Cats have a Sagittal Crest

My cat has a sagittal crest, has yours? Some (all?) cats have a sagittal crest. When I feel the top of her skull, which she likes me to do by the way, I can feel a ridge along the middle of the skull running from the front to the back. It is quite noticeable. I rub her head a lot as she likes it but just thought that her skull was a little uneven!

[note: the cat in the photo is not my cat. This cat chewing grass lives with Flickr photographer ex.libris and the photograph is by her published under a creative commons license]

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Well now I know different. The sagittal crest is commonly found among adult male gorillas. These animals have a very strong bite due to strong jaw muscles, which attach to the sagittal crest. The main chewing muscle is the temporalis muscle. This ridge of bone develops on animals who use their teeth when hunting and killing prey.



It can be present on dogs and cats of all types. The wildcat hybrids such as the Bengal cat and Savannah cat are perhaps more likely to have this ridge of bone. We know how hard a cat's bite can be so this is no surprise to me. Yet a domestic cat's bite is relatively weak compared to the Tasmanian Devil, a small dog like animal living in Tasmania. This animal has the world's strongest bite (see Cat Bites -- this sets out comparisons of bite strength)

There you go, cats have a sagittal crest -- have a feel next time you stroke your cat.