Editing Cat

{{Quality|Exceptional}}
{{Creaturelookup/0
|image=cat_sprites.png
|bone=0-4
|meat=0-7
|fat=0-7
|intestine=0-1
|skin=hide
|skull=1
|contrib=no
|wiki=yes
}}
{{av}}
{{creaturedesc}}

'''Cats''' are [[domestic animal]]s, and one of the most common [[creature]]s in a typical [[dwarven]] [[fortress]]. They spend their time hunting [[vermin]], creating [[remains|messes]] for their owners to dispose of, and also seem to want to wander every room, hall and mineshaft at least once, perhaps due to some modeling of curiosity. They do not require any food. All cats are born with Legendary [[skill]] in [[Climber|climbing]], with their newborns being known as ''kittens''.

Cats are infamous for the phenomenon known as a [[catsplosion]]. If you are not careful, your cat population may explode, causing your [[Frames per second|FPS]] to plummet. This can be hard to resolve due to the fact that [[Trap#Upright_Spear.2FSpike|killing]] pets causes a strong unhappy [[thought]] to their owners, though male cats can be assigned to [[Gelder|gelding]] in order to prevent them from breeding.

Some dwarves [[Preference|like]] cats for their ''aloofness''.

==Mechanics==
===Cats as pets===
Cats possess a number of mechanics not found in other domestic animals. They are unique among all other creatures in that they cannot be assigned as [[pet]]s; instead, cats choose dwarves as owners. The mechanics for pet adoption are still in place, so cats will only choose dwarves who have [[Preferences|preference]] for them. If a cat is [[cage]]d, it will not adopt; however, it may adopt the moment it is taken from the cage (even if assigned for immediate [[butcher]]ing). In [[adventurer mode]], cats can be witnessed bumping their heads on friendly creatures to greet them.

Cats are tiny and benign, making them extremely weak in combat and unable to defend themselves outside of very lucky hits. Avoid leaving cats in dangerous areas, lest them fall prey to dangerous creatures and create unhappy thoughts to their adopted dwarves. Thanks to their {{token|AT_PEACE_WITH_WILDLIFE}} token, cats will not perturb natural creatures, but are still prone to being killed by things like [[cavern]] monsters.

Inspecting a cat with {{k|v}} reveals an unique message saying {{dftext|This animal isn't interested in your wishes.|7:1}}

===Cats as pest control===
Cats (both pets and strays) will hunt and kill most vermin they come across, creating remains along the way. This makes them useful for dealing with vermin eating at your food [[stockpile]]s or causing rot; a cat placed over your food stock with a [[pasture]] will keep it free of troublesome vermin. The only other animal with vermin-hunting abilities are trained [[peregrine falcon]]s, which are significantly harder to obtain.

Cats, by nature, will attempt to haul vermin to their adopted dwarves. The dwarf will then dismiss the cat, at which point the cat will drop the remains for a dwarf with [[hauling|refuse hauling]] enabled to clean up. Cats with any [[contaminant]] on their fur will clean themselves with their tongue, exposing themselves to any ingestion-induced [[syndrome]]s the contaminant may carry.

===Cats as food===

Cats are useful around the fort to prevent the unhappy thoughts produced by vermin, and also for producing large numbers of kittens. If you can resist their cuteness and charm, and get to them before they adopt a dwarf, [[:Image:Cat_Meat_Roast.JPG|cats can be butchered]] to provide a small, never-ending trickle of [[leather]], [[bone]]s and [[meat]] for your fort. As a breeding pair of cats only costs 22 embark points, this is well worth considering - just cage and/or butcher the kittens as they are born, lest the kittens grow to adopt a dwarf before their last voyage (see [[Meat industry#Breeding|Breeding]]).

Kittens cannot be butchered for bones: only [[skull]]s will be created. Immature adult cats (less than 2 years old) may return about 2 meat, fat and bone, 1 skin, and 1 skull, or may only return a skull, while full adults (> 2 yrs) consistently return about 6-7 meat and fat. Unfortunately there is no in-game way to tell for sure whether a particular animal is an immature or full adult. (Note that other animals also have smaller immature sizes and butchering returns, but most other immature domestics return a more reasonable percentage of adult returns; for example, immature dogs consistently return about 50% of adult returns and include byproducts (e.g. bones and skin), compared to cats' 0-30% and sometimes no byproducts but the skull.) If you have a bunch of unwanted kittens, there are many uses for them. For example, use them as bait for a [[forgotten beast]] if it has some sort of poison, in order to determine what the poison does. If there's a desperate need to maximize cat-butchering returns, one can partly work around the lack of age info by slaughtering one-by-one the first-listed (therefore, usually, oldest) cats in the unit or animal screen until the returns drop to immature-sized returns, then waiting some months or a year for the remaining kitties to <s>stew</s> mature for a while.

{{Translation
| dwarven = kun
| elvish  = linì
| goblin  = sest
| human   = usa
}}

[[Image:Feral cat Virginia crop.jpg|thumb|center|250px|Admired for its  ''aloofness''.]]

{{D for Dwarf}}

Abnormally large cats "C" can easily be mixed up with a [[bronze colossus]] "C", whose effects on a fortress are a lot more "Fun" than a catsplosion.

{{gamedata}}
{{Creatures}}
{{Category|Animals}}