Study: Cats wiping out backyard wildlife
Reptiles are easy prey. (Photo by Amy E. Ford)
Cats can be cuddly, but America’s second most favorite family pet is also an accomplished killer.
Researchers at The University of Georgia have concluded domesticated cats are wiping out neighborhood wildlife.
USA Today sums it up as mundanely as possible: “That mouse carcass Kitty presents you with is just the tip of a very bloody iceberg. When researchers attached kittycams to house cats, they found a secret world of slaughter.” [Video of the carnage]
While icebergs are largely homogeneous in structure, the wildlife gnawed upon by Fluffy is quite diverse.
Mammals’ eternal foe, the reptiles (and their slimy cousins, the amphibians), take the brunt of the feline assault — lizards, snakes and frogs made up 41% of the animals killed by the 60 Athens-area cats equipped with collar cameras.
Cute creatures, such as chipmunks and voles, made up 25% of the tiny corpses; insects and worms 20%; birds 12%.
I’d have thought birds, as tasty as they are, would have been killed more often, but, from a predator’s standpoint they have the annoying ability of flight.
Nevertheless, birding enthusiasts are upset at the nation’s 74 million cats.
“Cat predation is one of the reasons why one in three American birds species are in decline,” said George Fenwick, president of American Bird Conservancy.
Cat lovers are equally upset at the UGA report, which has been called “heavy on errors, misrepresentations, and glaring omissions, and light on defensible claims.”
Here’s some more details from the complete UGA study that will make you think twice about kissing Fluffy:
- About 30% of roaming house cats kill prey — an average of two animals per week
- Cats brought home just under a quarter of what they killed, ate 30% and left 49% at the scene of the crime
- Roaming cats are a lot like roaming people — males were more likely to take risks than females and older cats were more careful than younger ones.
- Favorite risky behaviors include crossing roadways (45%), eating and drinking things they found (25%), exploring storm drains (20%) and entering crawl spaces (20%)
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114 comments Add your comment
EDinATLANTA
August 7th, 2012
5:39 pm
A primary reason I have a cat is to keep the squirrels, voles, salamanders, snakes, field mice, lizards, etc. away from the house. That’s one of the reasons they were domesticated in the first place. What an absurd study.
Barbara
August 7th, 2012
5:48 pm
Schmitty, .. “what use are cats ?”.. wait until the plaque comes to your neighborhood. … p.s. left to their own lives, cats “are” wildlife not separate from it and with the expansion of the coyotes’ territorities I’d worry about both the wild ferral cat and other wildlife.
Der Fuhrer
August 7th, 2012
6:08 pm
People carry parasites and reproduce irresponsibly.
Leave Kitty alone.
Mitch Kumstein
August 7th, 2012
6:09 pm
My cat, let’s call her “Lucy”, is a stone cold killer of the highest order. She is also very sweet and loves playing with my dogs.
I am also a former Marine who will snap the neck of anyone trying to hurt her. She is only doing what she was designed to do.
RGB
August 7th, 2012
6:56 pm
This report was from academicians who possess a shared mindset who also brought us:
1. Alarmism about man-made global warming.
2. The promise of economic growth through government spending.
3. The idea that government-run health care would reduce costs and expand access.
These eggheads need to get a life.
It’s ashamed that taxpayer dollars had to be used to finance such a study.
Expressed differently–and given the existence of marginal economics–some family lost their home due to excessive taxation because idiots at UGA wanted to “prove” that cats kill birds.
Makes be doubly glad I voted against T-SPLOST.
RGB
August 7th, 2012
6:57 pm
P.S. Snap their necks, Mitch, snap their necks.
Cats Rule!!
Peter J. Wolf
August 7th, 2012
9:00 pm
It’s disappointing to see so many news outlets swallowing in one in one gulp a press release plagued with errors, misrepresentations, and glaring omissions.
The American Bird Conservancy and The Wildlife Society claim, for example, that “bird kills constituted about 13 percent of the total wildlife kills.” Thirteen percent of HOW MANY? As the Athens Banner-Herald reported in April, “just five of the cats’ 39 successful hunts involved birds.”
That’s right: FIVE. Fifty-five cats, 2,000 hours of video—and just FIVE birds. Not so impressive when it’s put like that, is it?
And which species of birds are we talking about? Are these common? Rare? Native? Non-native? Etc. It’s curious that ABC and TWS, which claim to be concerned with the “ongoing slaughter of wildlife,” aren’t troubled by such “details.”
ABC president George Fenwick claims that “cat predation is one of the reasons why one in three American bird species are in decline.” Where’s the evidence? Certainly not in the KittyCam study!
Predators—cats included—tend to prey on the young, the old, the weak and unhealthy. At least two studies have investigated this in great detail, revealing that birds killed by cats are, on average, significantly less healthy that birds killed through non-predatory events (e.g., collisions with windows or cars).
As the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds notes: “Despite the large numbers of birds killed, there is no scientific evidence that predation by cats in gardens is having any impact on bird populations UK-wide… It is likely that most of the birds killed by cats would have died anyway from other causes before the next breeding season, so cats are unlikely to have a major impact on populations.”
Nobody claiming to have even the slightest regard for science would extrapolate from five birds killed in Athens, GA, for the purposes of developing a nationwide “estimate.” The fact that Fenwick is so willing to do so—and sell it to the public—says far more about the integrity of ABC than it does about predator-prey dynamics.
The ABC/TWS press release is just the latest installment in the long-standing witch-hunt against free-roaming cats. It’s difficult not to see it as an act of desperation—no surprise, really, from organizations whose position is supported by neither the science nor public opinion.
Peter J. Wolf
http://www.VoxFelina.com
dude
August 7th, 2012
9:23 pm
Cats are by far the best pets. Anyone that would hurt a cat should have their heads examined by a psychiatrist. The cat’s not the problem, you are.
Melaine
August 7th, 2012
10:05 pm
People that get tired of their pets and dump them in the country or on a dead end street thinking that they will be okay, think again. I am tired of finding bags of kittens or puppies and calling animal control when we have stray dogs wander into our yard. We have coyotes, foxes and wild dogs that will eat your house pet. Cats are natural predators and can fend for themselves often better than the dogs but become feral and a danger to domestic pets. Hate cats if you want but be kind to unwanted pets and adopt them out.
AZ Rattler
August 7th, 2012
10:22 pm
Ya know, we really don’t worry about loose kitties here in AZ. Where I live a loose cat’s life would be measured in hours as the desert isn’t a good place for kitty. Kitty would end up as an eagle snack, coyote snack and/or bobcat/mountain lion snack.