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.

Cat rescuer claims that there are more feral cats in West Yorkshire towns than normal

YORKSHIRE, UK: Debbie Newsome runs Henry's Haven Cat Rescue. They have a nice Facebook page with almost 10,000 followers. I have skimmed through the posts and I can see that it's a really tough job. They deal with a lot of quite sick cats and dying kittens and that sort of thing. It's a very tough world, the cat rescue world, and when you think that this organisation is run solely by volunteers and is not for profit, you have to conclude that they are fantastic people. They put themselves through distressing situations for the sake of cat welfare. They deserve all the credit they can get.

Conjunctivitis in one of the kittens rescued by Henry's Haven. Photo: Henry's Haven.

Newsome has been talking to Jasmine Norden of Yorkshire Live online and she says that they are dealing with an increasing number of cat colonies where parents and kittens are often seriously ill. The message that she is almost begging people to understand is that they must sterilise their cats because if you don't you get more misery in these colonies. 

The cats constantly breed and the kittens often have short miserable lives. They contract these classic stray and feral cat diseases such as the flu (e.g. herpes virus), which invariably ends up with a secondary bacterial infection causing conjunctivitis which damages the eyes and it sometimes leaves them blind which it is horrible. That said when TNR is allowed to happen some feral cats lead decent lives thanks to the volunteers.

Debbie Newsome spends her time trapping and neutering these cats to try and stop this cycle of breeding and dying after relatively short lives. But what is disturbing is that she says that there is definitely an increase in cat colonies. The article does not explain why so I'm going to guess and blame Covid. Covid has distorted the human-cat relationship.

Because of social distancing and lockdowns, the usual volunteers have been unable to do their job in TNR programs. This has left the feral cats to breed and suffer more because nobody is feeding them. TNR programs include feeding. Covid might also result in more people abandoning their cats because of financial constraints.

SOME PAGES ON SPAYING AND NEUTERING

Henry's Haven works throughout West Yorkshire. In the interview you can feel the concern in Newsome's voice. She said that people have got to stop the cats breeding and producing "unwell kittens". She said that: "It's all down to not neutering. If they were neutered, situations like this wouldn't happen."

Her cat rescue is currently working with a colony in Castleford and at first they thought they were dealing with four cats but have since trapped and neutered 7 adult cats and 5 kittens. She thinks there may be up to 20 cats in the colony in total. Some of the kittens in this colony had really bad cat flu as had the adults and there were "quite a lot of dead kittens".

The problem is that these cats are exposed to all the diseases around them because they have never been vaccinated or had any veterinary treatment. When one cat becomes infected, they pass it onto their siblings, while mothers pass the diseases onto their kittens.

Newsome said that she came across kittens in a hut. One of them was dead and the others had "green gunk" coming out of their eyes. And she said that, "It's awful because we're often dealing with picking up dead animals, it's horrible."

Some kittens do recover because they provide great care and some are infected with the feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV) and are therefore difficult to rehome as these cats are susceptible to illness and have to be kept indoors. And in some situations they have to be put down because they are too ill.

Finally, Newsome makes the point that if people think that spaying and neutering alters a cat's personality then they are wrong. Their lives are improved by the operation. Personally, I don't like the operation especially on male cats but it has to be done as it affects their appearance. There is no argument about sterilising, however. It has to happen. And people shouldn't delay because if you delay spaying a female cat and you let that cat go outside it is quite likely they will have kittens. You will have more unwanted cats to treat, to care for and to rehome.

She says that people are shocked when they discover what is really going on behind the scenes with respect to these cats. She says that if one person changes their mind and sterilises their cats, she feels that she has succeeded.

Australia using artificial intelligence to locate feral cats

DUDLEY PENINSULA, KANGAROO ISLAND, SOUTH AUSTRALIA: Before Australians kill their feral cats, they have to find them. Common-sense. They say there are millions of them but they have difficulty in finding them. A bevy of men have to skim through SD camera cards to check the images from camera traps. This takes time.

SPONSOR A CAMERA: The KI Landscape Board's Feral Cat Eradication team is checking cameras deployed out in the field for sightings of feral cats. Photo supplied

They have come up with a method which speeds things up, shaving off 40 days annually from the process. They are using 4G-connected camera traps which send images to an image recognition software business called 'eVorta' which has a near non-existent website. It tells me nothing about their AI software. 

But it allows the eradicators to be informed in real time of the presence of feral cats in the area. The team have installed 200 of the cameras across various sites on the Dudley Peninsula.

Locals have been asked to help funding with donations. I interviewed an Australian woman on the issue of feral cats (click here to hear her) and my impression is that the residents agree with the eradication programs. I just think they are bloody cruel because there is no attempt to use humane methods. It is 'kill at all costs' and sod the pain.

The objective is to get rid of feral cats from all of Kangaroo Island ultimately. They have received government funding of $4m under the Marshall Liberal Government's Landscape Priorities Fund to remove the cats and manage the kangaroos plus for weed control.

An alternative to killing feral cats in order to protect wallabies

Historically, Australian authorities kill feral cats to protect native species which includes wallabies. It's understandable but it is a negative solution particularly when the killing is carried out with a complete disregard for the pain inflicted. 

The Daily Science website reports an alternative method which I would like to disseminate in the interests of the welfare of feral cats. They say that a program called "head start" doubled the population of the critically endangered bridled nail tail wallabies in the Avocat Nature Refuge in Queensland. What they mean by this is that they protect the young Wallabies against predation by feral cats until they are adult enough to be able to escape and survive.

Mad bad and sick as far as I am concerned. Man carries tabby feral cat back to where? He's just shot it at night. He's having great fun saving Australia from native species Armageddon at the hands of feral cats. He is a member of the Sporting Shooters’ Association of Australia with a cat he shot. Photo: Adam Ferguson for The New York Times

Specifically, the researchers placed individual wallabies weighing less than 3 kg together with their nursing mothers in a 9.2-hectare enclosure which was free of predators except for birds of prey and some other predators, which are unspecified. They allowed them to live there over a three-year period beginning in 2015.

The mothers raised 56 wallabies in the enclosure and they found that the head start program more than doubled the population of wallabies over three years. There are 16 core members which increased to 47 of which 21 were inside the head start enclosure and 26 were outside. The survival rate of young wallabies increased, in that 15/20 juveniles (75%) survived past the age of weaning in the enclosure compared to only 3/12 (25%) in the wild.

Wallaby. Photo: Science Direct.

The researchers have estimated that the Avocet wallabies will become extinct within two years but for the head start program. They said that until they have a way to eliminate feral cats in the wild the head start program is a good idea.

I've written a lot about Australia and suggested many other ways of controlling the feral cat population size other than brutal killing in any way possible. If you are interested you can read some of these articles by clicking on this link.

Wallabies are cat snacks in New South Wales, Australia

Young wallabies have been described as "cat snacks" by scientists in New South Wales. This is because it's what they are to feral cats in that region of Australia. Too many of them are being eaten by feral cats and scientists have come up with what they refer to as "headstarting". It's a strategy which means moving the young wallabies to a fenced off area devoid of cats, where they can develop to become large enough to be able to fend off the advances of feral cats. Scientists from the University of New South Wales conducted a trial and declared it an unqualified success.

 Wallabies are cat snacks in New South Wales, Australia. Photo: iStock.

"These wallabies are really affected by predators only when they are very small - they're easy snack-sized for a feral cat," said Alexandra Ross from the university.

Bridled nailtail wallabies are vulnerable with only an estimated 500 individuals in the wild in three areas of the east coast of Australia. They apparently relocated the wallabies to the Avocet Nature Refuge, which is south of Emerald in central Queensland.

This happened between 2015-2018 and 89% of them survived to become large enough to be put back into the wild resulting in a more than doubling of the overall population size over that period.

The said that there was minimal disruption to their lives as the enclosure contained their natural habitat. The only difference was that they were protected from predation by feral cats. It is a nine-hector enclosure.

It was important to the researchers to make sure that the wallabies understand that they can still be preyed upon by natural predators other than feral cats such as eagles and pythons. They feel that the small enclosure helps them to learn the dangers of predation.

The process of 'headstarting' is only useful for animals that provide conservationists with a window in their early life when they are vulnerable to predation and which allows the researchers to remove them from the environment in which they are vulnerable.

The process is cheaper as well. Ross estimates that it is up to 90% cheaper than traditional fencing methods because of the smaller size of the enclosure required. Bridled nailtail wallabies were thought to be extinct until 1973 when they were rediscovered by a fencing contractor who stumbled across a colony in Queensland.

My thanks to Brisbane Times of the story. The research is published in Current Biology.

Cat and baby deer play together (video) - interspecies relationships

The first thing I think about when I see video above - this sweet vignette of an example of an interspecies relationship - is the sport hunting of deer. Why do people find this relationship as shown in the video so charming (and it is) while at the same time allowing deer to be hunted in such large numbers in America? 

Argument over trapping and killing vs trapping, neutering and releasing

There is an argument going on in Brooklyn, Parma Heights, Cleveland, Ohio, USA about how to manage the feral cats in their community and it is an argument that you see all over the USA, all the time. And the parties who are arguing are usually the same as well. On the one hand, the authorities prefer to trap and euthanise, as they call it, but which is better described as trapping and killing. On the other hand, many residents, but not all, prefer TNR, a well-known programme which is conducted all across America.

In this instance, it seems without notification, Brooklyn and Parma Heights Animal Control published a Facebook post about its policy to trap and euthanise feral cats. It was published last Tuesday apparently and then deleted. I believe that it was deleted because of the comments underneath the post by the citizens of that community.

Essentially the Facebook post said that the authority's policy was to trap and humanely euthanised all intact feral cats (see below). They also said that they "will attempt to relocate ear-tipped cats". What that means is that those cats which have been part of TNR programs and therefore have been ear-tipped will be treated differently and that there will be an attempt to relocate them.

If that attempt failed they would be euthanised. The primary focus is on killing the cats and the reason for this is, they argue, that they get requests from the public to get rid of them. There is obviously a segment of the public (and this is quite typical) who want the feral cats gone in the neighbourhood and they don't mind how it happens.

Facebook post on Brooklyn and Parma Hts Animal Control policy on feral cats introduced without consultation. Screenshot.

I think that you can guess what they said. One veterinarian in the area said that it seemed as if the clock was being turned back. Her name is Danya Linehan and she said, "I felt like I'd been thrown back about 30 years. It's been a very long time since I've seen anyone propose a solution of rounding up and killing cats to the overpopulation problem since we've been so successful with what we call TNR."

Another, Michelle Pierce, the owner of a Cleveland-based TNR rescue, said that trapping and killing is not a permanent solution and in any case other cats come into the area after the original ones have been killed. It is no solution at all whereas TNR stabilises the colony and stops them reproducing. It also stops nuisance behaviours and gradually the population dies out.

The problem with TNR for many residents is that it is too slow a solution. And that's why the local authority steps in to try and produce an instant solution and that can only be killing.

Another obvious problem which constantly returns is that it is almost impossible to be absolutely certain that you are trapping a feral cat and not someone's pet. When you trap a domesticated cat they sometimes behave like feral cats which means that under the policy proposed by Animal Control they end up being killed which is the crimes of criminal damage and theft under the law of America if you wanted to pursue that course of action. You may struggle to get the local police to act upon that and you may struggle to get the authorities to prosecute themselves on that but it would be a crime nonetheless.

The article on the Cleveland news website 5 ABC NEWS 5 CLEVELAND has been updated to tell us that on Thursday, Brooklyn and Parma Heights Animal Control said that they have suspended trapping feral cats "momentarily". Clearly they have observed and understood the reaction their policy. I hope that they take stock and try the more common sense route which can only be TNR.

I said at the beginning that they did not consult with residents. Any authority wishing to trap and kill feral cats as a solution would be wise to consult with the community first because you need their approval and their involvement because, as mentioned above, there will be outdoor domestic cats. They need to be inside if the authority is trapping outside. More important than that is that you have to seek the agreement of residents that feral cats can be killed and many of them will disagree.

The argument outlined above is one which recurs constantly in America. It is a problem based upon patience. TNR requires patience while killing is near instanteous. The former is a long-term solution. The latter is a quick but flawed fix which does not last.

Can domestic cats live outside in the winter?

Not sure why the question is being asked by someone because domestic cats are not meant to live outside in the winter! They are not designed to do that. They live with people inside their homes. That said the domestic cat is rugged and enduring but they will be hurt by some winters. It depends on what kind of winter it is which depends on where they are.

• NC kitten rescue: This procedure was used to successfully ‘thaw out’ frostbitten stray kitty
• Siberian cat is the first in the world to be fitted with four titanium prosthetic feet

Siberian cat lost limbs through frostbite (see link above). Image: PoC.

There are stories of domestic cats getting frostbite and losing their toes and part of their feet as a result. Horrible - see picture above for instance. I have read stories of domestic cats being frozen to the ground by ice. They have been injured by the cold. And sometimes ear flaps can suffer frostbite leading to amputations. You might have seen domestic cats with prosthetic legs. These are cats who've lost the ends of their legs to frostbite.

Domestic cats are very stoic and enduring. They will put up with very cold weather as the stories testify. But they'll be hurt sometimes and sometimes they will quietly die. We don't see stories about that. How many domestic, stray and feral cats died or were injured by the recent devastating Texas big freeze which claimed the lives of many people because of heating supply problems?

There are no hard and fast rules on whether domestic cats can live outside in the winter. No one's counting and no one has done a study on it. If a domestic cat is forced by unfortunate circumstance to live outside all winter and they live in Canada where it is bloody cold, it is distinctly possible that they will die of hypothermia particularly if their food supply is scarse and they become underfed.

Cats are good survivors but a relentless series of days when the temperature is below freezing will harm and kill domestic cats but it does, as mentioned, depend on the circumstances. In the urban environment there are opportunities to find some warmth and some sustenance.

Kind people feed stray cats. Some make individual shelters for ferals and strays out of cooler boxes for example. Some take the cats in and adopt them. There are food scaps around the place and many unwanted stray domestic cats make their way through cat flaps to 'steal' cat food inside homes. This is common actually. So, yes, when the circumstances are right a domestic cat can live outside in the winter. They'll gradually become feral.

They will lose their health and coiffed appearance. They'll become ragged and sometimes dirty. Their lifespan will be shortened but they might survive.

PETA's horrific outside cat stories should shock but no pictures please

PETA has to force change to improve animal welfare. They set out to shock people to achieve this goal. They want to force reality down the throat of the complacent public. There is apathy and ignorance about a lack of animal welfare in society. People live blinkered lives and PETA wants to open their eyes.

I agree with their philosophy but personally I cannot look at the photographs which accompany their 'horrific outside cat stories' on their website. These are photographs of cats that are truly suffering with terrible injuries and illnesses. They are normally feral or stray cats.

PETA is against the existence of feral cats. I get that too. They don't want to see feral cats suffering and in the past it seems to me that they have recommended that all feral cats be trapped and euthanized. There was uproar in some quarters about that and this philosophy does not seem to be universally accepted among all senior PETA staff.

I digress...because this your post is about forcing people to accept failure in animal welfare while at the same time not putting people off reading PETA articles. Personally I will not click on a link which describes 'horrific outside cat stories' on the PETA website and which are thrown up in Google search results. This is because I know there are likely to be photographs of badly injured cats

I cannot look at these photographs any more. They damage me. I cannot get them out of my head. I would ask PETA to use words as effectively as possible to describe the plight of these cats but to restrict the use of gory photographs because if I am being put off by them them I expect other people are too.

Brutal Australians playing God after they screwed up over feral cats

Going back to the beginnings of the settlement of the continent of Australia we can see the origins of today's so-called feral cat problem on that continent. Those early settlers were careless with their cats. They let them roam and they left them behind when they moved. These are the foundation cats of what the 'experts' believe are millions of feral cats today in Australia. 

And it bugs the hell out of Australians. Not all Australians, but the conservationists, cat haters and those want to protect their cute native species which they prefer the look of. It's a heavy dose of speciesism and it is playing God. It is preferring one animal over the other and it is a rearguard attempt to correct the disastrous errors of the past.

A western pygmy possum trapped in the area of proposed killing of feral cats. Credit: see image.

But in doing this they quote information about feral cat predation on native species in Australia as if it is written in tablets of stone but it isn't. It is guesswork. They don't know how many feral cats there are in Australia and therefore they can't work out how many native species are killed by the animals. So give us a break please Australian conservationists.

And in playing God I don't mean creating something beautiful or even ugly. I mean the painful destruction on a grand scale of feral cats. That is what playing God means in this instance. And we are told today that one of the nation's biggest conservation groups has decided to work with the Western Australian government to put down poison bait to kill foxes, feral cats and rabbits as well. They want to restore the native animals to their traditional domain in the words of the journalist on The Age website.

They are targeting a conservation area of 5,000 acres owned and managed by Bush Heritage Australia. We have heard it before; feral cats have a big negative impact on the sustainability i.e. survivability, of particularly small marsupials, reptiles and snakes.

The Western Australian government has been baiting the areas that it manages for a long time but the proposed programme increases the baiting area by a factor of five and it's going to target rabbits, foxes and cats simultaneously.

They use a familiar poison called 1080 which is designed specifically the cats apparently. The project will last five years and cover 40,000 hectors. Then intend to protect pets and working dogs "as well as possible". That is a point of contention. It is accepted that some pets will be killed. They say that the poison degrades quickly after rain and it is not toxic to native animals. I'm not sure how that works to be honest. It is made from plant species found in south-west Western Australia.

And then the journalist quotes the usual figures saying that feral cats kill 272 million birds, 466 million reptiles and 815 million mammals annually. They quote the source as the WA Biodiversity Science Institute. Well, I'd like to know where that institute gets their numbers from. Yes, we know feral cats kill native species but you can deal with the matter in a less brutal and more humane way by, for example, using TNR programs which will take much longer and I would propose genetic engineering about which I have written recently in which you can read about by clicking here.

Reducing feral cat numbers should be painstakingly precise and patient work

This is a boring and ubiquitous problem: how to reduce the numbers of feral cats in any one place. It is a perennial problem for thousands of local authorities who want to protect wildlife. They are eager to do it but sometimes they use blunt instruments in their panic and desperation to get a result quickly.

The only way to remove feral cats from areas which are considered important in terms of conservation is to do it painstakingly and precisely. There are no alternatives because you simply must distinguish between domestic and feral cat. And all the cats in between those extremities. There are, after all, many semi-domesticated cats outside.

Feral cats. Photo in public domain.

If your plan is to trap and kill cats roaming around the landscape on the premise that they are all feral you are mistaken. You may be liable for compensation and you may be engaging in a criminal act in killing someone's pet. It can be very hard to distinguish between domestic and feral cat. That is why the process has to be painstaking and precise.

All the methods that I have seen thus far are too blunt. To cite one in Australia where they have invented a machine which sprays poison onto animals that pass by. How can it be safe for owned cats? Perhaps they can make it as safe as possible but it can never be 100% secure. The problem once again is distinguishing between domestic and feral. The machine can't do it. Neither can it distinguish between a cat and another animal.

I've just written about Taranaki, a beautiful area in New Zealand dominated by Mount Taranaki. They have wildlife there which needs to be protected from freeroaming cats some of whom are feral and some aren't. Some are dumped by irresponsible owners. The suggestion is that all cats roaming around this area should be balled together and described as pests and vermin. Domestic cats are not pests or vermin. They are someone's domestic cat or were and they've been dumped. You can't kill these cats because they are still owned technically by the person who dumped them.

There has to be accountability. Cat owners acting this irresponsibly should be tackled and punished. They should be monitored. There should be standards preventing this kind of behaviour. Once again, I realise this is very difficult to manage. It is a challenge to improve cat ownership standards and force changes in habits which are against domestic cat welfare and conservation. I'm referring to abandonment in the countryside.

The conclusion is that dealing with feral cats has to be done humanely and in order to do that you have to be precise and painstaking: TNR comes to mind + enforceable laws governing cat ownership.

Feral cat feeders cannot let their cats down by stopping

NEWS AND OPINION: Sometimes, kind people who feed feral cats start doing it accidentally. Perhaps they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. This is how Pauline Tribe and Rose Magic of Durban, South Africa started. Pauline said something which brings home one of the underlying problems (if that is a fair description) of feeding feral cats. You can't stop because once you start the cats rely on you for feeding them and you cannot let them down at that point. If you start you have to continue because you take responsibility and the cats rely on you. It is as if you become their owner (guardian).

Pauline and Rose. Photo: iol.co.za

It is a self-imposed situation born out of an emotional connection with the cats and a desire to help because some people cannot walk by and ignore vulnerable animals. And they cannot stop for the same emotional reasons.

This is a good thing because it provides a constant source of motivation and there's no doubt this is needed because both Pauline and Rose get up at 2:30 AM every morning and have done so for the last 10 years to feed the cats! The total number of cats fluctuate but it is more than 70. They finish feeding by 7:30 AM and then go to work. It is quite amazing when you think about it. They both work and spend half the night feeding cats.

They also take in some cats and care for them at home. These cats are sick or injured in some way. After they've done that they prepare the food and water for the next morning. They get to bed by about 10 PM, said Pauline.

They first started when they were walking down the promenade on the beachfront and saw four or five cats crying for food. They popped into the local supermarket and got them some biscuits. They ate them up eagerly and so they decided to carry on feeding them. She said that "we were in the wrong place at the wrong time". She's joking but there is a hint of an admission in that statement that this pair of kind ladies started a long journey of caring for unwanted animals which is a burden to them in one respect. There can be no doubt about that. They have to do it because, as mentioned, they can't stop on an emotional level. But there's no doubt that on occasions they must feel that they wish that they could stop.

There are other issues. What do the other residents think about what they're doing? I think they are fantastic and long may they go on doing it but there are some people who strongly dislike the feeding of feral cats for various reasons. They may dislike the people who feed feral cats and therefore Pauline and Rose may have some enemies. So despite their kindness and decency they may have acquired people who dislike them. That is hardly a reward their efforts.

Source of news: iol.co.za. These are my thoughts.

Polystyrene cooling boxes modified to be used as homes for feral cats

Photo: Regina Cat Rescue on Facebook

This is a cool (excuse the pun) way to quickly make feral cat homes. They keep the cats warm during winter which is coming up. The idea comes from Regina Cat Rescue. They are based in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada. The boxes were used to transport blood products before they were modified by the volunteers. It's great to see recycling like this. Last year they found that the boxes kept a temperature of 20°C during the winter. I presume this is with a cat inside! They hand out about 75 shelter boxes annually to residents who want to help feral cats in the area. I flag up some potential health issues with Styrofoam in another post.

Source: CBC.

Greater bilbies are to learn how to be frightened of feral cats

In a NSW conservation programme the Australian authorities are going to put greater bilbies into an enclosure where there are a limited number of feral cats. Those which learn to survive will then procreate and teach their offspring to survive in a landscape where there are feral cats. The objective is to create a large enough group of greater bilbies with an inherent fear of feral cats and the means to avoid them so that they can be released into the wild in Australia and survive.

Great bilby atTaronga Zoo. Photo Rhett WymanCREDIT:
RHETT WYMANAdd caption

The experts are calling it "accelerated evolution". It's a reference to the fact that this small native marsupial species did not have time, they think, to evolve avoidance skills of predators such as feral cats. They are giving them the chance to evolve quickly and develop that skill so that they can prosper in an environment where there are too many feral cats according to the authorities.

It's another take on how to protect native species. The authorities believe you either kill the predators or you train the prey animals or both at which point the prey animal has a greater chance of survival in the wild.

It had been thought that greater bilbies were extinct in the wild in New South Wales. They are rabbit-sized marsupials. The plan kicks off by placing 10 bilbies, five of each sex, into a 2,000 ha enclosure, within the Sturt National Park, which is free of feral cats and other predators (I presume). This small group of ten were bred in a zoo and selected to be as wild as possible. Once they have bred in their 2000 ha enclosure they will be placed with feral cats into a much larger Wildlife Training Zone within the National Park. The government is backing the program to the tune of AU$8 million.it is expected that it will take two years before the animals are released into the wild as I understand it. They are fast breeders!

Source: Sydney Morning Herald.

Why not genetically engineer feral cats to stop them reproducing?

This may be an idea that has been put forward before but which has just occurred to me. It is possible, nowadays, to genetically engineer animals so that when they reproduce the female cat is rendered sterile. This genetic modification is passed on from the male to female.

Feral cat colony. Picture in public domain.

Therefore, if you introduce into a population of feral cats some male cats who can pass on this modified gene then eventually that colony would disappear and in a very humane way.

The technology is called "gene drives". As an alternative to passing on a gene which renders female cats sterile, you could ensure that offspring are nearly always males which would create an imbalance between males and females in a large colony. This also would have the result of reducing the colony's size to the point where it became zero ultimately.

I am convinced that it must have been discussed. It is new technology but I don't recall it being discussed in relation to feral cats. In The Times newspaper date 'gene drive' is discussed in relation to grey squirrels in the UK which have had a decimating impact upon red squirrels as many people know.

A lot of people consider that the domestic and feral cat is an invasive species (like the grey squirrel in the UK) and gene drives are one way of dealing with invasive species. I don't approve of it particularly and neither does the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. They dislike it because genetic engineering is unapproved for people and therefore why should it be approved for animals.

Another issue is that it may be difficult to confine this kind of genetic engineering to the target animals concerned. If it spread beyond the targeted species it may have a detrimental impact upon ecosystems.

However, I believe that this risk is being tackled. Like many other people, I am concerned about the plight of feral cats in many parts of the world. They are often abused or live rather short and miserable lives. However, sometimes their lives are quite decent because there are many volunteers running TNR programs in America, for example, which I think is wonderful.

TNR programs, I would argue, are similar to genetic engineering. In the former surgery is employed to make cats sterile and in the latter that objective is achieved through genetic engineering. Both are humane methods or considered so, certainly in relation to alternatives such as mass killing which is employed in Australia.

I would certainly recommend that the Australian government looks at this method of controlling feral cat populations. They have struggled for many years with methods to reduced the number of feral cats on their continent. As it happens, those efforts which are very cruel now seem rather futile and stupid in comparison to the estimated half a billion animals of native species which have been killed in the infamous wildfires which are largely out of controlled in the east of the country.

These fires have arguably been inflamed by global warming and Australia contributes to global warming by being one of the world's major coal mining countries. They export coal to China where it is burnt in coal power stations which contributes to global warming.

Arguably, Australia is in a complete mess with respect to the preservation and conservation of their native species. This is because of the ambivalent approach by their government and because they pursue economic growth at all costs as do most other countries which is very hard to stop in a competitive world. However, global warming is having a devastating impact upon wildlife conservation.

Woman sues Albuquerque mayor over TNR program

Marcy Britton has started a claim in the courts for monetary compensation for, among other things, losses to the value of her house because those estimated losses have been caused by the numbers of feral cats around or near her house. She claims that the city of Albuquerque is responsible (through the Director of Animal Welfare Department and the Mayor) and has in effect taken her home but failed to pay for it. It is called inverse condemnation in the American judicial system.

It’s disgusting. I mean you come home from work and there are cats on your porch. They get hit by cars. They get poisoned. This is where I live. My property value has been reduced…

The claim is doomed to complete failure. I guess she is peeved and wants to make an expensive statement. She has certainly got some press coverage.

It’s a gruesome, inhumane, illegal, thing to do to any animal…....

She hates TNR, sees it as inhumane and a failure. She regards the presence of feral cats around her home as disgusting and above all, I sense, she is very angry at the devaluing of her house. But she is speculating that her house is worth less as far as I can tell unless she has got an expert's report to support that claim and even that won't carry much weight.

The mayor of Albuquerque is being sued by Marcy. He is Tim Keller, aka the city's chief executive.

The city says that TNR is working in reducing the feral cat population as it does. The city supports TNR and it is the only humane way to manage feral cats. That is the exact opposite viewpoint to Marcy's.

There are however quite a lot of people who don't like TNR and who'd prefer the cats were trapped and killed. Marcy wants that outcome although she suggests some of the cats can be adopted through animal shelters.

I think it is unique to sue a government for running TNR programs or for supporting them or for failing to stop them. I have not seen the entire court claim.

This is just one more battle over TNR. It happens in many US cities all the time. Americans who are interested in feral cats can be divided into 2 groups. Those that support TNR and its humane but slow management of feral cat colonies and reduction in numbers and those that want to essentially trap and euthanise (actually more accurately described as kill).

Source: Various news websites.

You Never See Bad People Helping Feral Cats

Stray cat and kittens. Photo in public domain.

It is a point that needs to be made and I'll make it briefly. You'll never see bad people involved in caring for feral cats in TNR programs or simply feeding them.

They are all good people with good hearts. However, you will see bad people trying to kill feral cats or harassing volunteers involved in TNR programs.

There is a notable divide in human personality traits. I am not saying that all people who dislike feral cats and TNR are bad people; far from it. However, there is quite a lot of bad human behaviour surrounding feral and stray cats such as throwing them against walls or into lakes, or kicking them, or shooting them, or poisoning them or making the lives of cat lovers intolerable. These are all crimes. They are bad ignorant people who commit them.

This is significant. It confirms to me that treating feral cats humanely is the only way going forward and that means TNR. It would be wrong to dismiss the actions of good people involved in caring for stray and feral cats as misplaced and the people delusional.

They realise that there is an ethical mandate to look after feral cats and to reduce their numbers slowly in an humane manner. The bad guys, the cat shooters and abusers, lack the education and sensitivity to understand the moral obligation to treat these cats humanely.

They are simply ignorant oafs. Stray and feral cats divide communities. They are argued over at council meetings. City councillors should be decent and wise people. They generally are which is why when they thrash out a strategy on how to deal with feral cats in the community they almost inevitably come up with a decision which leads to treating these cats humanely.

The wise know that TNR and decent behaviour towards these cats is the only way. Don't think culling cats is a sensible alternative. It's immoral and ineffective in the long term.

Why are there so many feral cats in Israel?

The simple answer to the question in the title is that the people of Israel in general accept and don't mind the presence of community cats in their country. They are part of the fabric of life in the country I think it is fair to say. They are there because of the usual reasons which is some cat owners not spaying or neutering their cats and some of these cats become stray and feral cats and they procreate and so on. Unless steps are taken the numbers continue to grow. I have been to Jerusalem. There are lots of feral cats. The crucial point is to prevent the creation of stray cats in the first instance. There comes a time when it is harder and more expensive to resolve a 'feral cat problem'.

Jerusalem. Woman feeds community cats. Photo: EPA/ABIR SULTAN

There are apparently 2 million of them in Israel and the numbers are of course increasing because not enough of them are spayed and neutered under TNR programs. Despite the fact that there is no real commitment to deal with them in a humane way at present there may come a time when things change due to sheer numbers.

Someone predicted that there will be 8 million feral cats in the country in several years which would match the number of citizens in Israel.

The agricultural Minister apparently believes that the country should not neuter or spay cats because it would go against God's wish to be fruitful and multiply! That sounds rather far-fetched to me but I am open to an alternative viewpoint.

This Minister wants to ship out either all the male cats or all the female cats to another country which agrees to accept them. This would of course mean the feral cats of Israel could not multiply and it would solve at a stroke the feral cat problem. In fact they would all die out in about 15 years in theory.

Israel have a good relationship with their feral cats. They have banned declawing. They are good at animal welfare in my opinion. They won't want to deal with the cats inhumanely. There will probably start funding TNR programs more efficiently and also funding veterinarians to spay and neuter community cats free of charge. They should rely upon volunteers to help. Volunteers very often want to help and be involved. They keep the costs down.

Does TNR Work?

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Domestic Cat First Brought to Australia in 19th-Century

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 century. Others had postulated that Malaysian fishermen, in the 17th century, had brought cats with them to Australia.

Other cats were deliberately introduced into certain parts of Australia in order to control other species of animal such as rats and in one case this applied to an island. There are misconceptions and misleading articles about how cats devastated bird populations on certain islands in Australia. You will find that on occasions these articles misdescribe what has happened. Sometimes domestic and feral cats are scapegoats in Australia. In one case rats not cats killed the birds after the cats were killed by humans. Typical human stupidity.

Yes, the feral cat is an invasive species in Australia but that is the fault of humans. As it is the fault of humans it is beholden upon humans to do the right thing (e.g humane processes) in order to control feral cat populations on that continent. This, regrettably, is not happening as there have been several proposals to eradicate feral cats all of which have been very cruel, impractical, unhelpful, and doomed to failure but they do indicate a distaste for the feral cat on that continent by the authorities.