I was addressing the OP’s secondary question hypothesizing a world without humans.
But, certainly humans are by far the deadliest, most destructive species on this planet. Time to retire and let another species take over. Maybe they won’t f@$k things up as much.
I’m rooting against great apes taking over, though. If we are naked apes, then they are hairy humans. Give chimps a few millions years of dominance and they will be lobbing nuclear warheads at each other and idolizing the Kardasimians on TV.
So, I see you’ve seen the movies?
“You blew it up! Ah, damn you! God damn you all to hell!” Sure. Not exactly scientifically rigorous, but a fun flick.
I preferred the Eloi and Morlocks from Time Machine. Big crush on Weena.
When another comet hits the earth and wipes out every animal larger than a housecat it will be their time. The next comet may not be that selective though. Rough break for the cats not being around the first time.
Those are not the 9 deadliest mammals. That’s a random selection of 9 mammals that the article could find data for, 6 of which happen to be cats. We have a lot of data for cats because people like cats.
And while those hunt success rates are interesting, taken alone they do not provide a meaningful comparison between predators. They fail to take into account significant differences:
(1) What constitutes “one hunt”? It will represent a vastly different expenditure of energy for different hunting styles.
(2) How large are the prey? Lions are often going for buffalo that will feed a pride for days; whereas the housecat-sized wildcat is hunting small morsels every 30 minutes.
(3) What proportion of kills are stolen by other predators?
That’s the stat for the black-footed wildcat. I believe the more important takeaway regarding the domestic cat is that they kill much more than they need to survive (i.e. they eat only 28% of what they kill). That suggests that they have a significant buffer in times of need in the wild (e.g. when prey is scarce, they can increase the % kills that they eat with no adverse effect).
I’d say any predictions are highly speculative and dependent on a number of factors, but I wouldn’t go so far as to say “garbage.” I think educated guesses can be made.
The manner in which humans disappear in this hypothetical is an important factor. Were they wiped out 70,000 years ago before they significantly changed the landscape? Did the departing humans leave a post-apocalyptic wasteland for the animals left behind? Were they vaporized by extra-terrestrials, leaving things as they stand today (not great, but better than a nuclear wasteland)?
But, what if they were around?
It’s an interesting question to explore. Let’s say the Chixhalub bolide impacted Earth millions of years later, in a hypothetical world of proto- Felidae, Hominoidea, Avialae, Mustelidae, Canidae, Eumuroida, Cetacea, and any other clade you wish to compare, except Hominoidea (and maybe even them). Which family or species do you believe would gain the competitive edge? I believe felines would top the list. Perhaps smallish birds would come in second (which will make the smallish cats happy).
Here’s an interesting video that was recently posted which I believe highlights another clear advantage felines have over most other clades: they climb. This allows them to hunt additional food, protect food from ground-bound predators, and most importantly, escape from larger ground-bound predators. If the predator also climbs (e.g. bear), the lighter cat will simply climb higher onto thinner branches while thumbing his nose.
The video shows a house-cat climbing a man-made structure that, granted, wouldn’t be found in a world without humans. But there are alternate climbable structures found abundantly in nature. They’re called trees.
I believe cats would sort out which habitats best suit their needs, depending mostly on their size. Only Darwin Award-winning small cats would expand into open prairie with few trees in coyote and wolf-infested territories. Stupid cats are best eliminated from the gene pool. The smart small cats wouldn’t venture far from trees when larger predators are present. They’ll leave the prairies and savannas to their big cousins to dominate.
The sheer viciousness of small cats gives them another advantage over more docile prey. Cats don’t go down without a hard fight and they pack a damaging punch with their sharp canine teeth, claws and lightening-fast reflexes. Given a choice, would the average coyote hunt a rabbit, or a cat and risk having its eyes clawed out? Animals hunt the easiest prey when they can. They’re not stupid. Although I’ve personally seen house-cats approach large gators and slap them on their head, just because they can. I swear cats just love to show how bad-ass they are.
Bobcats not much larger than housecats are very common in treeless deserts infested with coyotes, but they are just big enough and mean enough to stay off the coyotes menu.
One of our 6 cats, Ollie, is a dwarf Highlander (Desert Lynx and the Jungle Curl mix). She is tiny, but completely fearless and bad-ass. She delights in aggressive mock-fighting with the rest of the clowder. She gets roughed up a lot by cats 3 times her weight, but like the Energizer Bunny, she just keeps going (and coming back), making sure her combatants pay a heft price for messing with her. Other times, she’s as sweet as can be. Go figure.
Kitty politics makes human politics seem downright civilized. Niven was right to model his Kzin after Terran domestic cats.