And how can we tell for sure if it's good or bad? Does killing these birds and mammals help maintain the ecosystem balance (due to these birds and mammals not killing billions other animals down the food chain, or not spreading infections and viruses), or the other way around?
What a ridiculous gaslighting question.
Asking us to prove that cats killing wildlife is a bad thing.
A guy once told me that they remove the fallen logs from the Canadian forests because fallen trees are messy and ruin the forest. How do you even respond to such a stupid concept?
As a cat lover this only strengthens my opinion that they should stay inside the house, humans cause enough damage to the ecosystem without needlessly unleashing pretty efficient predators for no gain.
As a cat lover this only strengthens my opinion that they should stay inside the house, humans cause enough damage to the ecosystem without needlessly unleashing pretty efficient predators for no gain.
> Cats should stay inside they house Isn't putting them on a leash, or having them wear a bell around their neck outside, enough for all parties?
I love cats, and ours are indoor-only. They are happy, simulated, and in good health. I expect their life expectancy is longer than if they were outdoor cats.
They don't have the opportunity to kill birds or other animals.
On the other hand, cats reducing rodent populations sounds like a very good thing. If only we could get them to ignore species we want to keep around...
As a cat lover this only strengthens my opinion that they should stay inside the house, humans cause enough damage to the ecosystem without needlessly unleashing pretty efficient predators for no gain.
by that logic, humans should stay inside too
The human equivalent is poaching/hunting without a permit, which humans are not allowed. It's not like we can issue permits to cats and make them follow it.
Cats also routinely go into other peoples houses and either get themselves stuck or hunt rats/mice there, also something that humans generally are not allowed to do.
And how can we tell for sure if it's good or bad? Does killing these birds and mammals help maintain the ecosystem balance (due to these birds and mammals not killing billions other animals down the food chain, or not spreading infections and viruses), or the other way around?
Sometimes I feel like people on this website act to be as obtuse and ignorant as possible to prove some kind of point. This is a great example
And how can we tell for sure if it's good or bad? Does killing these birds and mammals help maintain the ecosystem balance (due to these birds and mammals not killing billions other animals down the food chain, or not spreading infections and viruses), or the other way around?
A prerequisite for there to even be a chance of cats being involved in ecosystem balance would be for the cats to exist purely as part of the ecosystem, as in being exposed to negative feedback effects to it (e.g. starvation due to overhunting). As it stands, they are being fed by humans and mostly exist outside the ecosystem, and every kill by them only drains resources from the ecosystem.
I think the majority of pet cats live in cities and suburan settings, which are anyway highly artificial ecosystems. Also, as noted in another comment already, birds are fed in the same areas also, and provided nesting boxes, which probably increases numbers (or rather the carrying capacity) quite a bit. Studies seem to show that diversity has gone down, but biomass has even gone up a bit over 50 years [1]. The loss of species is apparently also related to removal of old buildings and modern ones lacking spaces to breed for birds like sparrows and swifts, and removal of landscape features that specialists depend on. Maybe cats play a role though.
The linked article says 90% of the mortality is caused by un-owned cats. I'd imagine that feral cats just replace wild cats in Europe, and thus do exist in the ecosystem with negative feedback (if they are not fed). Not sure about North America, as there is not really a small wild cat species I think?
If cats are killing wild animals that happen to flourish in human environments, is that such a loss to biodiversity? (Genuine Q. I don't know anything about what biodiversity folk look for.)
An extreme example would be Maos Great Leap Forward, where there was a human-led drive to exterminate sparrows as part of pest control, which in turn led to famines because sparrows also served as pest control for insects. Humans are very good at introducing invasive species (domestic cat, kudzu) and pretty bad at forseeing the impact they have
I suppose I'm wondering that since domestic cats are already well introduced, perhaps removing them can also have unforeseen negative impacts to the environment!
And how can we tell for sure if it's good or bad? Does killing these birds and mammals help maintain the ecosystem balance (due to these birds and mammals not killing billions other animals down the food chain, or not spreading infections and viruses), or the other way around?
What a ridiculous gaslighting question. Asking us to prove that cats killing wildlife is a bad thing. A guy once told me that they remove the fallen logs from the Canadian forests because fallen trees are messy and ruin the forest. How do you even respond to such a stupid concept?
Not entirely, we should be worried about almost all of it but we shouldn't underestimate the reproduction rate of mice and rats that are quite successful in urban areas. If we were to remove all domestic cats we would almost immediately be overrun by hundreds of billions of them and they could quite literally end us. Mice population can double in 3 weeks. If you start with a few hundred million 30 weeks would turn into a few hundred billion and 60 weeks a few hundred trillion (2,4,8,16,32,64,128,256,512,1024) If they are currently killing 30B you might start with 15B mice rather than a few hundred million.