Posted on 12/01/2010 9:31:05 AM PST by TSgt
A new report by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln that recommends killing feral cats as a way to control the wild animals has bird lovers crowing and cat lovers hissing.
Most likely to stir debate is the report's finding that a practice commonly used to control feral cats is ineffective at eliminating their colonies. ADVERTISEMENT
The practice of trapping homeless cats, neutering or spaying them and then returning them to the area where they were found has gained popularity across the country. Scores of organizations in cities and communities are dedicated to the trap, neuter and return effort.
The American Bird Conservancy lauds the report.
But Phyllis Larsen, a member of a feral cat management group on the UNL campus called Husker Cats, believes the report is flawed.
Mockingbirds are not a problem here on the east slope of the Sierra.
How menacing can a little spayed kitty be?
Moles in the spring and summer, mice as they migrate towards the house as cold weather sets in, and the occasional snake, bird and lizard. She's always very happy to share her prizes with me, even if I do continue to decline them.
Our kitty is always disappointed when we won’t let her bring in the newest mouse or gopher “toy” to play with. :-) She does pretty well, considering she’s declawed, and on a leash.
Agreed!
All of those I captured were parasite ridden and diseased.
I’m not talking about ridding the world of someone’s fluffy. Feral cats are just slightly above rats.
As long as they are killed humanely, fine. Pellet guns, drowning, or stuffing them in a sack and beating them with a shovel or hammer or whatever, are not humane ways to dispatch a cat. Regardless of what some people here believe.
Saturday.
There is a feral female tortoiseshell cat that occasionally passes through our back yard. She hasn’t caused any trouble, other than spawning more kitties.
We recently adopted a two-year-old orange tabby female; according to the shelter’s records she was found about three blocks from our house. My wife has recently begun to wonder if our cat is one of the tortie’s babies...
You forgot carbon dioxide. :)
The only way to stop feral cats is to stop the feral elderly ladies from feeding them!
Elderly neighbors? Maybe you should move.
Or, in our case, adults with Ruger 10/22s.
Our barn cats usually do a pretty good job of defending the realm. But if the feral toms are persistent...
>> If your “kitty” consistently pissed and crapped around my house to the point where the urine smell would take your breath away it soon would spontaneously disappear.
Fair enough, but she doesn’t do that. She stays at my place. Unlike dogs, cats use litter boxes. Dogs just crap wherever they feel like.
Conversely, if you were to leave your yapping attention-starved mutt unsheltered in your bare yard, bark-bark-barkety-barking at absolutely NOTHING for hours on end, your mutt might eat something that didn’t agree with it and be tits up when you return from your outing.
Fair is fair?
I’m not saying YOU PERSONALLY are that way, but tell you what — a helluva lot of my inconsiderate dog-owning neighbors are. A lot of doggie owners think whatever sounds emanate from the throats of their precious mutts is sweet music to be inflicted on everyone else at all hours of the day.
No ... .22LR should do the trick, though.
The feral cats around here will not let anyone get close enough to do any of the things you mentioned.
Live trap and then shoot them in the head. There is no reason to be inhumane. I agree completely.
She moved.
And I never went over to her yard and took a dump though she fed an army who did that to me.
I did chuckle when she said, “I wonder where all my little kitties are going?”
Several dead cats were found in her basement after she moved.
declawing is equivalent to cutting people’s fingers off at the knuckle. it is pretty ugly stuff. It also leaves the cat defenceless, even an indoor cat can get outside.
>> She’s always very happy to share her prizes with me, even if I do continue to decline them.
Yeah, I bopped down the stairs into my garage one day and waiting there on the mat for me was a two-foot snake, with Happy Cat proudly standing watch. Nonvenomous at least.
I have a cat with a “herp hobby”, apparently.
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