It appears to have been confirmed that the domestic and feral cat in Australia was first introduced onto that continent in the 19th century by Europeans. This probably coincided with the 162,000 convicts which were transported to various Australian penal colonies by the British government between 1788 and 1868. I, for one, had always thought that that was the case. We know that there are no wild cats in Australia and there never has been because of the water barrier between the Asian mainland and Australia. A study examined the genetic structure of Australia's feral cat populations and found the link, it appears, to 19th-century European immigrants. I say European because that's what my source says but it seems to me that most of the Europeans would have been British. Before the study there are various suggestions as to where this "invasive species" had come from. Perhaps, it was suggested, they come from ship's cats or European explorers in the late 18th cent

At a shelter in or near San Diego, USA, a tiny black kitten named Ember was euthanized (in truth killed) because she was considered to be either unfriendly or unadoptable. No doubt she was considered to be unadoptable because black cats are unpopular. They are not unadoptable and neither are they unfriendly. They are just unpopular because people still harbour strange misconceptions and superstitions about black cats even today in the 21st century. The shelter concerned changed their policy in July 2015 to allow them to euthanize animals that they considered to be unfriendly or unadoptable. It is, though, a bit of a shock to read that they decided that a small, sweet black kitten was automatically deemed to be unadoptable without any effort to see whether she could be adopted. Sometimes somebody comes along who is unconcerned whether a kitten is black or any other colour. Couldn't they have tried a bit harder? It all seems very harsh to me. The same shelter, through San Diego C

Fifty-one-year-old Tatyana Kondratyeva (she must be of Russian extraction) was convicted on animal cruelty charges and banned from owning animals for ten years. The reason she was convicted is because she hoarded 50 cats in appalling conditions. There were 38 dead cats in freezers etc.! We know these sorts of cases and this appears to be clear cut cat hoarding/cruelty. Her appeal to New Zealand's Supreme Court (the highest court in the land) via a failed Appeal Court application, was based on the absurd claim that only 22 of the fifty cats in her "care" were suffering significant health problems! That is more than 50%. Come on Tatyana! Your application was flawed and doomed to fail from the outset. She has more money than sense. It makes me wonder why someone with a bit of money was so negligently cruel to so many cats. She also argued that New Zealand's prohibition orders lacked clear criteria. This was a technical point she was trying to use to her advantage b