Are cats domesticated? The answer is more complicated that you'd think.

If you see videos of dogs being rescued from South Korean meat farms you'll see that they've very tame despite very little positive human contact.

There are Russian foxes that are raised for their fur. Some were selectively bred so that friendly ones were bred to other friendly ones. After many generations they are also very human friendly despite not being raised as pets.

Cats and dogs are the only animals that make eye contact and read your facial expressions. That's one reason to believe cats are domesticated.

Cats without sufficient human contact are wild animals. Cats need sufficient socialization between two and seven weeks of age. Some sites say it's up to fourteen weeks for some cats. The result isn't just an animal that's human friendly. Cats need human contact. Some can get depressed without it. Some can become clingy when they don't get enough human contact or after you were gone for the day or the weekend or one of their other humans is gone.

One of our shelter's kittens at a NE Wisconsin Petsmart was depressed after going from a foster home to a cage. He didn't eat much. If he was petted for five minutes he would eat like he was half starved but still wouldn't eat enough. Luckily he was adopted in a short time. That's him in the picture.

At the shelter we get cats that stop eating because they're depressed or afraid. If we can get them into a foster home quickly enough they'll start eating again. If we don't get to them in time they'll develop liver failure and die. My wife and I have fostered about 25 cats. 4 of them didn't make it. We currently have 5 cats and a 17 year old foster cat. We had 2 cats before we got involved with fostering.

So to answer the question, are cats domesticated, I don't know. Scientists disagree both regarding the definition of domestication and whether or not cats are domesticated.