Seriously, keep your cats indoors and they won't get run over. Sad.
Posted on 09/01/2009 9:57:40 AM PDT by JoeProBono
"...Someone out there owes us an explanation. Someone not human enough to stop Sunday evening after they ran over my cat not three yards from my driveway.
Thankfully, the cat didn't suffer. As I gently scooped my orange-furred pal off the road, I wondered what kind of person drives away after killing a member of my family.
His name was Doctor. I'm not a cat person, but if you knew Doctor, you didn't have much of a choice. He threw himself at you until you had no recourse but to love him. His eyes were slightly crossed and he drooled when pet more than 30 seconds. There were times I went outside at night to commiserate with him, when he was the only living thing willing to listen to my problems. The raccoons just hiss at me.
At the very least, his killer could have summed the courage to come to the front door and explained why they couldn't evade a slow, 10-year-old cat who was three-quarters the way across the street....
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
>>I stop and get out of the car, move the body...<<
There is a subtle wording difference there. I would call it a carcass.
My wife and child and I had been out doing errands, and were headed home with food in the car. As we left the shopping center, onto a 45mph divided 4 lane suburban road, a car with two ladies in it slowly passed us, as I was accelerating. Right as they had about a car length on us, a rabbit ran right out in front of them, directly under their right front wheel...somehow, it got run over so perfectly that its furless skull shot off like a rocket, at a 45 degree angle to them, and came to rest on the curb, trailing blood the entire way. I will never forget the look of shock on the faces of the women in that car...and my kung po ‘chicken’ combo didn’t seem quite so appetizing as before. At least until I got home, anyway. My family still laughs about it...and I don’t know what disturbed the women in the car more, the violent death of the rabbit or the 3 maniacs in the car next to them laughing their heads off.
Perhaps some of these people never heard the saying:
“If you don’t have something nice to say, you shouldn’t say anything at all.”
Think that applies here.
I had an almost identical situation, only it was in wild country. I was driving up Highway 101 in California near the Mendocino/Humboldt county line and a deer broke cover and ran at my truck. I accelerated to avoid it and it only glanced off of the left rear quarter panel. It was at night. It looked like it tumbled at the impact, in the mirror.I uttered an impolite word, pulled over and unlimbered the .357 and the Mag Light. I walked back to put it down, but he was long gone. No noise coming from the brush, nothing. I hope he was OK.
I'd suggest nailing it to a telephone pole at about eye level, so that the owner may more easily find the missing animal, as well. It's only courteous.
Obligatory disclaimer: Huge cat fan.
Seriously, keep your cats indoors and they won't get run over. Sad.
That’s assuming you have the ability to dial a ‘phone- I drive a Peterbilt- don’t count on it-!!
Very true.
May cat piss be on them.
That said (and meant), this is why I have only indoor cats these days. Too much damage and disappearance in the past. There a lot of @ssholes that aim for cats when they see them. Same ones that unleash their dogs to "sic 'em"..............
My Dizzy (may she RIP) was a drooler too. Love is worth a little cat spit.
I’ve run over several in my lifetime. I’ve never stopped. I don’t fully understand why I would.
Honestly, I don’t understand AT ALL why I would.”
Of course you don’t understand AT ALL why you would. And, running a few over is NOT the worst thing you’ve done to cats. Right?
Absolutely.
Hitting a deer can be really dangerous to the occupants of the car. Obviously hitting a large tree at high speed is not a good alternative, but swerving to avoid hitting the deer usually *is* advisable, even if hitting a large tree at much lower speed is the alternative. A few years back there was a horrible car-hits-deer story in my area. A busy father just home from a business trip was trying to spend some extra time with his very young son (7, if I recall correctly) by driving the kid to soccer practice. The father hit a deer, which came flying through the windshield, bringing along a piece of glass that decapitated the father right in front of his son.
It really depends a lot on the area — some places will obviously be deadly to cats in short order, but other places are conducive to long, healthy, enjoyable lives. My cats have all been indoor/outdoor (with a cat door, so they can always get inside when they want to). One got hit by a car at around age 14 — keeping him inside was never an option; he’d been a stray for most of his first year and just refused to stay inside much after I took him “in”. I tried once to keep him inside for a few days while he was supposed to be on an antibiotic 3 times a day. He methodically began to claw away the wallboard around the cat door, and was within a few minutes of removing the door from the wall, frame and all, when I discovered his little “project”. I gave up, let him out, and arranged with his friend, the owner of the Mystery Books store (see next story), to give him his midday pill (he showed up reliably enough morning and evening for food, that we could get the other two doses into him).
That’s the only cat I’ve had hit by a car, and the youngest age at which any of my cats have died (another also died around age 14 of kidney cancer). The last one I lost was at least 21 when he died — he was already declawed when I found him abandoned at around age 2, and spent the next 19 years as a declawed indoor/outdoor kitty. He died of a pulmonary embolism. He did however, help several vets make a good living, but only during his last couple of years and it was all for old-age type ailments (including major plates-and-screws surgery at age 19+ to patch up a hind leg broken in a missed *indoor* jump, due to advanced osteoporosis).
I had a cat like that many years ago. The whole neighborhood knew him, including a lot of people I didn't know (several of whom I ended up meeting via the cat). Several people use to let him into their homes (including a young couple in a second floor apartment who met Gordon when he took to sitting on an adjacent roof that allowed him to watch their pet cockatiel at close range), and at least two storekeepers let him in their stores regularly. He spent so much time inside the nearby Mystery Books store that I'm sure some of their customers thought he belonged to the store owner. The best story about him was one I heard from someone on the next block a year or so after Gordon died, and I dearly regret never actually witnessing the behavior described. This neighbor had a large dog that routinely spent several hours a day in the backyard, tied to a long cord that limited his movement to a large circle. The dog just went nuts at the sight of Gordon the kitty. So Gordon liked to curl up and lounge *just* beyond the dog's reach, enjoying the spectacle of the frustrated dog desperately trying to figure out a way to "get" the kitty. The guy said Gordon would sometimes lie there for an hour or more at a stretch. Apparently either the dog didn't make a lot of noise during this game, or did it at times of day when few people were home to notice. Gordon had a tag with my phone number, and would let anyone read it. I often got calls from people thinking he was lost (he never was -- just looking for attention), but never got a call about him causing any problems or provoking a dog into undue amounts of barking.
Before you go blaming free-roaming cats for a declining bird population, take a long hard look at what *people* are doing to the bird population. In suburban areas, the birds' natural food supply has been decimated directly by humans, who clear out all but a handful of trees and most kinds of seed- and berry-bearing shrubs, in favor of a narrow range of "ornamental" plantings. And nearly every square foot of surface that hasn't either been paved or built on is then turned into "lawn", which involves eliminating all seed-producing weeds by the application of herbicides and the prevention of grass going to seed by endless rounds of mowing to keep it artificially short. The mowing also makes the birds more vulnerable to all kinds of predators, by making it virtually impossible to hide on the ground. In many species of birds, it's the norm for babies to spend a few days hiding on the ground right after leaving nest, and before developing the ability to fly upwards reliably. If a cat can see a baby bird in the grass to pounce on it, it's because a human mowed the grass. In rural areas in many parts of the country (including my area, Pennsylvania), human extermination of large predators such as wolves has led to an explosion in the deer population. The deer proceed to wipe out many native plant species, some of which are critical to certain bird species (and to certain insect and amphibian species, and indirectly to bats). The deer often leave virtually nothing but ferns and barberry bushes.
As for me, I have 4 cats who all go in and out as they please via their cat door, and two of them choose to stay outside nearly all the time. I have a "back to nature" type yard/garden, with no grass (ivy as ground cover), lots of "overgrowth" of small trees and shrubs, and plenty of weeds in a couple of areas -- all this provides a large and diverse food supply for wildlife including birds. I also put bird seed in the driveway every day, as well as thistle seed in a feeder for the tiny finches. I also have a little plastic pond with a fountain that's operating about 2/3rds of the year; in the winter months I have a heated water dish next to it, so that there's always water available for birds, cats, squirrels, etc even during a hard freeze.
My cats occasionally snag a bird, but it's normal for a certain percentage of the slower, weaker baby birds to be taken out of each generation by predators, and also for older or sick birds to be taken out. If one of my cats shows an undue propensity and talent for bird-catching, it quickly finds itself outfitted with a loud bell on its collar (which is something you can do to a neighbor's cat, if the neighbor can't be bothered). Any bird that gets caught by a bell-wearing cat was already tagged by Mother Nature to be taken out. I have a large and diverse population of birds visiting my tiny property on a regular basis, and have had several different species nest there and successfully raise babies to adulthood. This is with 4 outdoor cats on a 1/8th acre lot. Trust me, the presence of free-roaming cats doesn't hurt the bird population a bit. I've definitely got more birds than my tiny plot of land could naturally support, without the artificial importation of bird seed grown elsewhere.
And what with my property being a veritable Disneyland for cats -- lots of fascinating birds and squirrels to watch/chase, mice who thrive on the leftover birdseed in the driveway at night, outdoor drinking water, catnip growing in the summer months, etc -- my cats don't show a whole lot of interest in crossing the street. They've been to the "other side" and found it boring by comparison.
>>Of course you don’t understand AT ALL why you would. And, running a few over is NOT the worst thing you’ve done to cats. Right?<<
Nope. here is a whole DU thread about me:
I consider the loss of a beloved pet to be a good thing for younger people. It can help them put the whole thing in perspective. It’s along the lines of “what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger”. Hopefully it helps them to look for human companionship rather than a shadow of the same via dumb animals.
I am so very happy that (your) (through no choice of their own) domesticated companion animals (house cats) play such an indispensable & important role in mother nature’s plan for our environment and wildlife.
On another matter, are you regretting voting for Obama yet? He doesn’t appear to be as strong of an advocate for companion animals rights as I thought he would be....
Be careful with the birdseed. I am not allowed to feed after March 1st because of the bear. I live in a pretty rural area in NY state. A few years ago my husband looked up from the newspaper to find a 400lb bear at the bay window. He ate the seed and left. I use the birdfeeders between December 1st and March 1st.
I say not allowed because I do so much miss the birds after March 1st. There is alway an arguement that I am sneaking birdseed to the feeders after March 1st!! But Hubby is right!! :)
Tootles the driving cat.
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