TNR volunteers spend money on cats before they spend it on themselves

Often, TNR volunteers spend money on cats before they spend it on themselves, which is why Feral Friday's free spaying and neutering service provided by the Golden State Humane Society, in Long Beach, is so welcome. They don't operate the Friday service every week because of insufficient funding but on this occasion, on August 23, they operated the discount service because of a $1,500 grant from Petco Love, the pet supply company's non-profit foundation.

Registered Veterinary Technician Tracey Murphy, left, and Ruby Areilla prepare a cat for a neutering surgery at Golden State Human Society. Photo by Harry Saltzgaver, Grunion Gazette/SCNG.

Golden State's Executive Director, Alexandra Casswell, correctly stated that the volunteers won't stop. They really don't stop because they are driven by compassion. There is a huge body of people, nearly always women, who can't let feral cats struggle and starve and do nothing about it. 

They have to get involved. So, this service is a welcome relief to the expenditure which I'm going to guess is potentially or actually a constant worry because a lot of volunteers are on tight budgets. Perhaps they are women living alone who obtain a lot of satisfaction from what they do and rightly so.

The first Feral Friday event took place in October 2019. Golden State has neutered 88 feral cats with this discount service so far in 2021. They believe that in neutering 88 feral cats they have prevented the births of 352-562 kittens. That's a lot of pain and distress avoided.

These cats are probably better described as 'community cats' as they become semi-domesticated through their contact with the volunteers. Long Beach's Animal Care Services endorse the TNR programs.

In case you are unsure, TNR stands for trap-neuter-release which is the standard and most humane method of stabilising feral cat populations. It is far superior to the concept of elimination through inhumane means which almost invariably leads to the vacant space being occupied by incoming feral cats.

Investment in TNR In Yonkers, NY After Animal Cruelty

After what has been described as the worst case of animal cruelty in the history of Westchester when the dead bodies of 25 cats and kittens were found in black plastic bags hanging from a tree in a wood, the city of Yonkers has acted constructively and proactively in allocating $15,000 towards trap-neuter-release programs to help reduce the number of homeless cats which are ultimately potential victims of the nasty people who like to abuse animals.

The city of Yonkers deserves to be applauded because this is a very constructive and an enlightened decision.  It also promotes the concept of TNR as a means of controlling stray and feral cat populations humanely.

An organisation called Animal Defenders of Westchester are delighted because the decision sends the right message about dealing with community chats: humanely and compassionately.  It sends the message that the city of Yonkers, New York cares about the vulnerability of community cats and wishes to do the right thing for them.

There is, I believe, a very gradual acceptance that TNR is the way to go in the long-term to control homeless cat populations but it will not work on its own. There needs to be a parallel changing of behaviour by the less responsible cat owners to slow the creation of unwanted cats.

One last point: I don't believe $15,000 is enough but we can't be critical.

Story.

 

Mass Trap Neuter Release Planned For Kauai, Hawaii

Kauai, Hawaii is a small island about 45 kms in diameter. I guess they have lots of seabirds. It is the sort of place where seabirds are the primary wildlife and they are potential prey for feral cats. You'd have thought with that in mind the authorities would have taken effective proactive steps years ago to ensure that cat owners behaved in a responsible way towards their duty in ensuring that their cats did not breed and did not wander to the point where they became feral.

But no, so the island has the classic "feral cat problem". Fortunately the authorities have set up an 11 member task force to use humane methods to reduce and control the feral cat population. Although the methods will not be totally humane - there is likely to be some killing but at present we don't know how much.

The target is no feral or stray cats on the island by 2025. How long does it take for trap-neuter-return to take full effect and reduce the feral cat population to zero? They have 11 years. I'd thought that was not enough time. In fact, I am pretty sure it is not enough time. It assumes a short lifespan for each feral cat but some may live longer than planned and the target requires completely successful (100% of cats neutered) TNR program across the island. This is probably unattainable and the TNR may take years putting the target back. It may have been wiser to set a more relaxed target so that success was more likely.

The plan is to TNR until 2020 combined with rigorous record keeping to monitor the progress. The aim is to achieve 90% feral cats TNR'ed by 2020.

It seems that they plan to TNR adult cats and try and adopt out kittens. There is certainly an admission that there will be some killing occurring in conjunction with the TNR.

Phase II will place strict requirements on the keeping of cat colonies. Where there are groups of cats they will have to be on private, fenced property and registered, certified etc.. I presume this refers to multicat households of those people who wish to care for feral cats. Most feral cat carers won't have the means to comply in my opinion.

At least the task for director has the correct starting point and attitude:

"It has to be done humanely, but we can't just leave this problem to sort itself out."

Source story.

Feral Cats Attacking Endangered Seabirds In Hawaii

The video shows endangered seabird burrows in the rugged rainforests of the mountains of Kauai in Hawaii where ferals cat attack the birds and feed on them.

Scientists state that feral cats are killing the endangered seabirds in large numbers. I would like to know where they get their statistics from because a video such as this one does not confirm that large numbers of seabirds are being killed by feral cats.

In the video you will see the cats pulling a Newell's Shearwater and a Hawaiian Petrel out of their borrowers and then killing them.

Dr Andre Raine, a coordinator of an endangered seabird recovery project, says that this is yet more evidence of the impact that feral cats have upon the conservation of these birds.

The population of these endangered birds is declining.  The reason for the researchers to find out why.

“The cameras are showing that cats are regularly visiting seabird borrows in all of our monitored colonies." says Dr Raine.

Dr Raine also states that one cat visited nine burrows in a single day last year. He goes on to state that a Hawaiian Petrel chick was killed in the process.  I wish to remain unbiased but that makes one bird and hints at the possibility that the feral cats are less destructive than as implied. Feral cats don't decimate bird populations.

There have been examples of feral cats killing island birds but often the research is flawed. Rats kill birds too for instance (How feral cats affect wildlife - overview)

Clearly the authorities in Hawaii are concerned about feral cat populations and no doubt they will be taking steps in the future to reduce the size of the population and I hope when that time comes they use the humane method, TNR. They are working with the Humane Society of the United States to work out the best way to reduce the impact on indigenous wildlife.

The impact of feral cats on wildlife is frequently over-estimated and always based on estimates.
Source

Neutered Feral Cats Act as a Buffer Against Rabies

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