Thursday, October 26, 2006

WHEN CATS RUN WILD



Lee had yelled a “word” about
the hairball on the rug,
so the cats were in the cattery
feeling very snug.

“I say – that’s one big cat down there,”
said a reverential Spike.
“Oh, let me look!” Fiona cried
and then she hollered, “YIKE!”

“That’s not a pussy-cat,”
said Tibbs with wisdom rare,
That is a wild bobcat –
I’m glad that we’re in here!”

It’s true. For the first time in the 15 years we have lived here, wild bobcats have shown up in the back yard and around the neighborhood. We can only assume that they are following dinner – that is, the wild turkeys that turned up recently. (See my previous entry on the turkeys.)
Bobcats can grow to about 36 inches in length and weigh in around 30 pounds. Not huge, but pretty big by housecat standards. Their prey can range from insects, frogs, and rodents to mid-sized animals such as rabbits, hares, and yes – housecats! They have been known to kill deer, usually when they are bedded down.

The danger of wild animals and street traffic is one reason that our cats are housebound. The cattery gives them 24-7 access to the second-story deck where, as you can see, they have several levels of viewing and resting platforms, catwalks, a natural branch to climb and scratch on, as well as litter boxes, cat beds, and fresh water. They have access through a cat flap cut into a piece of Plexiglas and inserted into one of the windows.

The other half of the protection angle is the birds. We have many hanging feeders and a wide range of wild birds, and we prefer not to make them cat food. The hummingbirds that hover inside the cattery from time to time are at their own risk.

Only once has a bird been caught around here. One day there was a flash of movement through the house and then a black-and-white flash through the living room and down the stairs as Spike went after whatever it was, followed by a horrified shriek from my mother who was at the bottom of the steps.

I dashed down the stairs and found Spike huddled at the bottom, a small brown bird clasped in his paws. The bird looked totally pissed off and Spike looked utterly pleased but puzzled. “What do I do with it now that I caught it?” he seemed to ask.

I eased the wee creature from between his paws and examined it. There was no damage and a quick identification explained the event – it was a Chimney Swift that had apparently entered the house through the upstairs fireplace. Spike followed as I carried it back upstairs and turned it loose from the deck, a kind of dejected expression on his face at seeing me throw away this exciting new toy.

Perhaps the event of the bobcat will convince some of my neighbors to keep their cats inside. Although some of them profess to love the birds also, they are aware that their cats prey on our songbirds. This is an ecological disaster. Here are a few facts that I gleaned from the Internet, from reliable scientific studies:

In 1987, Peter Churcher and John Lawton asked the owners of cats in a Bedforshire, England, village to keep any 'gifts' brought to them by their cats; owners of 78 house cats participated (all but 1 cat owner in the village), with the researchers extrapolating from these findings to estimate that the 5 million house cats in England were responsible for killing approximately 70 million animals each year, 20 million of which are birds. [PB Churcher and JH Lawton, 1987, "Predation by domestic cats in an English (UK) village. Journal of Zoology. (London.) 212:439-455.]

A four-year study in rural Wisconsin by Coleman and Temple confirmed the UK findings; 30 cats, radio-collared for various periods of time, led researchers to conclude that, in Wisconsin alone, cats may kill 19 million songbirds and some 140,000 game birds in a single year. [JC Mitchell, 1992. "Free-ranging domestic cat predation on native vertebrates in rural and urban Virginia." Virginia Journal of Science, Vol 43 (1B):107-207.]

Richard Stallcup of the Point Reyes Bird Observatory estimated that of the 55 million domestic cats in the US, excluding Hawaii and Alaska, some 10% never go outside, and another 10% are too old or slow to catch anything. Of the remaining 44 million, a conservative estimate is that 1 in 10 cats kills a bird a day - this would yield a daily toll of 4.4 million birds - or 1.6 billion cat-killed birds in the US each year. ["Cats take a heavy toll on songbirds / A reversible catastrophe," Observer, Spring/Summer 1991, 18-29, Point Reyes Bird Observatory; Native Species Network, Vol 1 Issue 1, Fall 1995.]


Hercules the Liger


Of course, there are much larger wild cats, even around here. We have evidence of cougars in the woods from time, and one was spotted on the street a few blocks from our house several years ago. Now, that would be a site to give a kitty pause. Although for a really big cat, you have to look for a liger! (Don’t show this to Spike – he would faint for sure.)

2 comments:

sighthound enthusiast said...

This is very interesting Lee, and I agree entirely that domestic cats are a menace to small critters everywhere. Of course, we potentially have something of the same problem with Fred our sighthound, but this problem is easily solved by muzzling him when he's out. Though he has been known to jump our fence as you know. And it won't protect the dozy black and white cat I've seen wander through our garden a couple of times... :-0

Maybe there is a way of muzzling cats/removing their claws or something, which would give them their freedom, but prevent them from killing?? I don't know much about cats, or whether anything like this has ever been tried, or whether it is practical.

Fred's muzzle doesn't bother him in the slightest incidently.

Bird Advocate said...

Thank you for being a responsible owner and keeping your cats indoors. It's where they belong.