--- title: Leopards, jaguars, cheetahs and the house cat — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Leopards, jaguars, cheetahs and the house cat», a lesson of the biology course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: The cat on your sofa is a tiny cousin of the leopard: the same soft paws, sharp claws, whiskers and night-shining eyes, the --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / Leopards, jaguars, cheetahs and the ho… # Leopards, jaguars, cheetahs and the house cat Lesson 20 of the biology course of Mova's primary school: 18 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/0/) — The cat on your sofa is a tiny cousin of the leopard: the same soft paws, sharp claws, whiskers and night-shining eyes, the same creeping, pouncing hunter inside. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/1/) — Each wild cat has its own speciality: the leopard is the strong climber that drags its meal up a tree, the jaguar has the crushing bite that cracks turtle shells, and the cheetah is the sprinter, the fastest runner on land. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/2/) — Spots tell them apart: leopard rosettes are small and empty in the middle, jaguar rosettes are bigger with spots inside, and the cheetah has plain solid spots and black tear lines down its face. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/3/) — A black panther is not a separate animal but a dark leopard or jaguar, and in bright light you can still see its spots under the black. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/4/) — House cats came from the African wildcat about 10,000 years ago, when farmers welcomed the mouse-catchers into their grain stores, and they still knead, purr, hunt and twist in the air to land on their feet. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/5/) — Leopards drag their kills, sometimes as heavy as themselves, up into trees where lions and hyenas cannot steal them. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/6/) — Leopard rosettes are small and empty in the middle; jaguar rosettes are bigger with spots inside; leopards live in Africa and Asia, jaguars only in the Americas. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/7/) — Jaguars have one of the strongest bites of any cat for their size, strong enough to crack turtle shells, and they catch caimans, small crocodiles, in rivers. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/8/) — A black panther is a leopard or jaguar with extra dark pigment, and its spots can still be seen in bright light. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/9/) — The cheetah is the fastest land animal, reaching about 100 kilometres per hour in a sprint with long legs, a light body, a bendy spine and a steering tail, but only for about 20 to 30 seconds before it overheats. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/10/) — Cheetahs cannot roar; they chirp, purr and hiss, and cubs answer their mother's chirp so she can find them in the grass. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/11/) — Cheetahs have dark tear lines from eyes to mouth that may cut the glare of the sun, and they hunt in the day, while most big cats hunt at night. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/12/) — Cats knead soft things with their paws, as kittens knead their mother for milk, and purr when happy, but sometimes also when hurt or scared. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/13/) — House cats come from the African wildcat; people began living with them about 10,000 years ago in the Middle East, and a cat was buried with a person on Cyprus about 9,500 years ago. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/14/) — Cat whiskers are very sensitive, about as wide as the cat's body, so they tell the cat whether it will fit through a gap, and help it sense prey in the dark. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/15/) — Cats twist in the air to land on their feet, the righting reflex, but it is a myth that they are always safe when they fall, so keep windows and balconies closed. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/16/) — Pet cats are still hunters even when well fed, because hunting is an instinct, something they are born with, from their wild ancestors, and they catch many birds and small animals, so a bell or keeping cats in at night helps wildlife. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/20-leopards-jaguars-cheetahs-and-the-house-cat/17/) — A house cat usually has 18 toes, 5 on each front paw and 4 on each back paw, and about 24 big whiskers on its face, about 12 on each side. - ← previous: [The tiger: the biggest and strongest cat, a solitary and cunning hunter](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/19-the-tiger/) - next →: [Elephants: the trunk and everything it does](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/21-elephants-the-trunk/) - ↑ back to [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/)