Earlier quoted context omitted.
Then bring in some bears to take care of the coyote problem
Then some gorillas to fight off the bears.
[dead]
Clearing 500k feral cats from New York’s streets
211–220 of 244 posts
Re: Clearing 500k feral cats from New York’s streets
#212Earlier quoted context omitted.
The article mentions that the cats may be responsible for control of mice population, but apparently attacks on the New York rats are relatively rare being far larger and more aggressive.
That’s nonsense - When I lived in a rural area I had a Bengal cat that would bring home much larger prey than Rats such as Rabbits and Squirrels.
NY Rats are larger than Rabbits and Squirrels.
Re: Clearing 500k feral cats from New York’s streets
#213Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Who's to say cats can't live independently among humans (and rats and other animals) in cities? I knew about this nonprofit via a cat colony caretaker, @poetssquarecats (I follow her on Tiktok and she's amazing) that talks about the struggles of feral cats and uncontrolled cat colonies. Yes, of course animals in the wild also suffer from diseases, parasites, and injuries. But these animals aren't in the wild. They'…
> female cats can become pregnant at 4-6 months old already, and they have on average 16 kittens a year in multiple litters). This totally was not true in my living memory of fifty years. Edit : like this is totally news to me which frightens me knowing that could really mean that we've passed a irreparable inflection point in a number of the most stabilized metabolic endocrine and hormonal management systems that ha…
At least gay frogs don't breed huge families, but adopt instead.
Re: Clearing 500k feral cats from New York’s streets
#214Be careful what you wish for. It reminds me of the Four Pests campaign in China around 1960, especially the extermination of sparrows, one of the causes of the Great Chinese Famine. 500k feral cats: that's a lot of mice, pigeons and young rats! Without predators like feral cats, NY's rat problem could become even more, well, interesting.
Yup.
Similarly, in the Everglades the invasive Burmese Pythons introduced in the 1970s are multiplying, killing predators like bobcats, and the rats are taking over, further destroying the ecosystem. [0]
[0] https://www.livescience.com/animals/snakes/burmese-pythons-a...
Re: Clearing 500k feral cats from New York’s streets
#215Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Who's to say cats can't live independently among humans (and rats and other animals) in cities? I knew about this nonprofit via a cat colony caretaker, @poetssquarecats (I follow her on Tiktok and she's amazing) that talks about the struggles of feral cats and uncontrolled cat colonies. Yes, of course animals in the wild also suffer from diseases, parasites, and injuries. But these animals aren't in the wild. They'…
> female cats can become pregnant at 4-6 months old already, and they have on average 16 kittens a year in multiple litters). This totally was not true in my living memory of fifty years. Edit : like this is totally news to me which frightens me knowing that could really mean that we've passed a irreparable inflection point in a number of the most stabilized metabolic endocrine and hormonal management systems that ha…
Another, more reasonable hypothesis, is that you were wrong about your preconceptions of cat reproduction. The time to reach sexual maturity seems to be pretty well established, and the number of kittens of course will vary depending on conditions but it's not rare to be in those cases of female cats having multiple litters in a single year. Cat pregnancies last two months approximately, so it's not unreasonable at all.
Re: Clearing 500k feral cats from New York’s streets
#216Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you know how traumatic spaying is, and how absolutely trivial it is to not get your dog knocked up unintentionally? Until you snip all your own tubes and those of all your children, keep your euthanasia propaganda to yourself. Every human causes far more environmental harm than any animal.
What does this have to do with environmental harm? I thought the discussion was about animal population. I'd also argue that starving to death is pretty traumatic, hence why we should have better regulation on pet population.
See the part where it’s trivial for a responsible pet owner to not get their dog knocked up.
Re: Clearing 500k feral cats from New York’s streets
#217Re: Clearing 500k feral cats from New York’s streets
#218Earlier quoted context omitted.
You stopped reading because they said something that is widely known by disease ecologists and the result of an actual scientific study? https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/cats-are-surprisin... "Researchers led by Fordham University’s Michael Parsons spent five months observing a rat colony housed at a Brooklyn waste management facility [...] Over the course of the 79-day testing period, local cats ambushed ju…
Yeah, I saw a TikTok and this guy was filming a cat that had lost it's tail and an eye. Apparently, it had gone toe-to-toe with the rats of Brooklyn if I remember correctly and lost. NYC rats can get pretty gnarly in size, nothing like the mice or squirrels we think of that cats usually kill.
We need AI driven robocats.
Re: Clearing 500k feral cats from New York’s streets
#219Be careful what you wish for. It reminds me of the Four Pests campaign in China around 1960, especially the extermination of sparrows, one of the causes of the Great Chinese Famine. 500k feral cats: that's a lot of mice, pigeons and young rats! Without predators like feral cats, NY's rat problem could become even more, well, interesting.
Our neighborhood feral cat population has gone way down and our bunny population has gone way up. When I saw a cat almost catch and kill a baby bunny it dawned on me that these might be related.
Re: Clearing 500k feral cats from New York’s streets
#220Pet ownership needs more regulation. And it needs to be enforced. Our neighborhood social media pages are full of stray animals roaming the streets, piles of newborn kittens in crawlspaces and dumpsters, emaciated dogs found everywhere... And then at the same time you have people trying to give away or even sell puppy after puppy and kitten after kitten. If you own an animal, it needs to be spayed or neutered.
Do you know how traumatic spaying is, and how absolutely trivial it is to not get your dog knocked up unintentionally? Until you snip all your own tubes and those of all your children, keep your euthanasia propaganda to yourself. Every human causes far more environmental harm than any animal.
> Do you know how traumatic spaying is
How traumatic is it? The surgery and recovery doesn't look that hard. And heat's not exactly pleasant.
> how absolutely trivial it is to not get your dog knocked up unintentionally
I wouldn't say it's trivial to guarantee your dog never gets out or has a visitor to the yard. (And your own track record here is just an anecdote.)
> Until you snip all your own tubes and those of all your children
I can control myself, and if my child gets pregnant that's their responsibility. A dog can't be responsible for its own babies.
> keep your euthanasia propaganda to yourself.
The fuck?