Next Doors Cat

[snakey1]

Oh and before the pissee pussy huggers start I was kidding.

I wasn't .

[kleinboet]

From what I am reading on this thread, cats should be exterminated on site - the are responsible for the decline in bird life and any other urban creature. Never mind about the Magpies, the Crows, kids with pellet guns etc. Also I must have some pretty far out cats that DON'T hunt!!

And before anyone says it, they sleep INDOORS at night!!

[Guest Rabbit]

Thanks for all the advice guys, I wont go as far as poisioning it just yet, although the missus might as he's taken over one of her large pots as a latrine. I agree with the fact that cats may be resonsible for the demise of some of our wild life and especially songbirds, which doesn't do them any favours. Actually I like all animals, and to see a disembowled anything on the lawn makes me feel pretty angry, and yet for the cat its a gift to the owner, just to say hey there's more where that came from...enjoy. I think Kleinboets right in that some cats dont hunt, they are the real clever ones, why bother got a human to provide everything for me!!

 

One of my customers neighbour has a white Boxer called Milly, havn't seen her for about six months, untill today, she went beserk, I had a whiskery face wash, with paws on each shoulder.... Luvverly

Edited April 13, 2007 by Rabbit

[medwaygreen]

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. This may be surprising, but many millions of birds die naturally every year, mainly through starvation, disease, or other forms of predation. There is evidence that cats tend to take weak or sickly birds.

We also know that of the millions of baby birds hatched each year, most will die before they reach breeding age. This is also quite natural, and each pair needs only to rear two young that survive to breeding age to replace themselves and maintain the population.

 

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. If their predation was additional to these other causes of mortality, this might have a serious impact on bird populations.

 

Those bird species that have undergone the most serious population declines in the UK (such as skylarks, tree sparrows and corn buntings) rarely encounter cats, so cats cannot be causing their declines. Research shows that these declines are usually caused by habitat change or loss, particularly on farmland

 

 

Paragraphs taken from the RSPB web site.

Edited April 13, 2007 by medwaygreen

[peter mccue]

I have a garden full of songbirds, Woodies, Doves, & the occasional raptor dines off the bird table as well!

 

What I also have is a Cat & to be honest I didn't really want one but got landed with it, he's turned out to be so useful I can't imagine our house without one. What a lot of people don't realise is they're quite easily trained plus if you get their bits chopped off or tubes tied (whatever it is they do with tabbies) they don't wander very much & often stay within their own small garden area.

 

When ours was a kitten he got a whupping with a rolled up newspaper whenever he went anywhere near my beloved pond & its fish, he learned quickly & has never bothered with the pond since, by the way he's now 9 yrs old. The same applied to the bird table with the same result. He does get the odd bird, it would be daft to say otherwise, but he only gets the real young 'uns & the knackered old ones. Mice & everything else was fair game for him & he does the job well, he also loves spiders which keeps him in really good stead with the women in my family!.

 

He allows no other cat (or dog) into the garden, he is mental on that score, it really is a case of no dog to big I have a sneaking feeling he may come unstuck one day!. So if you leave a cat to his own devices he's a seriously uncontrolled killing machine, but you can train them every bit as easy as a dog & save the bird population to boot.

[Soozy U]

Ours is a rescue cat and he hasn't got a clue when it comes to birds; he likes to sit and watch them and thats about it.

He has brought a couple of mice in but does not know what to do with them........... I do I scream for Tony to get them out of the house

Edited April 14, 2007 by Soozy U

[Si...]

Contrary to some of the postings here, cats - IF FED PROPERLY - do not go hunting for birds!

The instinct to hunt only kicks in when an animal is hungry. I have two cats, one old Male who is now 20 years old, and another (female) who is 6. Neither of them have ever had to go hungry as there is ALWAYS food (wet and dry) and plenty of water available to them. I have never seen either of my cats show the slightest interest in hunting! I have seen my 6 year old watch a mouse (shrew?) run across the garden and not even bother to get up and investigate!

 

 

Now I have to disagree with you there.

 

I have had 4 cats (not all at the same time) and there was ALWAYS wet & dry food, and always plenty of water available. All except one of my cats (which had a dodgy back leg) have killed birds, mice, rats etc...

No matter how much you feed your cat(s) they will always have the natural instinct to hunt. No two ways about it. My cats never ate their prey, they always played with it then leaving it alone.

 

Just because you`ve not seen them hunting/stalking, doesn`t mean that they don't do it.

[kleinboet]

Si - The old cat is 20 and I have had him since he was two weeks old (his mum was run over and killed) He spends his days (and nights!) sleeping on the Bed. He goes out to MY garden, does his business, buries it, and then meows like h*ll to get back in! I watched our 6 year old scream out of the house and shin up a tree when a Magpie (just about the only breed of bird left on our estate) flew into it. He went up, looked totally confused, and came down again.

So much for my "killer" cats!

[Guest tigger]

Best type of cat is a dead one

hate the things

 

a certain motoring liquid and milk will sort them out

 

 

Spot on !

[n4lly]

http://www.trapping.com.au/Duke.htm

 

Should work on crouch sniffing short assed dogs too