Mammals
Pallas's Cat
Otocolobus manul · also called Pallas's cat, manul, steppe cat
Pallas’s cat, or manul, is a house-cat-sized predator of the Central Asian steppe that looks twice its true weight, wears the longest fur of any cat, and has a face fixed in a permanent scowl. It hunts pikas on cold, high, treeless plateaus where almost nothing else its size can live.
Overview
Pallas’s cat ranges across steppe, semi-desert, and rocky montane slopes from Iran and the Caucasus to Mongolia, Tibet, and western China, often at 3,000–5,000 metres. It is a solitary ambush hunter of pikas and voles, relying on cover and stillness rather than speed — it is a poor runner and bolts for a rock crevice or old marmot burrow when alarmed.
Built to peer over cover
The cat’s flat face and low, wide-set ears let it lift just the top of its head above a rock and watch, with its body hidden. The heavy brow and cheek fur that make it look permanently annoyed are by-products of that design. Its pupils contract to circles, not slits — unusual among small cats.
The coat
Pallas’s cat has the densest, longest fur of any wild cat, with belly hair about twice the length of back hair. Held out from the body, it traps warm air against the frozen ground and makes a 3-kilo cat look stout and round.
Status
Pallas’s cat is Least Concern (reassessed from Near Threatened in 2020) but declining, hit by habitat loss, poisoning of the pikas it eats, and hunting. In zoos, kittens die at high rates from toxoplasmosis because the wild cats evolved where the parasite is rare.
Pallas's Cat: common questions
Why does Pallas's cat look so grumpy and flat-faced?
The permanently unimpressed expression comes from a combination of features shaped by its open-country life. Its face is broad and flattened, its forehead low, and its ears are small and set low on the sides of the head instead of standing up on top. This lets the cat raise just the top of its head above a rock or a tussock and scan for prey or danger while keeping almost its entire body and outline hidden. The wide-set eyes, heavy cheek fur, and low brow that make it look cross to us are simply the by-products of that peering-over-cover design. It has also become an internet favourite partly because those same features read as a scowl in photographs.
Is Pallas's cat bigger than a house cat?
No, it is almost exactly the same size — most weigh between 2.5 and 4.5 kilograms, within the range of an ordinary domestic cat — but it looks much larger and heavier because of its coat. Pallas's cat has the longest, densest fur of any wild cat, and the hair on its underside and lower flanks is roughly twice as long as the hair on its back. That thick layer, held out from the body, makes the cat appear stout and round, especially in winter. Underneath the fluff is a short-legged, compact, muscular little cat.
Where does Pallas's cat live and how does it survive the cold?
It lives across the cold, dry, treeless heart of Asia — the steppes and semi-deserts of Mongolia, the Tibetan Plateau, parts of Iran, the Caucasus, southern Russia, and western China — often at elevations between 3,000 and 5,000 metres, where winter temperatures fall far below freezing. It copes through insulation and shelter rather than activity. The dense double coat traps a deep layer of warm air; the cat dens in rock crevices, caves, and abandoned marmot and fox burrows; and it is most active at dawn and dusk, resting out of the wind during the coldest and hottest hours. It does not hibernate and must keep hunting through the winter.
Why is Pallas's cat so difficult to keep in zoos?
The main problem is disease in kittens, especially toxoplasmosis. Toxoplasma gondii is a common parasite in most environments, so many wild cats and their prey carry it and mothers pass some immunity to their young. Pallas's cats evolved on high, cold, arid steppe where the parasite is scarce, so they have not developed those defences. In captivity, where Toxoplasma is present, unprotected kittens are frequently infected and mortality in the first weeks of life is very high. Breeding programmes manage this with strict hygiene, careful diet, and sometimes isolating pregnant females, but Pallas's cat remains one of the harder small cats to raise. Adults also stress easily and are prone to respiratory infections.