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Parasites - Cats allowed outdoors are
more likely to contract debilitating parasites such as worms, ticks,
mites, and fleas.
Poisons
and Traps - Exposure to pesticides, rodenticides and antifreeze
poisons and kills thousands of outdoor cats each year. Cats are
maimed and killed in traps set for furbearing animals.
...And
for the Birds
Today, birds and other wildlife face more
obstacles to their survival than ever before. Wildlife habitats are
destroyed and degraded every day, and many species are declining as
a result. Even the impacts of natural predators on their prey is
changing based on how humans are altering natural environments. And
the presence of an unnatural predator — the domestic cat — is
having an impact as well.
Scientists estimate that cats kill hundreds of
millions of birds each year and three times as many small mammals.
Most birds killed by cats are members of relatively common species,
like the Northern Cardinal, Song Sparrow and Dark-eyed Junco; others
are rare and endangered — the California Least Tern, Piping
Plover, Western Snowy Plover and California Gnatcatcher.
Regardless
of the status of the species, each wild animal suffers when captured
by a cat. By letting our cats outside, we — perhaps without intent
— place a higher value on the freedom of our pet than on the life of
that cardinal, that chickadee or that chipmunk she kills. |
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“Is
it Nature’s Way for Cats to Kill Birds?”
A descendant of the wild cat of Africa and
southwestern Asia, the domestic cat instinctively hunts and
captures prey. However, wildlife in the Western Hemisphere
did not evolve in the presence of a small, abundant predator like
the domestic cat, and thus did not develop defenses against them.
Cats were introduced in North America by European immigrants only a
few hundred years ago.
While cats may instinctively hunt wildlife, it
is clear that they are not adapted to life in the wild as are our
native wild cats like the bobcat and mountain lion. Outdoor domestic
cat populations are most commonly found in and around human
settlements; most do not survive without direct or indirect support
by humans. They are in this way very different from native
predators.
Truths
about Cats and Birds
We all know that cats don’t have nine lives,
but there are three other myths about cat predation we’d like to
dispel.
1. “Belled” cats do kill wildlife. Cats
with bells on their collars can learn to stalk their prey silently.
Even if they don’t, wild animals do not necessarily associate the
ringing of a bell with danger.
2. Even well-fed cats kill wildlife. The urge
to hunt and the urge to eat are controlled by different portions of
the cat’s brain.
3.
Once caught by a cat, few birds survive, even if they appear to have
escaped. Infection from the cat’s teeth or claws or the stress of
capture usually results in death. |
