as five tons.

One particular specimen which curator Matthew Carrano can’t wait to get hold of is a meat-eating Jurassic dinosaur called Allosaurus, which has been on display for 30 years. ‘Scientifically, this particular Allosaurus is well-known,’ he explains, because ‘for a long time, it was one of the only Allosaurus specimens that represented a single individual animal’.

The Smithsonian’s five-meter-long Allosaurus, however, is definitely one unique individual. So once crystallized glue holding it together is removed, researchers and conservators can get a better sense of how the creature’s joints actually fitted together in life

Another modification in the museum plans to make to its Allosaurus is removing a couple of centimeters from its tail, which is not original fossil but casts of vertebrae. ‘The tail on the Smithsonian’s specimen is too long’, says Peter May, owner and president of the company in charge of dismantling, conserving, and remounting the 58 specimens in the museum’s dinosaur hall. He explains that the skeleton on display has over 50 vertebrae, when it should have something closer to 45.

Slicing a thin cross-section out of a leg or rib bone can help with that. By placing a slice under a microscope, researchers will be able to count growth rings on the bone, the number of which would have increased throughout the creature’s life, very much like the rings on a cross-section of a tree trunk.

One example which Carrano wishes to investigate further is an apparent blow to the Allosaurus’s left side. ‘The shoulder blade looks like it has healed improperly,’ he explains. If the damaged shoulder blade can be fitted together with the ribs which are held in storage, paleontologists might be able to determine the severity and cause of the damage.

Finally, Carrano hopes to be able to compare the Allosaurus with another dinosaur in the collection called Labrosaurus. Labrosaurus is known only from a single bone – a lower jaw with a distortion which is believed to have been caused by disease or injury. ‘The two front teeth are missing and there’s an abscess there’, Carrano explains.

But in order to confirm their suspicion, Carrano and his colleagues will have to wait a while. ‘A lot of what we hope to learn won’t be accessible to us until the exhibits have been taken down and we can have a good look at them’, he says. So he won’t be able to get his hands on the Allosaurus quite yet.