[Ravenpaw carries back a snake to a small prey pile guarded by Tigerclaw as Graypaw, and Firepaw watch on]

Ranking the types of fresh-kill (Rewritten) by Echoheart

Echoheart ranks the different types of prey in the series.

[Ravenpaw carries back a snake to a small prey pile guarded by Tigerclaw as Graypaw, and Firepaw watch on]
Art by Perlenmond
[Ravenpaw carries back a snake to a small prey pile guarded by Tigerclaw as Graypaw, and Firepaw watch on]

Hello! This article is a rewrite of my very first one (since that got cut off). So I was wondering, what’s the best kind of prey in Warriors? What would be able to satisfy the most amount of cats and be the most convenient to catch? And of course, which is the tastiest?
I’m going to be ranking five types of prey for each of the five Clans. Also, I’ll be borrowing some of what I wrote in my previous article.

There are three components to look at: how tasty each piece of fresh-kill is, how easy it is to catch, and how many cats it can feed. Each type of prey will be given a score out of 3 for each component so we can compare them!

First up, the classic mice. According to Graystripe, ‘you haven’t lived until you’ve tasted mouse’. And when Firestar first tasted it in Into the Wild, he described it as ‘juicy and tender, and sang with the flavours of the forest’. Mice seem delicious! I don’t think anything bad has been said about the flavour, although obviously RiverClan cats would rather eat fish. So we can give it an easy 3/3 for taste.

How easy are they to catch? Well, when stalking a mouse, you have to be light on your paws (because a mouse can feel your pawsteps before it hears or smells you.) According to the Warrior Cats Adventure Game guide, locating a mouse is relatively difficult, but approaching one is fairly easy. The difficulty in grabbing a mouse varies greatly because mice tend to panic and race away blindly, but that means that they sometimes run right into the hunter’s claws. Once a mouse is caught, it’s easy to kill. So I give it a 2/3 for difficulty.

Finally, how many cats can a mouse feed? According to Tyrrantstorm’s article about the fresh-kill pile, a cat at its healthiest will eat about 8 mice a day (if their diet is only mice). I don’t think mice are very filling, and so deserve a 1/3. Final score for mice: 6/9.

Rabbits are WindClan’s most common prey. In Crowfeather’s Trial he describes it having a ‘warm, delicious’ scent as he ‘savoured the juices and rich taste of flesh’. Good enough for me! 3/3.

In Moonrise, Crowpaw catches a rabbit for Stormfur, Feathertail, Squirrelpaw and Brambleclaw. That’s four cats! 3/3.

Locating a rabbit is easy but approaching it can be very difficult—rabbits have good hearing and are nervous creatures. Grabbing a rabbit can be very difficult as they are very fast and clever. Also, they are large enough so that killing them can be challenging. Rabbits usually take a group to hunt down as well. I’ll give it 1/3. Overall, they get a 7/9!

Now for SkyClan’s favourite: birds. We’ll only be focusing on sparrows, since it’s listed as prey in the Warriors Adventure Game guide. Sparrows and other small birds are very easy to spot, particularly when they are landing. However, they are very sensitive to movement and so can be challenging to approach. The most difficult thing is grabbing them, because if you miss, they will fly away—you won’t get a second chance. They are fairly fragile animals, so killing a sparrow is very easy. Let’s give it a 1.5/3—not too convenient to catch, but easy to kill!

An average sparrow contains around 43 calories, and an average adult cat needs around 120-180 a day. So a cat needs roughly 3 and a half sparrows per day. Better than mice, but not as good as rabbits. Another 2/3!

Do they taste good? Hmm. There’s actually really little info on this…let’s just say it’s a 2/3. Final score: 5.5/9!

Fish next, for RiverClan! This is probably the easiest out of all the prey, with no need for stalking or chasing, so it gets 3/3. Its taste is up to opinion, of course, so it gets a 2/3 for that.

And there are many types of fish, but a typical salmon is around 4kg—which equals a lot of calories. No wonder RiverClan is always so well-fed! A nice 3/3. Overall they get an 8/9, the highest yet!

Time for ShadowClan’s favourite prey. In Secrets of the Clans, Boulder says that “I know they look pretty unappetizing – trust me, I was as reluctant as you to try them when I first came to the forest. But you should try them. Peel off the skin first – that’s very chewy. Underneath, it tastes like if you mixed rabbits and fish together.” Wow—that actually sounds pretty good! Let’s give it a 2.5/3 :3

However, an average frog roughly only has 16.5 calories. That’s even less than a sparrow—an adult cat would need around 9 a day. That’s even worse than mice :0 1/3.

Frogs would be pretty hard to catch, since they have powerful legs for jumping. They can only really be found in ShadowClan territory anyway. But okay, Sasha did catch one on her first try in the manga. Let’s say it gets a 1.5/3. Overall, that’s a 5/9.

Overall ranks:
Fish: 8/9! RiverClan has the best prey 😀
Rabbits: 7/9. Hooray for WindClan!
Mice: 6/9
Sparrows: 5.5/9
Frogs: 5/9

So I think fish is the best type of fresh-kill. BUT THAT’S JUST A THEORY!! 😀
(if you’ve gotten this far thank you, this has to be the most random article yet :P)

-echo

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