A new book examining the complicated
issue of cats and wildlife has re-opened a difficult discussion that has long
pitted animal welfare organizations against biologists, birdwatchers and the
environmental community. And the position taken by authors Peter Marra and
Chris Santella is doing little to make that discussion any easier.
You can tell by its title, Cat Wars: The Devastating Consequences of a
Cuddly Killer, that the authors don’t pulling any punches. Marra, who
directs the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center, and Santella, a journalist,
argue that drastic action is necessary to curb the massacre of birds and small
mammals caused by feral cats and housecats that are allowed to go outside.
After reviewing thousands of
reports, pet-owner surveys, cat regurgitation studies, academic research and
other data, they calculated what they say is a conservative estimate – cats
kill up to 22 billion small mammals, 4 billion birds, 822 million reptiles and
299 million amphibians in the United States each year.
“More birds and mammals die at the
mouths of cats than from wind turbines, automobile strikes, pesticides and
poisons, collisions with skyscrapers and windows, and other so-called direct
anthropogenic causes combined,” they write.
What’s more, the authors say that
feral cats are also a hazard to human health. Feral cat colonies where humans
provide food attract raccoons, skunks, foxes and coyotes, too, easing the spread
of rabies. Cats also carry a variety of diseases that can be transmitted to
humans, from a bacterium that causes a life-threatening infection in cat scratches
and bites to a parasite that can cause birth defects when pregnant women are
exposed to cat feces.
The authors call feral cats an
invasive species and say the only answer to solving the problem is what is
euphemistically called “trap and remove,” which means capturing the animals and
euthanizing them.
“No one likes the idea of killing
cats,” they write. “But sometimes, it is necessary.”
It is unclear how many feral cats
live in Rhode Island, but all the interested parties agree it’s too many.
Estimates range as high as 250,000, though state veterinarian Scott Marshall
says it’s probably closer to “tens of thousands.”
He
established a Feral Cat Working Group in 2010 after receiving innumerable
complaints about the animals. The group, which includes members from animal
welfare groups, academia, environmental organizations, and public health
agencies, hired a student from the Tufts University School of Veterinary
Medicine to census known feral cat colonies in the state. She found 302 colonies,
mostly in urban areas, with a total of about 4,000 cats.
It
is believed there are many more colonies than those she surveyed, plus thousands
of uncounted cats that are not part of established colonies and an estimated
60,000 housecats whose owners let them go outside.
“Cats
are a serious problem for wildlife,” said Marshall. “Their hunting instinct
isn’t diminished by feeding them. A pet cat that is fed at home still brings
birds and rodents home. We can’t deny that they’re having an impact on wild
birds, rodents and to a lesser extent reptiles. They kill whatever they can
get.”
According
to Marshall, feral cats live very short lives. Their life expectancy is less
than two years. Half don’t make it out of kittenhood, 75 percent don’t survive
one year, and 85 percent die before their second birthday.
“People
don’t realize that when animals are dying young in large numbers, they have a
miserable life and a miserable death,” he said. “They’re struck by cars,
exposed to parasitism, die of exposure, get ripped to shreds by predators. They
don’t live good lives.”
He
agrees with the authors of Cat Wars
that, unfortunately, the best solution is euthanasia.
“Given
the tools we have, that’s the only way to solve it,” Marshall said. “If a male
contraceptive were available, that could be effective, but right now nothing
else works.”
Most
of the animal welfare groups in Rhode Island disagree. Vehemently.
They
argue instead for a method called “trap, neuter and return,” or TNR, in which
feral cats are captured at colonies, brought to clinics to be spayed or
neutered, and returned to their colony. Advocates say it is the most humane alternative
to euthanizing the animals, and because the cats can no longer reproduce, the
colonies will eventually disappear.
Gil
Fletcher, a member of the Feral Cat Working Group who runs a cat rescue
organization called PawsWatch, acknowledges that not all of the animal welfare
groups agree with the “return” component of TNR, and because there are numerous
small grassroots groups advocating for feral cats, there is considerable
tension among them. But, he wrote in an email, “it goes without
saying that any form of large scale lethal approach to reducing the
free-roaming cat population (trap and euthanize, hunting, targeted poisoning,
etc.) is an anathema to this group.”
Fletcher is pushing for municipal governments to
adopt the TNR approach, because the feral cat problem is one he equates with
other community concerns addressed with taxpayer funds, like anti-littering
campaigns and roadside beautification efforts.
While he barely mentions the impact of cats on
wildlife – other than to disagree with the cat predation numbers Marra and
Santella claim – he says that “the cat people” and “the wildlife people,” as he
calls them, all seek to remove free roaming cats from the outdoor environment.
Their “interest, motivation and their presently-favored means are poles apart,
but the end goal is the same,” he said. “By all logic, they should be natural
allies.”
Part
of the reason they aren’t, according to Marshall and the scientific community,
is that there is no evidence that TNR works. In practice, feral cat colonies
managed with TNR don’t get smaller and disappear. Instead, the populations
remain mostly the same and the animals continue to kill wildlife. To be
successful, at least 80 percent of the cats in a colony must be spayed or neutered,
and the colonies must be constantly monitored as new animals arrive.
“TNR
seems to be the panacea that animal welfare groups endorse, but there’s
virtually no evidence that it’s effective,” Marshall said. “Everybody wants it
to be effective, but it’s very labor intensive, expensive, and ultimately it’s
ineffective. Unless people can shut down new inputs into the colonies, it’s
doomed to fail.”
The
one thing Marshall and Fletcher agree on is that it will be nearly impossible
to address the issue of feral cats in Rhode Island without public support for
whatever strategy is chosen. And they say that the public won’t support a
widespread euthanasia effort.
“The science would say that cats should be
removed from the environment, but emotions run very high and there is no public
support for removal,” he said. “I personally don’t like the idea of tolerating
their existence, because in my opinion the lives and deaths they experience are
far less humane than trapping and removing them.”
The authors of Cat Wars, however, are less concerned with the sad lives of feral
cats and more concerned for the welfare of wildlife and the environment. They
say that of all the threats to birds that are directly or indirectly caused by
humans, cats are the easiest problem to fix, especially when compared to
complex issues like climate change.
“To me, this should be the low-hanging fruit,”
said Marra in Smithsonian Magazine.
“but as it turns out, it might be easier stopping climate change than stopping
cats.”
This article first appeared in EcoRI.org on November 22, 2016.
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