Posted on 04/13/2005 9:10:21 AM PDT by Houmatt
MADISON, Wis. Apr 13, 2005 — Although Wisconsin residents have voiced their support for a plan to legalize wild cat hunting, some legislators and cat lovers say they will continue their fight.
The proposal would allow licensed hunters to kill free-roaming cats, including any domestic cat that isn't under the owner's direct control or any cat without a collar, just like skunks or gophers something the Humane Society of the United States has described as cruel and archaic.
Outdoor enthusiasts approved the proposal 6,830 to 5,201 at Monday's spring hearings of the Wisconsin Conservation Congress, a citizens' advisory group.
The results, released Tuesday by the state, get forwarded to the Natural Resources Board for its consideration. Ultimately, though, any measure would have to be passed by the Legislature and signed by Gov. Jim Doyle.
Already, two state senators Scott Fitzgerald and Neil Kedzie are promising they'll do everything they can to keep the plan from becoming law.
Kedzie, who chairs the Natural Resources and Transportation Committee, called the issue "a distraction from the main tasks we have at hand."
"I don't see a whole lot of momentum for it," Kedzie said. "It's not the responsibility of the DNR to regulate cats."
Fitzgerald, co-chairman of the Legislature's powerful Joint Finance Committee, said he will "work against any proposed legislation to legalize the shooting of feral cats."
At least two other upper Midwestern states, South Dakota and Minnesota, allow wild cats to be shot and have for decades.
Every year in Wisconsin alone, an estimated 2 million wild cats kill 47 million to 139 million songbirds, according to state officials. Despite the astounding numbers, the proposal has been met with fierce opposition from cat lovers such as Ted O'Donnell.
O'Donnell, who gathered more than 17,000 signatures in an online petition to oppose the plan, was joined at Monday's meetings by scores of other animal lovers who held pictures of cats, clutched stuffed animals and wore whiskers.
Even Karen Hale, the head of the Madison Audobon Society, one of the largest pro-bird groups in the country with 2,500 members, voted no. She said the proposal was just too controversial, even though wild cats have reduced the state's bird population.
"Here's betting that if this 'shooting cats' is passed, there will be some humans getting shot too. Someone's going to shoot the wrong cat, an unseen collar or something."
To paraphrase one of the other posters you ought to bear in mind you'll be shooting at someone who is armed.
In October I nailed a buck at about 300 yards clean in the heart. With a single shot rifle. No scope. Just my range and windage finder.
And I am not the best shot I know. I know guys who'd think I was a pussy for taking an "easy" shot.
Any cat lovers who decide to go after even "yahoo" hunters should write their will first and bring along a body bag for themselves out of sheer courtesy for the coroner when they come out to clean up the mess.
You might shoot for fun. I shoot to eat and so do a lot of guys out there.
Hey, you really want to go crazy? Go after one of the Ted Nugent type bow hunters. Those guys will creep up behind a deer and nail him from less than fifty feet. With a bow and arrow. Go after one of those guys and you'll likely be skinned, cleaned, and bagged before your gut pile attracts the first crow. And your cat will make a nice fur collar for his wife's deerskin coat.
Besides, just because there's no law allowing cat population control in your area does not mean it isn't going on. The folks who do it just don't talk about it and cat lovers comfort themselves pretending their tabby got run over or picked up at a pound.
Keep telling yourself that.
And then KEEP YOUR CAT IN YOUR HOUSE and you won't have to worry about any of it.
An exchange program, perhaps?
just kidding, folks
"Other dogs and cats seem to enjoy climbing my fence and crapping in my yard and destroying my plants. People can be real Aholes."
Same here, and if their animals keep disappearing, that's their fault.
You missed my point, but I'm not going to try to explain it to 'machoman' again.
Happy hunting, Davey Crockett.
*****
I have never been crazy with the macho hunter who gets a sense of fulfillment or adventure out of using modern technology, usually in the form of a high-powered rifle, to kill, at long range, an animal that was not trying to harm him.
Your "hunting" excitement is a substitute for something else.
Let me remind you that many cat owners are more accurate with a rifle than you. ;-)
What a glib command by you. Just think how much wiser you would have been if you had gotten some oxygen at birth.
Maybe you wouldn't have fallen for that "Nuclear Freeze" baloney.
;-)
If a cat (or fox or any other predator) takes one quail in one year, that's one less quail these manly men can shoot. So they want to knock off the competitors. Of course, some people simply hate cats and others wish to kill for the sake of killing -- they are the type who try to run over an animal when it runs across the road in front of their car.
I have friends in the country who let their cats outside, uncollared and unsupervised. I think that is unwise. I've been told that they are afraid that a collar will catch on something. I keep my cats indoors, but over the years there have been escapes (brief and permanent) of cats without collars. Some think that all of these cats are fair game.
It is possible. It's depends on the cat's pesonality and age. Kittens tend to be more trusting (up to six months). After six months, it is possible to tame them, but more difficult. It takes plenty of patience and food and there's no guarantee that you will be successful. Some cats are naturally wary and others are just not friendly. Of course, that's true of domesticated cats, as well.
I wonder, too. I suspect that some will shoot and then claim that they didn't see the collars. Oh, well! Or, they will shoot the cats, remove their collars from the dead bodies and perhaps toss the bodies into the bushes. No collar -- okay to shoot.
Further, how do you know a cat is really feral, and not a farm cat? Don't farmers keep barn cats to control rodents?
I have a number of friends who live in the country and their cats go outside minus collars. One of my friends owns a horse and I've visited the various barns that he has been kept. The barn owners keep cats and I don't recall seeing collars. I may be wrong, though.
The same idiots who shoot at road signs.
For nesting season, I agree. Otherwise, it is rather pointless. Funny thing is, I had a neighbor just like you. One day a feral cat strolled in, ignored his huge dog and made himself at home. He's still there, coming and going as he pleases.
"If a cat (or fox or any other predator) takes one quail in one year, that's one less quail these manly men can shoot."
Don't kid yourself or us a feral cat kills and eats one quail each year and survives. A cat on the prowl is hunting, whether it is feral or roaming. They will miss some stalks. Others will be on nests of five robin fledglings or 14-16 in a Bob White quail clutch.
"One day a feral cat strolled in"
One day a feral cat strolled into my yard. Zap, he vanished. That happens every few days now.
"I have never been crazy with the macho hunter who gets a sense of fulfillment or adventure out of using modern technology, usually in the form of a high-powered rifle, to kill, at long range, an animal that was not trying to harm him."
A single-shot Sharps .45 with no scope and just the range and windage finder common to that rifle in 1870 is "modern technology" to you?
You shoot with black powder and a blunderbuss, I take it.
"Let me remind you that many cat owners are more accurate with a rifle than you."
Nice. Please note that I said:
"And I am not the best shot I know."
So here's a quandary for you; a cat owner shoots YOUR cat on their property. Then what?
By the way, I notice all of the violent threats are coming from the mentally disturbed branch of the cat owner group.
If cat owners decide to go on a killing rampage because they were irresponsible and let their cat on someone else's property then you'll find not only a lot of homicidal cat owners being prosecuted for murder you'll find the predictable response of private property owners shooting MORE cats than ever before.
Your cat has no right to be off of your property uncontrolled. No different than your dog.
Again, keep your cat in your house or on your property and we needn't worry about it.
I don't understand what the hell it is with you "cat lovers" who think your cat has a right to piss and crap in anyone else's yard and then you say you "love" your cats yet you let it into harm's way in the form of predators (hawks and eagles eat cats - I've seen it and it is unpleasant at best), dogs, cars, trucks, feline leukemia, Parvo, rabies from whatever rodents they catch, and other assorted forms of injury and demise.
If you let your children do what you let your cat do your butt would be in jail and the kids would be taken away.
You say you love your cats but you people sure as hell don't act like it.
http://www.matrifocus.com/LAM02/earth.htm
Read what this real cat lover wrote. I agree with her 100%.
take a day off.... I see you have mer foolishness coming.......
stop your silly cat hating essence.......... get a life!
stop your silly cat hating essence.......... get a life!
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