Humans can sustain a large density of cats that wasn’t possible in the wild. If it’s a pet cat, don’t let it hunt. It will imbalance the ecosystem by adding too many predators who don’t depend on the prey for sustenance
cats have been allowed outside for over 1000 years
That’s simply not true. There were never as many outdoor cats as there is today and cats used to have natural predators everywhere to keep environmental balance which is lost today. Keeping all of your pets indoors (or at least backyard) is the only ethically viable position.
Downvoted by people who don’t like facts. There isn’t a country in the world with a domestic cat population that wouldn’t see a huge benefit to their native wildlife by keeping those pets inside or in a pet run. But people don’t like the change or the effort of doing so, so they ignore this inconvenient fact.
Indeed, pet owners simply don’t want to hear the truth which is incredibly irresponsible.
Even if you really must let your cat out there are things you can do like colorful collars with an attached bell which:
The BBScc reduced the number of birds brought home by 37% (probability of reduction of 88%). The number of mammals brought home was reduced by 54–62%, but only with the additional bell (probability of reduction of >99%)
I’ve never seen a cat owner who cares enough to even do that when we have clear evidence this works. The naturalist argument of “oh they are local animals” is such an irresponsible cop out where they can’t even bother to put a collar on to diminish the damage. It’s inexcusable laziness, nothing else.
Yeah I always found the argument absurd as I live on a paved over rectangle with a few square feet of grass my cat likes to poop on while he hangs out with the local squirrels. He is far too lazy to hunt anything, he killed a mouse that was actually inside the house many many years ago but has been a pacifist since. He is 15 he literally wants to sit in the sun and do nothing.
Of course there are some cats who will hunt, and their owners should not allow that. But the blanket statements about environmental impacts, while they cool their house with AC, burn fossil fuels to heat food and go to work, order crap on Amazon…just lacks perspective.
As a cat owner who works in the animal industry, you’re suffering from ‘my personal experience is reality-itis’.
You can’t ‘not allow’ your cat to hunt. The only chance you have is to keep it inside. Your old cat likely doesn’t hunt outside but to think it killed a single mouse it’s entire life, is delusional.
I don’t understand people like you. Can you not accept that there are shades of gray, and exceptions to every rule? I’m simply arguing that not all cats MUST be kept indoors no ifs ands or buts. I concede that many cats, young ones in particular, will kill small animals. My (rescue) cat was an indoor cat for most of his 15 years and only when I moved from a major urban city apartment building to a slightly less-urban city single family house did I let him outside under controlled circumstances. I straight up know he isn’t going around killing things. I didn’t go out and BUY this cat, I’m not actively contributing to breeding or anything. I have an animal that deserves to enjoy his old age.
I should probably not engage with you people and just keep my truth to myself.
Your particular circumstances are why YOUR particular 15 year old cat is great hanging in his own yard. It is not an argument in general even that SOME cats ought to be outdoor because they are overwhelmingly get killed and kill out there.
Your argument is so inapplicable to almost anyone else that its like saying your former ax murderer friend is totally safe because he’s taken up Buddhism and non-violence and is now mostly crippled.
Cats don’t always show you what they kill. I had a roommate that kept letting my cats out. Never saw them kill anything. Then my neighbor told me about how they were little murder machines while I was out at work. Tried taking out a whole near of baby birds.
It very well could be true. But I also don’t really think you’ve been able to watch your cat every moment of his outdoor life to know he literally never goes anywhere and has never killed anything. My cats are indoor only in a tiny apartment and I frequently can’t figure out where they are, even when I worked from home.
Those houses you both live in, how many animals were displaced to build them? How many died so your house can exist? You blame cats for the misery we as humans do to species of this planet. Sad
It’s a form of nonsense argument where instead of addressing the actual point someone points at something worse and implies that if we can’t stop insert worse thing we somehow needn’t worry about insert less worse thing. In actuality presumably they have an outdoor cat and are contributing to the problem and just want to justify it.
This is bullshit logic. We as adult humans already exist and have little choice about national housing policy. We can however choose not to contribute to suburban sprawl OR murder cats roaming the neighborhood whacking the wildlife. We can also choose not to have 12 children who will need space too. Not being able to do everything is a poor reason not to do anything.
Yes buddy I did adopt from the shelter I was volunteering at. In order to adopt you have to agree that the cat will not be allowed to roam outdoors because they don’t want to adopt to morons.
It’s hardly just cars. They have similar lifespans in areas that aren’t so car-centric.
They get parasites. They get into fights with animals in their weight class (like racoons). They get trapped by animals outside their weight class (like wolves). Tons of issues in the wild.
My uncle has a farm with a bunch of feral cats around. I learned at a young age to never get too attached to outdoor farm cats.
This is Michu, he used to live next door to me. He would be outside all the time, even in the freezing cold. Sometimes I’d hear him meowing at the neighbor’s back door to come back in, but nobody would answer. I’d hear the little guy calling out, and nobody would even be home. Sometimes I’d find him curled up on my deck chairs, so I started leaving blankets on them for cold nights. Eventually he started approaching me when I sat outside. We’d chill on the step and watch nature together.
Now, I don’t know how much his outdoors lifestyle contributed to his acquisition of a UTI (since they can occur in indoor cats as well, and search engine enshittification is making my search for hard data impossible.) However, I imagine that if Michu had been inside, his people might have noticed he wasn’t healthy.
Honestly, I’m not a vet and I’ve never had a cat, so I don’t feel qualified to tell people how to take care of theirs. This thread just reminded me of how I miss this little guy. He was around 4 years old and still had a lot of love to give. I was just lucky enough to receive some of it.
Let’s keep building houses and not talk about how that destroys countless species’ habitats.
No, let’s shit on cats for the misery WE cause.
Saying an animal can’t go outside because they are the Hitler of animals is so disingenuous and out of touch with reality.
Cats are animals and are in their element outside. Birds are not being massacred by cats. They are being massacred by humans, and you are a fool for thinking any different.
Maybe stop hating cats and start hating humans if you want to protect birds’ habitat from being destroyed.
We cause it both by building over all the habitat AND by letting cats loose. Since I have to live somewhere I won’t feel bad about existing but I’ also won’t be letting my cat out to make it worse. That said that is 99.9% because outdoor cats normally live 2-4 years and indoor cats live 10-20 years. May cat gets to go outside in a strolller/harness and otherwise gets to roam our floor of the apartment.
Bigger issue imo is cats destroying wild life not the wild life destroying cats. Either way, keep your cat inside.
So, now you’re starving coyotes?
Some of us live in countries that don’t really have dangerous wild life and cats have been allowed outside for over 1000 years.
>countries that don’t really have dangerous wildlife
>cats have been allowed outside for over 1000 years
Sounds like your country does have dangerous wildlife, you just like the predator more than the prey
Sure it used to but we killed them off centuries ago
Humans can sustain a large density of cats that wasn’t possible in the wild. If it’s a pet cat, don’t let it hunt. It will imbalance the ecosystem by adding too many predators who don’t depend on the prey for sustenance
I always love bringing out this good ol chart.
Fake news. Birds aren’t real.
so… cats are the most effective way to combat birds?
Bro someone send this chart to Australia, they can win EW2
yes :)
I might bookmark this one :)
But I am not talking about the US
Not a lick of urban sprawl in your fancy graphic. I wonder why?
Buildings, automobiles, power lines…
Which is not the same as the effects of urban sprawl destroying their habitat (however this is obviously impossible to quantify)
English isn’t your first language.
Thinking isn’t your strong suit.
Define urban sprawl.
Are you under the impression that being against urban sprawl is an unpopular opinion on Lemmy?
Im under the impression that saying that cats are the end of birds is asinine when all we do as humans is destroy habitat for all fauna.
Overly dramatic people who think their meat comes from a store are the same people who make this argument about cats.
Get over it, cats are not the genocidal maniacs you make them out to be, WE ARE.
Maybe letting cats out is one of the many ways we destroy habitat, and calling it out is valid?
Maybe start with the house that is burning down before putting out your match.
And stop calling out those who call you out on this crap.
How would you quantify that?
deleted by creator
That’s simply not true. There were never as many outdoor cats as there is today and cats used to have natural predators everywhere to keep environmental balance which is lost today. Keeping all of your pets indoors (or at least backyard) is the only ethically viable position.
Downvoted by people who don’t like facts. There isn’t a country in the world with a domestic cat population that wouldn’t see a huge benefit to their native wildlife by keeping those pets inside or in a pet run. But people don’t like the change or the effort of doing so, so they ignore this inconvenient fact.
Indeed, pet owners simply don’t want to hear the truth which is incredibly irresponsible.
Even if you really must let your cat out there are things you can do like colorful collars with an attached bell which:
https://zenodo.org/records/15210938
I’ve never seen a cat owner who cares enough to even do that when we have clear evidence this works. The naturalist argument of “oh they are local animals” is such an irresponsible cop out where they can’t even bother to put a collar on to diminish the damage. It’s inexcusable laziness, nothing else.
Strap a collar so that your cat ends up crazy or hanged surely there wont be any animal cruelty after that right guys right ??
I bring you evidence you bring me imaginary anecdotes. OK.
Do you live in a building? Like something that was built by humans?
Then you have killed more animals than any cat will ever kill. Your continued use of any kind of lodging is killing animals.
Please stop living inside a man made structure and help destroy said structure so birds can live and take back their habitats.
After you do that, I will stop letting my 15 year old cat outside.
Have a great life!
Lmao what a stupid fallacy thats not even worth responding to. Bye
It’s OK, I thought what you wrote was not worthy of my time either, but then I decided to educate actual intelligent people, so I responded.
We really are a bunch of dumb apes, and we are doomed as a species. Its just a matter of time.
Im sure there are no birds in turkey, according to your logic.
Yeah I always found the argument absurd as I live on a paved over rectangle with a few square feet of grass my cat likes to poop on while he hangs out with the local squirrels. He is far too lazy to hunt anything, he killed a mouse that was actually inside the house many many years ago but has been a pacifist since. He is 15 he literally wants to sit in the sun and do nothing.
Of course there are some cats who will hunt, and their owners should not allow that. But the blanket statements about environmental impacts, while they cool their house with AC, burn fossil fuels to heat food and go to work, order crap on Amazon…just lacks perspective.
As a cat owner who works in the animal industry, you’re suffering from ‘my personal experience is reality-itis’.
You can’t ‘not allow’ your cat to hunt. The only chance you have is to keep it inside. Your old cat likely doesn’t hunt outside but to think it killed a single mouse it’s entire life, is delusional.
I don’t understand people like you. Can you not accept that there are shades of gray, and exceptions to every rule? I’m simply arguing that not all cats MUST be kept indoors no ifs ands or buts. I concede that many cats, young ones in particular, will kill small animals. My (rescue) cat was an indoor cat for most of his 15 years and only when I moved from a major urban city apartment building to a slightly less-urban city single family house did I let him outside under controlled circumstances. I straight up know he isn’t going around killing things. I didn’t go out and BUY this cat, I’m not actively contributing to breeding or anything. I have an animal that deserves to enjoy his old age.
I should probably not engage with you people and just keep my truth to myself.
Deluded.
Your particular circumstances are why YOUR particular 15 year old cat is great hanging in his own yard. It is not an argument in general even that SOME cats ought to be outdoor because they are overwhelmingly get killed and kill out there.
Your argument is so inapplicable to almost anyone else that its like saying your former ax murderer friend is totally safe because he’s taken up Buddhism and non-violence and is now mostly crippled.
Cats don’t always show you what they kill. I had a roommate that kept letting my cats out. Never saw them kill anything. Then my neighbor told me about how they were little murder machines while I was out at work. Tried taking out a whole near of baby birds.
I have cameras, and I work from home. He literally does not leave a fenced-in rectangle. I know for a fact he doesn’t kill anything.
It very well could be true. But I also don’t really think you’ve been able to watch your cat every moment of his outdoor life to know he literally never goes anywhere and has never killed anything. My cats are indoor only in a tiny apartment and I frequently can’t figure out where they are, even when I worked from home.
Bullshit and hearsay.
Those houses you both live in, how many animals were displaced to build them? How many died so your house can exist? You blame cats for the misery we as humans do to species of this planet. Sad
I don’t remember blaming cats all man made environmental catastrophes, but whatever.
It’s a form of nonsense argument where instead of addressing the actual point someone points at something worse and implies that if we can’t stop insert worse thing we somehow needn’t worry about insert less worse thing. In actuality presumably they have an outdoor cat and are contributing to the problem and just want to justify it.
This is bullshit logic. We as adult humans already exist and have little choice about national housing policy. We can however choose not to contribute to suburban sprawl OR murder cats roaming the neighborhood whacking the wildlife. We can also choose not to have 12 children who will need space too. Not being able to do everything is a poor reason not to do anything.
Those cats already exist, you dipshit. Adopt, don’t buy. Spay/neuter. Let them have an enjoyable life and move the fuck on.
Yes buddy I did adopt from the shelter I was volunteering at. In order to adopt you have to agree that the cat will not be allowed to roam outdoors because they don’t want to adopt to morons.
Urban sprawl as well.
These cat hater can’t even get their heads out of their asses long enough to realize that humans are the biggest issue for wild animals bar none.
We destroy their habitat faster than any cat can hunt, but the cats are literally Hitler in their eyes.
They are delusional in my eyes.
A lot of those so called cat haters actually love cats. Did you know that outdoor cats have much shorter lifespans?
And you’re a fucking idiot. The cat is a tool of humans killing animals.
You are delusional in the majority of the population’s eyes.
Oh no, not the majority. Whatever will I do?
Your words are of an eloquence that would make a sow blush. Idiot indeed!
What a grasp of the English language you have; educate me more, Daddy.
Humans are dangerous wildlife not least because of our cars. That is why indoor cats live 10-20 years and outdoor cats 2-4
It’s hardly just cars. They have similar lifespans in areas that aren’t so car-centric.
They get parasites. They get into fights with animals in their weight class (like racoons). They get trapped by animals outside their weight class (like wolves). Tons of issues in the wild.
My uncle has a farm with a bunch of feral cats around. I learned at a young age to never get too attached to outdoor farm cats.
This is Michu, he used to live next door to me. He would be outside all the time, even in the freezing cold. Sometimes I’d hear him meowing at the neighbor’s back door to come back in, but nobody would answer. I’d hear the little guy calling out, and nobody would even be home. Sometimes I’d find him curled up on my deck chairs, so I started leaving blankets on them for cold nights. Eventually he started approaching me when I sat outside. We’d chill on the step and watch nature together.
But then a few months ago, he stopped coming. He stopped appearing entirely. When I talked to the neighbors, I learned that he’d contracted a UTI and had died. (Apparently it only takes a few hours for a swollen urethra to kill a male cat.)
Now, I don’t know how much his outdoors lifestyle contributed to his acquisition of a UTI (since they can occur in indoor cats as well, and search engine enshittification is making my search for hard data impossible.) However, I imagine that if Michu had been inside, his people might have noticed he wasn’t healthy.
Honestly, I’m not a vet and I’ve never had a cat, so I don’t feel qualified to tell people how to take care of theirs. This thread just reminded me of how I miss this little guy. He was around 4 years old and still had a lot of love to give. I was just lucky enough to receive some of it.
RIP, Michu ❤️
Where you live perhaps, I don’t know anyone that has had an issue here. As I said, some of us live in different countries.
But sure if you live next to a typical American 16 lane backroad you might not want to let them out.
tbf, in most urban/sub urban areas, it’s too late already.
Its not, nature can recover very quickly given the right respect
Let’s keep building houses and not talk about how that destroys countless species’ habitats.
No, let’s shit on cats for the misery WE cause.
Saying an animal can’t go outside because they are the Hitler of animals is so disingenuous and out of touch with reality.
Cats are animals and are in their element outside. Birds are not being massacred by cats. They are being massacred by humans, and you are a fool for thinking any different.
Maybe stop hating cats and start hating humans if you want to protect birds’ habitat from being destroyed.
Hypocrites, the lot of you.
This lot is impossible to reason with, but I applaud your effort.
Google is right there, dipshit
Insult me more, and i will change my mind, Daddy.
Tell this to fucking New Zealand.
Tell it to Turkey!
We cause it both by building over all the habitat AND by letting cats loose. Since I have to live somewhere I won’t feel bad about existing but I’ also won’t be letting my cat out to make it worse. That said that is 99.9% because outdoor cats normally live 2-4 years and indoor cats live 10-20 years. May cat gets to go outside in a strolller/harness and otherwise gets to roam our floor of the apartment.