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I think a lot of people are just delusional about nature and "the wild", and think their dogs will be "free" running around in the country. People treat cats awfully too. Every year I get emails through my university department asking if anyone can take in a cat that just got abandoned outside by someone who moved away. They think that the cat can hunt for food and that someone else will feed it, but they don't consider cars, dogs, and all of the diseases that they can get. If free-breeding cats have an average of five kittens per litter and produce several litters in their life, it's obvious that most have to die young or we'd be up to our eyeballs in cats. Our younger cat was rescued as a kitten from a parking lot--fortunately he came begging for food or he would have soon died, he was 50% underweight.

Wild animals can be subject to that kind of attrition and I find it unpleasant but tolerable, but for domestic animals we have already intervene in their fate and I think we have the responsibility to use more humane methods of population control.

Our cat had was a stray too. She's so cute. Do you remember her picture? You wanted to confiscate her for excessive cuteness. You should see her kittens. She only had two, but they are just as cute, and fiesty. We didn't mind her having one litter, and since it was so small we will probably let her have one more, but then they're all getting fixed. Cats are very useful on a ranch. They keep snakes away from the house, and rats out of the feed room. We feed ours and love on them, so they are very domesticated, but they still love to hunt. It's instinctual. Cinnamon, our kitty you want, is very small, but boy can she hunt. It's so fun to watch her. She'll love all over you, but when she sees something that peaks her interest, off she goes. She's very good at taking care of mice. She doesn't eat them, just kills them, except when she was pregnant. Cravings I guess.