Cats will eat almost anything.
Analysis has revealed that felines are “generalist predators” that will prey on more than 2,000 species, including sparrows, mice and bullfrogs.
Researchers from Auburn University in the United States created the largest dataset from previous studies on cat diets and discovered that almost half of the animals that moggies eat are birds.
Reptiles made up almost a quarter while mammals accumulated for a fifth.
Andrew Mitchinson, chief editor of news and views at Nature journals, said: “The authors constructed the largest database of cats’ diets so far by exhaustively combing through hundreds of previous studies.
“Their meta-analysis identified 2,084 species eaten by cats, of which 981 were birds, 463 were reptiles and 431 were mammals.
“Surprisingly high numbers of insects (119 species) and amphibians (57 species) were also identified.
“The emerging picture is that cats are extremely indiscriminate predators that eat whatever animals they can capture or scavenge.”
