Allegedly feral cats killed 145 young Cuban crocodiles at a breeding farm

The Cuban crocodile is an endangered species particular to that country with particular characteristics such as having the ability to leap high out of water and be curious and aggressive by temperament. Because they are endangered the Cuban authorities have been breeding them to restock the swamps. 

Every year, the Zapata Swamp Crocodile Breeding Farm, the world's largest Cuban crocodile breeding operation, releases some 500 Cuban crocs into the swamp, in the hope that they'll flourish and reproduce according to Etiam Pérez-Fleitas, a biologist who's affiliated with the farm.

And then suddenly, during October and November 2022, Mr Pérez-Fleitas said that there were a series of predator attacks resulting in the death of 145 four-month-old crocodiles. They believe that feral cats killed and ate the crocodiles based upon the evidence but there's no certainty that this has happened.

The clues that they have relied upon include:

• "Suspicious markings and fur recovered in the vicinity"
• Camera traps which recorded at least one feral cat entering the breeding farm's pens.
• And on one occasion "farm staff witnessed several cats feeding on something nearby".
• The staff members found "fragments of crocodiles".
• The attacks on the crocodiles stopped a month after seven feral cats were captured.
• And lastly, there is no evidence that other predators have been involved.

That said, they don't believe that feral cats are a major problem i.e. an "existential threat to the Cuban crocodile".

That's because these attacks occurred in a breeding farm, an unnatural environment. Feral cats would struggle to attack the Cuban crocodile in the wild where they are much more dispersed.

That said, it is another story which effectively attacks the feral cat. The feral cat is receiving a huge amount of negative press nowadays with increasing pressure on the authorities to do something about the large numbers of feral cats in many countries. 

Of course the problem is a human created one. What the authorities should be doing is educating people to take better care of their cats, to spay and neuter them, to perhaps keep them indoors full-time and provide an excellent environment indoors. They should do things to prevent predation as is happening right now in Australia.

The authorities should not be reactionary by which I mean going around trapping and killing feral cats. That doesn't cure the problem. What cures the problem is stopping procreation and preventing the existence of feral cats. Feral cats ultimately come from domestic cats and domestic cats that are carelessly owned can end up becoming stray cats and stray cats become feral cats. Deal with human behaviour to cure the problem.

And lastly, I think without being too harsh on people, we can put this alleged feral cat attack down, once again, to human carelessness. Why weren't the pens constructed in a way which prevented feral cats getting in? This breeding farm is not protecting young crocodiles well enough. I hope the authorities are looking at that as well.

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

Cat domestication is a failure in the United States

The statement in the title seems to be exaggerated and plain wrong. It seems to be too negative and unhelpful. It can't be true can it? There are millions of domestic cats in nice homes in America. They are well cared for. They are happy. They live good lives and their human caregivers are nice people. This is all positive. It indicates that cat domestication in America is successful from both the cat and the human's perspective.

But I cannot agree for this reason. And below my reason there some detail on this thanks to Bing's co-pilot who did some research for me.

If you weigh the unhappiness experienced by feral and stray cats and compared it to the happiness experienced by domestic cats in good homes, which is the greater? See below for more on this.

I'm told that the recent figures from the United States estimate that there are 82 million pet cats living happily in people's homes throughout the country. I'm also told that the population of stray and feral cats in the United States is estimated to be between 60 and 100 million. Some estimates are more conservative ranging from 30 to 80 million. Notwithstanding the difference in these estimates, you can see that there is a very similar number of feral and stray cats to the number of domestic cats.

A stray or feral cat lives a very tough and harsh life in both the urban and semi urban environment in the United States. It's hard for them. PETA, the animal advocacy charity consistently state that feral cats are miserable. They argue or have argued that it is more humane to euthanise feral cats rather than operate TNR programs for them. They want to pull them out of their measurable existences and send them to heaven.

A lot of people disagree with that including Nathan Winograd but they make a point. It is difficult to arrive at a conclusion other than that feral and stray cats are likely to be unhappy or indeed miserable, living relatively short lives compared to their domestic cat cousins. 

They are preyed upon by coyotes and other predators, they are shot at by miscreant and unpleasant cat hating people. They are poisoned by similar people. They are denigrated by others who don't want them in the neighbourhood. They are euthanised at cat shelters because they don't want feral cats. There are people who say they should be put back where they came from and left to die.

All in all a bad picture for the millions of feral and stray cat in the United States. If you are going to work out the success of cat domestication you have to weigh up the pros and cons. You have to carry out a balancing act between the good and bad.

Negative spin-off

Stray and feral cats are a negative spin-off, a bad consequence of cat domestication. They are there thanks to the carelessness of humankind. They are a failure in cat domestication. They should not exist at all. Every feral cat is a symptom of failure in the human-to-cat relationship. This was not the end game envisaged by humans when cat domestication first started.

Wildlife

And think of the wildlife that feral and stray cats kill. A lot of people don't like that. This is another aspect of failure in the cat domestication process.

'Weighing' the good and bad in cat domestication

Now let's imagine we add up all the pain and misery suffered by stray and feral cats in the United States. Let's put that pain and misery on a scale and call it negatives. Now let's add up all the happiness and contentment enjoyed by domestic cats in nice homes. Let's call that the positives.

My argument is that the negatives are the same "weight" as the positives" and therefore he cannot say that cat domestication in the United States is successful.

I can add a further factor here. Of the approximate 82 million domestic cats in America at this time, not all of them will be happy. There must be a reasonable percentage who are unhappy because their caregiver simply don't do a good job. I'm going to guess and say that about 10%-15% of human caregivers of domestic cats are underperforming and the cats are unhappy. This further adds to the equation I mention above and it tips it in favour of cat domestication failure. What do you think?

Number of stray and feral cats in the USA - 2024

In the United States, the population of stray and feral cats is estimated to be between 60 and 100 million. These cats, once they leave the comfort of our homes, become one of America’s most impactful invasive species. They pose ecological, economic, and ethical challenges for animal welfare groups. The issue of unowned cats has long been a community concern.

Here are some key points about stray and feral cats:

1. Origins of Stray and Feral Cats:
   • The general understanding among experts is that the homeless cat population is growing and currently sits at around 60–100 million cats. Some estimates are more conservative, ranging from 30–80 million.
   • Only 85% of pet cats are spayed or neutered. Spaying or neutering pets is crucial for controlling stray and feral cat populations. When pets escape or roam outside, they can mate with neighborhood cats, perpetuating the problem. The closer we get to 100% pet neutering, the more we reduce the strain on welfare groups and the current homeless cats in our communities.
   • Roughly 15% of cat owners lose their pets at some point during a 5-year period. Cats and dogs tend to roam when the front door swings open. However, only 75% of lost cats are recovered, compared to a 93% return rate for dogs. Over a five-year period, this translates to over 3 million cats becoming lost and never returning home.

The challenge of managing stray and feral cat populations requires a collective effort from pet owners, animal shelters, and governments to address this complex issue.

Number of domestic cats in the US - 2024

In the United States, cats are the most popular house pet, with approximately 90 million domesticated cats residing in around 34% of U.S. homes. That’s quite a feline presence across the nation!

To break it down further:

• The average number of cats per household is 1.78.
• There are approximately 123.6 million households in the U.S. according to the 2020 U.S. Census Bureau data.
• Roughly 26% of households have at least one cat.

So, if we do the math, we get approximately 82 million pet cats living happily in people’s homes throughout the country. That’s a whole lot of purring companions! 🐾🐱

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

Woman who does TNR wrestles with a smart feral cat and it looks horrible

Woman who does TNR wrestles with a smart feral cat and it looks horrible. Screenshot.

This woman must be kind as she is a TNR volunteer. She feeds, traps and neuters feral cats where she lives - not sure where she lives! No matter. The video is a bit shocking as she takes a risk in trying to pick up a smart feral cat and place her in what appears to be a sack of some sort to take her to a vet to get her spayed. 

Me deciding to take a chance to grab the extremely smart feral cat I've been feeding so I can get her fixed. No cats were harmed! Only me!"

She makes a fool of herself looking stupid as she fights with the cat getting scratched. We don't see the injuries she suffered but she must have been harmed perhaps quite seriously. As I say, it looks horrible.

To be honest, she is brave in allowing the video to be uploaded to social media as she is not shown at her best of you know what I am getting at.

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

Animal advocates say school kids swung around dead cats (they'd shot) in front of them saying "meat, meat, meat"

NEWS AND VIEWS - NORTH CANTERBURY, NEW ZELAND: Animal advocates were present at the North Canterbury Hunting Competition in Wellington, New Zealand. You may have read about this competition in which adults and schoolchildren under the age of 14 go out and shoot wild animals including feral cats. The kids were offered a £100 cash prize for the most cats shot dead! Great.

There was uproar about schoolchildren shooting feral cats. The first problem is that it indoctrinates the children into believing that shooting animals for fun is a good thing. Secondly, you can never be sure that you are shooting a feral cat or a domestic cat; someone's pet.

Animal advocates say schoolkids swung around dead cats they'd shot in front of them saying "meat, meat, meat". Image: NZ Herald.

Because of the uproar, 'on the ground' and online, the people who made the rules about the competition said that children under 14 couldn't shoot feral cats in order, I guess, to appease the animal advocates who were protesting.

But the adult version of the events still took place. Adults still shoot feral cats and perhaps occasionally someone's domestic cat companion. There is a photograph online of what appears to be hundreds of animals piled up as the end result of this shooting competition. To an animal advocate it looks disgusting.

But the point of the article is that a group of six protesters at the event were taunted by children who began repeatedly chanting the word "meat" while swinging around dead cats presumably by the tail. Charming.

It's reported that before they did this the children told the animal advocates to go and eat carrots and grass. They added that the protesters were going to die from a lack of protein and iron.

One animal advocate, Sarah Jackson, said, "The first thing we saw when we arrived was children having relay races with the deceased bodies of animals. These included baby pigs, rabbits and possums."

The organisers of the fundraising event said that the protesters had provoked the children. And they justify the shooting of feral cats because of the devastating impact that they have on native species. Comment: that does not address the problem of indoctrinating children into accepting what most people regard as unethical and immoral behaviour. And it does not address the problem about shooting domestic cats by accident.

So, the conclusion from this story is that the children concerned are beyond redemption. The world has lost them to animal cruelty. They will be cruel to animals all their lives and people are going to have to accept it. They've been taught that by their parents and by the hunters and shooters of New Zealand who see nothing wrong with destroying sentient creatures to protect native mammals and marsupials.

There must be a better way. I'm sympathetic about protecting native species but to do it this way is very crude and cruel. And it doesn't really work except to entertain the people doing the shooting. You can't simply eradicate all the feral cats in New Zealand or in a certain area of New Zealand by shooting them. They come back; they breed. 

There has to be a far more sensible, efficient, practical and long-lasting solution and of course one which is humane and decent.

Neutering operation blinded a feral cat but turned him into a domestic cat overnight

NEWS AND COMMENT-NORTH CAROLINA ANIMAL SHELTER: This interesting story from America confirms what we already know about anaesthetics on domestic and feral cats. It can blind them. As I recall, there is a about a one in 400 chance of a cat being blinded by a general anaesthetic.

So, this cat whose been named Scoot lost his sight after he was brought to the shelter and neutered. That would have been a standard process. You can see in the photograph that his left ear has been trimmed, called 'ear tipping' indicating that he was a feral cat cared for under a TNR program.

Scoot. Image: The Charlotte Observer.

But here's the interesting bit: he was a scratchy, irritable and difficult cat as feral cats are prone to be unless they have been through some sort of socialisation.

But in this instance, because he became instantly blind, his temperament became much milder and of course he became reliant on his caregivers. It seems that he decided he had to integrate into human society in an instant in order to survive. Which made him a good pet overnight. In fact, he pretty well instantly transformed into a domestic cat.

He was adopted by a shelter worker, Mariah Shields.

She said:

“It’s very obvious how new he is to being blind, and he started out very quiet and unassuming,”

Apparently, he's opening up and he started to knead his owner (regards her as his surrogate mom) and is becoming very sociable. He greeted her with a meow in the morning and when he is petted, he wants to play. 

And recently he hugged her. He's become a bone fide pet cat of the highest quality all because he was instantly made blind by an anaesthetic.

I guess you could say that this is a silver lining in the heavy risk of anaesthetics seriously harming domestic cats and this can happen in the most innocuous operations such as teeth cleaning.

That's why people who know about the dangers of anaesthetics are reluctant to take their cat to veterinarians for teeth cleaning which often is a necessity.

Large feral (?) 'Siamese' cat in Australia trapped and killed causing an outcry from some sections of the community

A large feral cat in Australia has been trapped and killed causing an outcry from some sections of the community. But was the cat feral or an inside/outside domestic cat? It appears so.

Large feral cat in Australia trapped and killed causing an outcry from some sections of the community. Image: Daily Mail Australia.

Comment on the above photograph: I find it very strange. The comments on the right-hand side appear to be have been made by the owner of this 'feral cat'. That means that the cat is not feral but an outdoor/indoor domestic cat. And the person has described the cat as "Siamese". The cat does not look like a Siamese cat judging by the camera traps image. The cat does not have pointing but appears to be an even colour throughout. So, I'm not sure what is going on. And if this is the case the authorities have killed someone's pet! Damages come to mind. The owner should sue them.

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I have followed the shenanigans and attitudes of the Australian authorities towards feral cats on the continent for years. It doesn't surprise me one jot that the authorities in charge of administrating Moreton Island off the coast of south-east Queensland decided to trap a so-called feral cat weighing 6.8 kg (15 pounds) and euthanise it (kill it). At least they didn't shoot it! That is the normal way for Australia's authorities to deal with feral cats.

Trapping and euthanising is way too humane for Australians when it comes to the 'vermin' and 'pest' that is the feral cat on that continent. They hate the animal but not everyone does because in this instance this feral cat who had earned the name 'Tangalooma puma' had a following and there was an outcry when the feline was trapped and killed.

A resident caught the cat in July having set up a humane trap. He learnt the technique in a workshop run by Brisbane City Council. The cat was then euthanised by Queensland Parks and Wildlife Services in accordance with the Biosecurity Act 2014.

In order to verify that this cat was a pest by preying on native species, they conducted an autopsy and discovered the remnants of a crow and a bandicoot in the stomach. This proved to them that the cat was decimating native while species which justified their actions in killing it.

Residents of Moreton Island are allowed to have pets but as it is given over to being a national park, they can't really let their cats go outside. I'm not sure if there is a local ordinance which forbids domestic cats going outside. The reports don't comment on that.

Of course, most of the residents are happy that the cat was killed but, as mentioned, not everyone is in agreement perhaps because it was a pet cat 😎. It makes me smile ironically. No one should agree to domestic cats being killed by the authorities for doing nothing wrong. It is wanton cat killing.

It's peculiar that they dubbed the cat a "puma". It seems that in the imagination of many they exaggerated its size to that of a mountain lion (a very large feline). This is not untypical of humans. And in doing that there was a gradual swell of hatred of the animal resulting in one resident deciding to trap it.

But 15 pounds in weight for a domestic or feral cat is not that big. It is slightly bigger than normal but not huge. And if a cat has become feral for whatever reason, they're going to have to hunt to survive. 

People need to look more carefully at why the cat became feral cat in the first place. The only reason is because of human carelessness. I always think it is very unfair if the existence of an animal due to human carelessness becomes such a nuisance that they have to kill it. The animal is an innocent victim of sloppy human behaviour. This is not a reason to kill the animal.

It is a reason to educate people to stop being sloppy on cat ownership. It's a reason to be kind to the animal because they are victims as well as the animals that they eat.

Are feral cats clean?

Are feral cats clean? It's quite a good question and I feel that I need to try and answer it. Without reference to any books or the Internet, my personal viewpoint is that feral cats will maintain their typical cat cleanliness - the type of cleanliness that we see in domestic cats - if they are in good health, well fed and perhaps cared for by a feral cat colony volunteer working under the TNR umbrella.

Handsome Greek feral cat. Photo: Image by user32212 from Pixabay 

However, the big problem is this: feral cats have greatly shortened lives because survival is much harder. Food is harder to come by. The kind of food they can get at is often unhealthy. They may hunt whenever they can but the nutrition is much less good than it is for a domestic cat.

In addition, they have no veterinary care and therefore when they get ill, they stay ill. When a cat becomes ill, they lose motivation to self-groom (autogroom). Many illnesses cause a lack of appetite (anorexia). Many illnesses cause lethargy. Both these symptoms will severely reduce activity levels and motivation to do things including maintain self-hygiene.

RELATED: Feral Cats Are Healthier and Live Longer Than Thought.

And therefore, they don't clean themselves which can exacerbate their ill-health. They will develop more fleas and very badly infestations can greatly impact health especially for a young cat and certainly for a kitten.

RELATED: Independent newspaper’s BIASED headline about the feral cat threat to the Kangaroo Island dunnart.

The answer to the question is this: feral cats are not clean very often but they are sometimes. And normally they will be clean when they live in a colony cared for by volunteer. When you see those colonies, you see feral cats which are akin to domestic cats in all but name. They are semi-domesticated and are well able to be rehomed a lot of the time. And they are.

It is the neglected feral cats, particularly those living in developing countries, where conditions are hasher than usual. Where the temperatures are high or where the winters are very cold such as in Russia. Clearly, the climate affects health. Long winters will kill cats and long hot summers with 40° temperatures which appear to be commonplace nowadays in countries like India, are going to ultimately lead to premature death when combined with ill-health. These cats will not be clean. I have seen many dishevelled, unkempt, sad, clearly ill, destined to die prematurely feral cats on the Internet when researching articles. They are examples of many others.

RELATED: US troops shoot feral cats with air guns on their South Korea base.

However, we should not brand all feral cats with the same brush because it needs to be stressed that many are clean.

Feral cat has been living on a roof for four years

NEWS AND COMMENT- Sungurlu, a town in central Turkish province of Çorum: A feral cat who appears to be thoroughly unsocialised has been living on a roof for 4 years and her lifestyle is ongoing. It is highly unusual because it appears to be an example of self-isolation but she is being fed regularly. This may, indeed, be partly why she refuses to come down. She is female and most ginger tabbies are males.

Female ginger tabby has lived on a roof for 4 years and has no intention of coming down. Photo: IHA Photo.

This certainly isn't the case of a cat being stuck up a tree or in a high place. She remains on the roof voluntarily. Locals and firefighters have tried to get her down without success. We don't know the details of those efforts. It would be interesting to hear them. It is certainly possible to get her down by placing a trap on the roof and then bringing the trap down from the roof. So I think we can probably argue without knowing more that efforts to bring her down have not been carried out effectively.

The roof is on a building which is part of a bazaar. Muttalip Yavuz, who runs a coffeehouse said that this ginger tabby cat jumped onto the roof from a building opposite. He also said that firefighters have come multiple times to bring her down and failed. And shopkeepers have tried a few times but they couldn't capture her either. They have, therefore, decided to leave her and feed her.

The cat is unsocialised and fearful of people said Ahmet Köylü. She eats the food left for her but it appears that people who feed her have to remove themselves from the roof before she feeds. Apparently she constantly meows when she begs for food as it is not always provided on time. This is not a satisfactory state of affairs!

As mentioned, the solution is to employ standard TNR techniques. I'm surprised that this is not been carried out but of course no one is to blame. It's a question of finding somebody in Turkey, living nearby, who knows about TNR work. That will resolve the problem. I am sure there are TNR operatives in Turkey who'd assist. The cat can then be socialised with patience and hopefully rehomed.

Perhaps, the shopkeepers below quite like the idea of a cat living on the roof because it is a form of advertising for them. I sense that that is part of the problem too.

The story comes from İhlas News Agency (İHA) via Daily Sabah.

Can you detect a faint smile on this rehabilitated feral cat?

This is Sad Boy. As you can see, he had a hard life as an unneutered feral cat. In the photograph on the left his face is tense, his eyes are closed slightly, his nose is badly scarred through fighting, and his mouth points slightly downwards. All in all, his face as a feral cat indicates the difficulty in surviving.

Can you detect a faint smile on this rehabilitated feral cat? Photo: Reddit user: u/PoetsSquareCats.

Move forward a couple or three months and thanks to the care of an individual (we don't know her or his name), he is rehabilitated. Sad Boy appears to have been a semi-domesticated feral cat because he looks domesticated in the second photograph implying that it didn't take that long to integrate him into the human lifestyle.

What is noticeable is the lightness in his face. I even detect, I believe, a faint smile. His eyes are slightly more open and the tenseness in his face has disappeared.

Also, his jowly cheeks have disappeared. This is because, I presume, he has been castrated (neutered) and when you do that the production of testosterone is more or less completely stopped (but not entirely as it happens as the adrenal glands produce this hormone). This shrinks the cheeks and you end up with this slightly less masculine appearance.

The two photographs help us to focus on a domestic cat's facial expressions. I suspect that a lot of people think that domestic cats have no facial expressions. They are used to seeing the same impassive face every day. This leads people into believing that domestic cats are aloof. It is not actually true. They do have facial expressions and they are not aloof. Pain is certainly reflected in a cat's face. That is been established scientifically and a cell phone app has been created to read a cat's face so that the owner can better understand their mood.

Perhaps, the subtle changes in the expression of a cat when their mood lightens as reflected in this pair of photographs, is due to the fact that they suffer pain with greater stoicism than humans. Humans express their emotions almost wildly sometimes through facial expressions. There is a stark difference between felines and humans in this regard.

Plum, Pennsylvania puts the squeeze on cat ownership and feral cat care

PLUM, WESTERN PENNSYLVANIA, USA-NEWS AND COMMENT: Plum is a borough in Allegheny County in the US state of Pennsylvania. The administrators have taken that big step in interfering in cat ownership and feral cat care. They want to manage cats and until now pretty well anywhere on the planet, domestic and feral cats are generally unmanaged. They have extraordinary freedom of movement. Domestic cats can't trespass. This is in contrast to dogs but dogs are more dangerous than cats.

TNR volunteer, File photo.

I sense, reading the cat news as I do on a daily basis, that local authorities are enacting bylaws i.e. local ordinances to manage both feral and domestic cats within their jurisdiction. This indicates a general trend towards tightening up domestic cat ownership to improve standards in conjunction with attempts to reduce the number of feral cats in a community.

The local authority has created a new law which stops residents from taking care of feral cats on their property. The underlined words are very important because they protect TNR programs. And cat hoarding is strictly prohibited. And they going to make it illegal for any cat owner to allow their cat to run free outside the boundary of their property unless they've been sterilised. And the cat must be inoculated against rabies. Interestingly, my reading of this new law indicates that domestic cats must be ear tipped if they are allowed outside to indicate that they have been sterilised and immunised.

Ear tipping which is the cutting off of the tip of the left ear is exclusively carried out on feral cats when they are part of a TNR program and they have been sterilised and sometimes vaccinated and then return to where they came from.

The council voted 6-0 to make it illegal for anyone to provide food and water or any other form of sustenance to stray, feral, free-roaming or homeless cats or dogs. And it will be illegal to allow any other person to engage in such activities on their property. Well, my reading of that seems to state that it does not forbid TNR programs on public property. This seems to be correct because I think this council wants to be involved in TNR programs, which by the way is the best way to do things. When the local authority is involved in TNR it gives those programs a status and a moral authority which encourages others to leave them alone and let volunteers get on with the work.

This law would seem to protect the regular TNR programs on public land which are very popular among many people in America because they actually work to stabilise the feral cat population in many communities. There is currently nothing better in terms of stabilising feral cat numbers. Although, detractors will always criticise TNR arguing that it is too slow and it puts feral cat back on the street where they came from to do what they been doing before which is spread disease and be a nuisance to residents. They forget that the citizens of America put them there in the first place but that is another story.

Anybody in violation of this new ordinance could face a fine between $100 and $1000 and may even be sentenced to a jail term.

There has been a general resistance to this law. There was an attempt to bring it into action in 2018 but there were objections on the basis that it would be unfair.

Link to the original article.

The original reporting is not great as it leaves so aspects of the story unclear. If you can clarify or add please leave a comment.

78-year-old woman persecuted by condominium administrators for feeding a cat or cats in common areas

NEWS AND VIEWS - THIS IS AN OPINION PIECE: This is a classic case of an elderly lady who is tenderhearted and decent and as a consequence she is feeding a cat or cats at a condominium: Tampa Racquet Club Condominium in Florida. Her name is Joan P Hussey. She's been in dispute with the administrators of this condominium before over this issue.

This image is for illustration purposed only. This is not Joan. Picture: Pixabay.

Hussey claimed that she only feeds a black-and-white cat that she ensured had been sterilised years ago. This cat's name is Cleo. The condominium say that she is feeding cats in the plural against their rules in and around the common parts of this condominium as reported by Tampa Bay Times.

They argue that she is attracting other animals and creating an wanted health issue for the neighbours and tenants, blah blah blah. It's the usual stuff if you are familiar with this sort of litigation and argument. It's usually the big, classy condominiums with expensive apartments who end up pushing around old ladies when they feed a couple of cats on the manicured grounds. And it's usually one or two leaseholders who complain about a little old lady who can't help herself feeding stray cat or cats. She's too nice to see cats starving.

Hussey says that she puts down a bowl of dry food under her car in its covered parking space. After her cat, Cleo, has eaten she picks up the food. She does this to avoid being accused of attracting other wild animals. She appears to be monitoring the feeding carefully and sensibly. She said that she is very surprised to be sued and that she looks after the cat respectfully.

The condominium administration say that she's been asked to stop several times and doesn't comply. The matter went to arbitration as it has to under the law but Hussey didn't attend the arbitration process because she was confused by all the jargon and papers. 

However, an order was made against her in her absence which required her to stop feeding the cats. She had, inadvertently, dug a bit of a hole for herself. Although she could probably get that hearing reheard and appoint a lawyer to attend a fresh one.

In the interests of justice a fair hearing needs to take place and it didn't for whatever reason. Now she's being sued in the courts and the condominium administrators want the court to issue an injunction against her. This would be an order to stop her feeding the cat or cats. It is not clear to me from the story whether the condominium are telling the truth about the number of cats or whether Hussey is.

The condominium are also asking her to pay their reasonable lawyer's costs and fees. The hearing is yet to be set and in the meantime the condominium administrators, through their lawyer, are saying that Hussey must comply with the arbitration order.

Hussey feels persecuted and concerned. She said: "I go to bed at night and I can't sleep, thinking about this thing."

It's the big machine against the little person. It's keeping a fancy residential complex tidy against what some consider to be unsightly community cats or a sole community cat wandering around. It offends the eye of some leaseholders. They want everything picture perfect. They don't see the need to be tender and decent towards what appears to be an abandoned animal which needs the help of somebody. That somebody is an old lady of 78 and she is paying the price for her kind heart and her tender actions.

New Zealand shooter kills a "monstrous" feral cat

ANALYSIS: A man in New Zealand, Jesse Feary, likes to shoot possums and was out hunting when a very large black cat crossed his path. He tracked it down and shot it from about 50 metres away. He believes that it was some sort of "baby big cat" (are you joking Feary?) which is absolutely ridiculous because it is clearly a very large black feral cat. It is known that feral cats grow to a very large size on the Australian continent and in New Zealand as well (perhaps more rarely) because they have available prey and therefore over many years they have evolved into bigger animals.

Photo: Jesse Feary

You can see in the photograph that he took above that this feral cat is about the length of his rifle when you factor in the legs. I don't think this is monstrous but it is certainly large for a feral cat. It isn't the first time that very large feral cats have been shot by New Zealanders or Australians. Both these countries contain citizens who like to kill animals. They both appear to have a hatred of feral cats although I am generalising because there will be lots of people who are more sensitive towards stray and feral cats.

For an outsider like me it is disgusting to be perfectly frank. I hate to see it and it is highly insensitive, crude and basic in nature. You know, the guy was going out possuming which mean shooting possums for the fun of it. The guy just likes to shot whatever he can legally; whatever he can take pot shots out. It's all ridiculous in my book. But there it is; this is the photograph and you decide for yourselves whether this is a small big cat or just a big feral cat! It's a no-brainer it has to be a feral cat. The cat was shot in in the North Canterbury area, as I understand it.

What To Feed Feral Cats

Although dry cat food is not as good as wet (high in carbs and too dry), it is more practical for feeding feral cats because it can be left and it won't go off. Any brand of dry cat food would do; the best quality affordable.

Update: Experienced feral cat caretaker writes this:

No, no, no to an absolute dry kibble diet for ferals. That's a lazy mans' way. It's time consuming, but what I do is prepare my feeders as much as I can ahead of time. All feeders have wet food layering the bottom and then covered with dry. They don't get any less than what I give to the darlings inside my home. I don't see them as "less than". They are equals. I make no less than 4 visits to my colonies per day. Early morns are the big feed fest, late morn is checking water supply and taking up leftover food, early afternoon is "snack" feeders put down, and late afternoon is taking up feeders and replenishing water. Because it's scorching hot in summer here, fresh water is a must. I'm especially vigilent during these months.

If the person can supervise the feeding then wet could be put down but it needs to be taken up quite soon afterwards depending on the ambient temperature. It goes off rapidly in warm weather in my experience. I can remember Martha Kane's husband, Richard Vella, feeding feral cat colonies in Malta with dry cat food. Here is the video:



When feeding with dry food, fresh water should also be put down. There should always be a supply of fresh water  - common sense.

Feeding early in the morning would seem to make sense. Feral cats feed throughout the day. Evening and morning are probably favorite times as they coincide with their hunting activities.

One cup of dry cat food per cat per day would appear to be sufficient. If there is food left over it is probably too much and vice versa.

Dee an experienced cat lover may like to add to this in a comment. 

Feral vs Indoor Cat Lifespan

I have seen a lot of variation in the estimated lifespan of feral cats compared to indoor cats. In general people say that about 3-5 years is the lifespan of a feral cat and 14 years is the average lifespan of a domestic (not specifying whether the cat is a full-time indoor cat or not).

The truth is no one has been analysing cat lifespans. These are estimates or to be more generous "guesstimates" based on a reasonably assessment.

Another point to make is that a full-time indoor cat might not, on average, live longer than an indoor/outdoor cat.

ASPCA says that the average lifespan of an indoor cat is 13-17 years with some living to 20 plus but that is not an average is it? That is a very generous spread based on informed guesswork.

My late lady cat aged about 16 years of age at the time. I had just wiped her coat
which is why it looks a bit wet. She lived four more years.

Petco says that an indoor cat has an average lifespan of 12-20 years (even more of a spread and not an average in my view). They also say that outdoor cats (cats kept outdoors full-time I presume) live for 1-5 years. This is highly simplified. No one keeps a domestic cat full-time outdoors - well, very few people do. I suppose they are referring to feral cats but don't say that. This is neither scientific nor accurate information.

Wikipedia confidently state 12-15 years as an average "life expectancy of a cat". They must mean the domestic cat as opposed to the feral cat.

Wikipedia quote a study as assessing the feral cat lifespan at 4.7 years. The links to the study are broken so I could not read it.

Indoor cats need more play to make them active. People in general don't play enough with their cats. An indoor cat arguably is more likely to become obese and obesity is the cause of many serious illnesses which can be life threatening. Outdoor cats within a secure enclosure will get exercise safely. This is rare however. People aren't bothered to build decent enclosures to be honest.

We know that outdoor cats, meaning stray cats and feral cats, live shorter lives than well cared for domestic cats who live mostly inside the family home. We can probably rely on 14 years as being a reasonable guess at the domestic cat lifespan. I'd favour a bit longer say 15 years. Like people cats are living longer but also like people dementia is more commonplace. Are cats living too long sometimes?

Feral cats will be lucky to live beyond five years on average but many may live to a not dissimilar age as domestic cats if cared for by a feral colony carer i.e. a person who feeds and TNRs the cats as part of a program. Many feral cat carers provide winter housing as well as feeding. There are many factors so averages don't really help. It is about individual cats.

The Passenger Pigeon: A message to domestic cat critics

In the 19th century the raucous passenger pigeon was the world's most common bird. It swarmed in hundreds of millions over the eastern half of North America journeying from one forest to another in search of nuts, its main source of food.

One colony was 20 miles long and 5 miles wide. Other reports talk of columns of birds up to 3 miles wide; the birds tightly packed flying overhead for hour after hour.  The ornithologist, John James Audubon, recounted in 1810 walking in Kentucky with a never-ending stream of passenger pigeons flying past him for 3 successive days.  A modern estimate puts the colony of birds that he saw at 1,100,000,000 (1.1 billion) birds.  Other flocks of passenger pigeons may have numbered 2 to 3 billion.  The entire population at peak was estimated at about 10,000,000,000.

In the 1880s there was still mass nestings of the passenger pigeon. Yet two decades later this most common birds was extinct. The last of the species was a captive female called Martha who died sometime between midday and 1 pm on September 1, 1914 in Cincinnati zoo.

Mark Avery, the author of a fascinating book entitled: A Message from Martha -The Extinction of the Passenger Pigeon and its Relevance Today, has decided that the reason for this bird's rapid decline to extinction was a combination of industrial slaughter through sport hunting combined with another well-known form of human activity namely “progress", which in this instance refers to the rapid spread West in the 19th century of American colonists who cut down forests with such gusto that by 1872 some 52% of trees in eastern America had gone. These trees were mostly mature ones that provided the bird's main source of food. In modern parlance this is "loss of habitat". Both hunting in the form of poaching and habitat loss are very relevant today with respect to human threats to the wild cat species.

What has this got to do with cats?  Frequently on this website and on the Internet generally, we see criticism from people who dislike the domestic, stray and feral cat. They constantly state that bird populations are in decline because of predation by the cat.

In defence of the cat, I always state that human behaviour is far more dangerous to bird populations and has had a far greater impact upon their population sizes. The story of the passenger pigeon in North America illustrates my argument and I hope that it drives home the point that ornithologists and cat haters should please reconsider what they wish to say when they criticise the domestic cat.

Fort Wayne Have Decided to Use Trap Neuter Return Rather Than Euthanise

Fort Wayne City Council are seriously considering changing the city's animal control ordinance from trap and euthanise to trap neuter and return.  My reading of the situation is that the ordinance will be changed and an efficient and organised TNR program will be set up by a coalition of organisations which include Animal Care & Control, the Allen County SPCA and the Humane Organisation to Prevent Euthanasia (HOPE).  I believe that they are calling this a Community Cats program.

For the past 30 years the approach of the leaders of the city of Fort Wayne was to trap free roaming cats and then kill them.  The peak year for this policy was 2010 when Animal Care & Control trapped more than 8,000 cats and euthanised about 7,000 of them.  In 1980 the figure was 2,000.  You can see it's been an ever increasing number which in itself is a sign of failure of this policy which no doubt encouraged the City Council to decide upon the only alternative, TNR.

Jessica Henry, director of the Alan County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, says this about trapping and killing:

“There's zero evidence that it works.  In fact all the evidence says the contrary...  It serves no purpose."

I suppose the evidence she is referring to is the past 30 years of trapping and euthanising leading to more cats.

I think that we can agree that trapping and euthanising stray cats simply provides temporary relief to the problem by removing the cats from the environment until a new population moves in. Killing stray cats has its attractions because you see instant results and historically people find it difficult to think long-term and map out strategies that produce results over decades rather than months.

We know that politicians are always seeking instant results to get votes so it does take some courage to do the right thing and plan in the long term.

An encouraging indication of the success of TNR comes from Indianapolis which started a TNR program in 2004.  There was an average decline of 35% in stray cat numbers across the city with one area reporting a decrease of 43%.

The people who support TNR do make a good point, however.  If TNR is to work it must be done effectively and completely with proper funding.

In Fort Wayne, the three organisations referred to as being involved in this program will work as a team.  They will each have separate responsibilities.

Animal Care & Control have the responsibility of retrieving the trapped cat's, scanning them for microchips and then take them to HOPE whose role it is to spray and neuter the cats if no microchip is found.  They will also notch one of the ears of the cats after the operation. The SPCA then collect the cats from HOPE and return them to their territory. Cats visually in decent health will be returned while cats that are obviously ill will be euthanised.

There are of course concerns with trap neuter return because you are ultimately going to be putting some cat back into the environment who are ill who may well spread disease to other animals.  On that argument you are perpetuating a lot of misery amongst stray and feral cats, which is the argument we hear repeated by PETA.

However, there is simply no better solution than TNR. There is really no choice in the matter so although TNR is not a perfect solution is the best solution based upon hard evidence.

There are many people who disagree that TNR works.  These people prefer to kill the cats. It is really about how effectively the programme is carried out and I hope that the city of Fort Wayne carries out the programme highly efficiently which will help to promote this far more humane way of treating stray cats. We created stray cats it is our duty to resolve it humanely. 

Woodsman001 aka Jim Stevenson - Feral Cat Hater - Bird Lover

Jim Stevenson aka Woodsman001

Woodsman is the notorious feral cat hater/shooter and internet troll. He professes to shoot feral cats in their thousands.  He is proud of it and he gets away with it. He considers it his duty because feral cats spread disease and destruction, he declares (frequently).

Jim Stevenson

Jim Stevenson

Jim Stevenson

He admits to using  a .22 calibre rifle. You may have heard about him.  He spends a lot of his time writing very long comments below Internet articles and they're all the same.  Everyone comment he writes is pretty much the same in basic content.  The tone of the comment is identical as well.  They are classic rants.  They insult people. They indicate that he has a lot of hatred for people who like cats and the cats themselves.

He likes to use the phrase “cat-licker".  This is reference to a cat lover and I think he got the idea from the picture of a woman who likes to lick her cat.  It stuck in his mind - his damaged mind - because believe me does have a damaged mind.  How do I know?  His comments strongly indicate it.

His hatred for the feral cat and indeed all cats that go outside, originates in his ornithological activities. He likes birds and birdwatching.  He is the founder of the Galveston Ornithological Society and his father (or mother) was/is an ornithologist.  It is in his blood. He is programmed! He is what we call a “twitcher". He is about 60 years of age, I believe.

Although I am not 100% sure that the pictures on this page are of Woodsman001, this notorious internet troll, I do believe they are and that his real name is Jim Stevenson.

He was outed when in 2006 he was spotted shooting a cat in Galveston County and ended up in the criminal court being prosecuted for it.  I believe a photograph was taken off him by the police. Because he went to court there was discussion about him and his activities.  A .22 calibre rifle was found in his white van which squares up with what we know about his activities shooting feral cats. He uses a scope on his rifle.  He likes to shoot feral cats and I'm sure he's very good at it. He calls himself a mobile abortion clinic or something like that, meaning he aborts the lives of cats. He wants to exterminate them all to protect birds.

On the occasion he was caught shooting a cat, we are told that it was because he wanted to protect a piping plover (a shorebird).  The cat he shot was stalking this bird.  That also squares up with what we know about Jim Stevenson.

He was on trial in Galveston, where he lives. His lawyer said:

"Six or seven people got struck because they thought it was the biggest waste of their time," Nelson said. "They couldn't believe they got called down to court to talk about a bird and a cat. Much of those people were more dog people than cat people. Some of the people on the jury have cats and are professed cat lovers. I don't think it comes down to bird versus cat. I think it ultimately comes down to the law."

The central question was whether he shot a pet or a feral cat. The latter is unprotected in Texas from being shot. The domestic cat is obviously protected. But if a person takes pot shots at cats in general they are open to killing a pet. Obvious. I don't know the outcome of the criminal trial. Can someone help in a comment?

For some time, I have wanted to know who Woodsman, the Internet troll was.  I think I have found out.  It is important to know who he is but now we need to make a direct and hard connection between his Internet troll activities and himself.  He uses a proxy servers and other fancy methods to avoid being detected as an Internet troll.

If we can build up evidence that Jim Stevenson, the ornithologist, is the notorious Internet troll that people know as Woodsman, it may be possible to prosecute him for these activities.  I don't know the law in America but in the UK to troll on the Internet the way he does is considered a crime and a number of people have been prosecuted in the UK for this sort of activity.

Jim Stevenson, if he is this person, has many Internet names and e-mail addresses.  You can see some of them on this page.

Anybody who reads this webpage curve further information about this person then please do so in a comment.  It would be great if we could stop him one day.

Finally I agree that cat populations need to be controlled - long overdue in fact. I don't like to see cats prey on birds. However, for a cat, birds are well down the list of prey items at about 6% of prey items. Small mammals are preferred because they are easier to catch. Cats don't decimate bird populations.

We have a moral obligation to control feral cat colonies and in a way that is humane and decent because the feral cat originates in the careless activities of people. At present TNR is the only humane way we know.

So I am not against the basic concepts of Jim Stevenson's thoughts. I am strongly against how he does things.

Definition of Feral Cat

Definition of Feral Cat

This is a definition by a lady, Dee, who lives in America and who knows a lot about feral cats because for many years she has cared for them. Here definition is practical and pragmatic.

What I would call semi-feral cats.

A TRUE FERAL is completely unapproachable. Except for the dominant male of the colony, the remainder will retreat until a caretaker steps “out of bounds”.

A FERAL is unapproachable also, but will remain in the open unless threatened.

A SEMI-FERAL will allow a certain amount of close distance but can be easily spooked. These are very workable and the ones that I most bring home and work hardest with.

The STRAYS IN THE WILD are those that were domesticated at one time but have been out long enough that they have become skittish. They’re a piece of cake to turn back around.

The DOMESTICATED speaks for itself.

Below is a definition by a scientist, Mr Slater who writes in a superb book about the domestic and feral cat which is entitled: The Welfare of Cats.

“A feral cat is one that cannot be handled and is not suitable for placement in a typical pet home, that is, the cat that is un-socialised.”

I think these two together, one from a scientist and the other from an experienced cat lover provide a nice combination to define the term “feral cat".

Quite naturally, there are varying degrees of wildness amongst the feral cats of any country.  This means that people must be careful when defining what a feral cat is, which is why the definition in italics is a good one because it is based upon an individual cat's personality and characteristics.  One should not generalise when it comes to selecting out feral cats. Each cat should be assessed individually.