my sister’s cat ended up chilling in the walls of our basement, and my brothers kitten discovered a hole she could fit thru between the kitchen counters. they are sneaky
Actually managed that once. Basement was half finished by the previous owners but left a hole for the well window. The result was a gap between the window and the drywall. Cat wanted to look out the window and ended up falling onto the insulation. He cried for a while until we figured out where he was, and when we grabbed a ladder to mount a rescue he hauled his own happy ass out unassisted. Same cat also managed to find a way ABOVE the ceiling of a basement closet.
Nope. And the RSPB doesn’t believe cats are a concern:
The UK’s largest bird charity, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB), is not particularly concerned about the impact of cats on the British mainland.
Cats have also been around in the UK significantly longer than many other places. Here in Hawaii they’re a plague on native species that had no such predators before.
That’s a big part of the difference. Cats in the old world are probably fine since everything there has evolved alongside them. But the native species in the Americas haven’t had housecats to worry about until relatively recently in evolutionary terms.
I’m a outdoor cat person but in fairness one issue to consider is that while cats are natural in Europe, their current numbers and general location are something that’s pretty unnatural. I definitely err on the side of not being concerned about it, but I do think it’s something to consider as people have more pets.
Personally I have one cat that has brought in a single frog, and another that exclusively brings in recycling.
Since 2017, the Cat Classification Task Force of the Cat Specialist Group recognizes Felis silvestris silvestris as the valid scientific name for all European wildcat populations, arguing that it is doubtful that the Scottish wildcat is sufficiently distinct to accord it separate subspecific status.
It’s just a plain old cat, it’s not going extinct.
Yeah the British really do have a history of royally fucking over whole eco systems. Brought rabbits to Australia thinking they would be a good food source.
Except they bred like well rabbits. And destroyed whole eco systems. So the British imported foxes to eat the rabbits. Except literally every other native species is easier for a fox to kill than a fast rabbit.
That’s a bit of a harsh take considering it was one guy on the 19th century who didn’t know better. Looking at it he brought 13 rabbits for his private estate - I don’t think the science was there for extended Environmental Impact Studies back then - just some rich guy making a minor change to his place having unintended consequences so branding an entire country as fucking morons is a bit much.
Awesome, glad that’s settled, just a minor blip on what would be Australia’s impeccable record of care for both indigenous creatures, and indigenous people.
My neighbour at the time was a lovely rough diamond type with a big knife scar down his face. He said he had an idea who it might have been and was going to have words.
I’m not so sure both about Americans having their cats indoors, and “others” having it the opposite way. I have never been to the UK or the US, but most owners I had seen kept their cats indoors. Except for Georgia (the country), where cats seem to be treated as some sort of weed that grows on it’s own
There are a lot of strays around at first sight, but then I found out that at least about a third of them have owner/owners because they sometimes stick to several places. A lot of people also care for the strays and check them for issues not taking 'em home, some initiatives are doing neutering and finding homes for treated cats.
I heard it’s somewhat similar in Türkiye, everyone loves cats but mostly don’t want to care about them above feeding them when met. Don’t know if outdoor cats are popular there, though
With a name like Kusimulkku I should have guessed. I wouldn’t call you American but you are one of the weirdest countries in Europe. A language designed to confuse with an obsessive dedication to double-consanants. I assume your cats are as unsociable as your people. https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/051a8dd9-2533-415d-8b82-a026eef67a5e.webp
30% of bird deaths is still a lot of bird deaths. I would much prefer if cats were only responsible for 40 small animal extinctions rather than the 60 or so that they’ve caused so far
Not how cats work. Nice job getting butthurt about a funny comic on the internet, though.
And just so you can be better informed in the future. Feral cats are the ones affecting the ecosystem. Outdoor house cats have a negligible influence on wildlife. Let your cat go outside sometimes.
And, just a guess, you should probably go outside sometimes too.
"The magnitude of mortality they cause in mainland areas remains speculative, with large-scale estimates based on non-systematic analyses and little consideration of scientific data. Here we conduct a systematic review and quantitatively estimate mortality caused by cats in the United States. We estimate that free-ranging domestic cats kill 1.3–4.0 billion birds and 6.3–22.3 billion mammals annually. Un-owned cats, as opposed to owned pets, cause the majority of this mortality."
Downvoting doesn’t make you right and it doesn’t make your cats less miserable.
"The magnitude of mortality they cause in mainland areas remains speculative, with large-scale estimates based on non-systematic analyses and little consideration of scientific data. Here we conduct a systematic review and quantitatively estimate mortality caused by cats in the United States. We estimate that free-ranging domestic cats kill 1.3–4.0 billion birds and 6.3–22.3 billion mammals annually. Un-owned cats, as opposed to owned pets, cause the majority of this mortality."
Loss, S., Will, T. & Marra, P. The impact of free-ranging domestic cats on wildlife of the United States. Nat Commun 4, 1396 (2013). doi.org/10.1038/ncomms2380
There. Do I have to do all you peoples’ thinking for you?
If you want anyone to take your argument seriously, then you do the opposite of thinking for others - you provide your sources so your audience can review and then think for themselves based on the data. Otherwise you’re just expecting people to take your word for it, which means you would be doing all of the thinking for the people who don’t question which, based on your comment, is not what you want.
If you quote an authority source you are obligated to cite it. It is not other’s job to backwards full-text-search a quote to determine who your were referencing. Pretty common academia stuff, but as you said you’re an ecologist and for sure know that, so you must have omitted it purposefully
This study is about the immense magnitude of cat predation, and your takeaway is that we shouldn’t limit owned cat predation simply because un-owned cat predation is higher…
We estimate that cats in the contiguous United States annually kill between 1.3 and 4.0 billion birds (median=2.4 billion) (Fig. 1a), with ∼69% of this mortality caused by un-owned cats. The predation estimate for un-owned cats was higher primarily due to predation rates by this group averaging three times greater than rates for owned cats.
This study estimates that annual bird deaths by owned cat predation in the US is around a 750 million median figure, and you’re just fine with that?
It kind of sounds like this is part of a paper that is detailing seemingly large amounts of predation from cats of which the majority is attributable to un-owned cats which I gather you reckon means “outdoor” owned cats aren’t a big threat to wildlife populations since they aren’t responsible for the greatest amount of the total predation from cats overall.
But, without the context, the numbers cited sound instinctively like ‘big’ numbers so if the total magnitude of predation from cats is large and “owned” cats are responsible only for a fraction of it, their contribution could well be substantial nonetheless. Not knowing the scope or the details of the quoted paper it’s unclear if it goes in to what the estimated proportion is other than not the majority and its unclear how much predation can be tolerated by the populations upon which cats, both owned and unowned, prey.
For example maybe owned cats are responsible for 40% of the total predation by cats on local wildlife in an area with the remaining 60% being attributable to un-owned cats. This would make un-owned cats majority responsible for the predation yet you could reduce the total predation by 40% if owned cats were all kept indoors in that hypothetical. The actual numbers are likely different and could well be much more slanted between owned vs un-owned cats’ share of predation but if the estimates for the sustainable amount of predation certain populations can withstand are below the current total amount of predation then removing even a smaller fraction might be the difference between endangerment and extinction.
"The magnitude of mortality they cause in mainland areas remains speculative, with large-scale estimates based on non-systematic analyses and little consideration of scientific data. Here we conduct a systematic review and quantitatively estimate mortality caused by cats in the United States. We estimate that free-ranging domestic cats kill 1.3–4.0 billion birds and 6.3–22.3 billion mammals annually. Un-owned cats, as opposed to owned pets, cause the majority of this mortality."
Maybe don’t believe every sensationalized social media article that’s really just a barely disguised cat litter ad.
Im a professional ecologist. I have to listen to one of my colleagues rant about this topic on a nearly weekly basis, because its the focus of her grant work.
There are multiple groups of actual researchers in nearly every institute of biological study on the planet dedicated to spreading local awareness about wild cats.
There are multiple websites entirely dedicated to trying to inform people that the small apex predator from a far off desert doesnt actually belong wandering the wilds of your neighborhood.
There are a few actual native species of wild felines currently threatened due to feral domestic cats, that are having trouble becoming stable again because of folk like you.
The kind of person who doesnt really grok that owned cats are where feral cats come from, because your cat is fucking left and right in the bushes.
The kind of person who thinks their cat can win a fight with a car, or coyote, or wolf, or fox, or badger, or weasel, or any other predator in the wild that youre gleefully feeding it to.
The kind of person who is to blame for multiple feline diseases spreading and festering in local populations because you let your cat go pick them up from the source and spread them about willy nilly.
The kind of person who failed to pay attention in grade school science.
But please. Go on, tell me how the majority of science is a pop article about cat litter, flunkie.
If you’re a professional ecologist, then you should know full well that even if a cat is perfectly sedentary and kills nothing, and is neutered, they can still get and spread diseases, they can still get run over, and they can still be attacked and killed by other outdoor animals
I mean… I know Im not lying, and my comments are repeating the current standard. So either you retired 4 decades ago, or youre about as successful an ecologist as you are a conversationalist.
Letting your cat outdoors means its interacting with wild populations. That makes it succeptable to the same problems. An ecologist would know this.
A responsible pet owner doesnt let their pets roam outdoors, so thats a confirmed lie. But at least its not breeding, yes.
Wildcats are often refered to as apex predators in their native environments, because they dont live near all those predators. But piddling over the exact definition of apex doesnt really stop your cat becoming a coyote meal.
This basic concept is a grade school science lesson. If you dont know algebra, why would I assume you took calculus classes?
Some of us, sure. I dont think youre part of that collective group though.
For starters, Ive never met an ecologist who wants to feed their pets to the local wildlife, or who completely ignores the massive issue of feline disease spreading.
E: I just noticed your edit, on apex predation. Do you genuinely think that cats cannot be an ecological threat to small mammal, reptile, and amphibian populations just because they can be eaten by larger locals? By that logic, you are counting on your pet getting eaten. Thats… Thats insanely fucked up.
By that logic, you are counting on your pet getting eaten. Thats… Thats insanely fucked up.
And something an actual ecologist would have thought of, as you are essentially considering your pet cat as part of the food web, a high school level ecological concept.
You cited a decade old research paper with funding conflicts.
But my awareness of cat risk makes me not an ecologist?
Lol, ok. Your cat is likely riddled with parasites and other diseases, and might vanish one night in a smear of red alongside the road to die a slow, painful, lonely death.
But you keep spreading your lies. Im sure the slow, painful, lonely deaths of other peopled beloved pets makes it worth it to you.
Ill be completely honest, I am well aware this guy will change nothing. I feel horrid for their cat, who will certainly die young and die violently. But this isnt about facts, its about feeling right about past actions. And they dont want to face that previous pets probably died because of them.
But my comments serve as signposts for passersby, who will hopefully actually care about their pet and their local ecosystem, and do the right thing.
Lowkey sucks to deal with a whiney cat who is used to going outside, I get it, but you can harness train cats. Or build a catio.
Im not going to do anything different than you would. Open google scholar, put in various searches about outdoor cats, and read the newer articles.
Im not going to badger any of my real world friends about sources for a dumbass internet argument, and my memorized sources are all about my actual work, which is specialized in botanical study specifically.
Or reach out to your local university. Im sure there are a few local researchers who are plenty passionate about this and are invested in giving you specific local examples.
If being told that a random knock off reddit forum is not a high enough priority for me to go google things for you that you are fully capable of googling yourself, translates in your head into “theres no data at all” then you didnt want facts in the first place.
No one memorizes all studies ever written anywhere about anything. I specialize in botanical science. Cats? Not plants. So I dont have those studies titles and authors memorized.
To go find them, I would do what every other researher or grad student would do. Use google scholar. Which is very easy to use, and you can do it just fine yourself.
If you actually cared about the data, you can easily and quickly find it. But, you dont, so you wont.
If you don’t think outdoor cats, not just feral cats, are destroying the ecosystem, then you’re not only an ignorant ecologist, but a fucking dangerous one. God only knows what other goody-ass looney tunes theories you have. Not only are you misinformed, but you go so far as to defend and spread that misinformation. Jfc.
All the ones I’ve been in it’s just a bunch of us fat dudes crowded around watching another fat dude say “extra most bestest” to some pimply teenager that hates his life.
I think the joke is that nobody ever actually enters LC. They just order from there. So there would be no way of knowing if it was actually secretly an entrance to the backrooms
This could have been an episode of Reply All, from their “Yes, yes, no” segment. It would go down the Backrooms rabbit hole and back up reminiscing about cheap Little Caesar’s.
But now that you mentioned it, what is their back room? Do they even have a kitchen?
Or do they all just go to the Little Caesars Dimension and through the Pizza Portal and fetch us some Hot-and-Readys by negotiating with the outer gods?
The door to the back is a portal to the elemental plane of pizza. Employees dip into the back to slay a pizza elemental and harvest its crust whenever they run out of dipping sticks.
Hey um I’m sorry but I’ve been seeing you here for months and I just have to know: is there a story/meaning behind your username choice?? If so please please tell me the lore. I want to know. I need to know.
They partnered with DoorDash a few years ago, and its one of those one driver=multiple stops things. Which means your pizza is usually cold by the time it gets to you.
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