ARE FERAL CATS A THREAT TO BIRD POPULATIONS?

If we believed the propaganda of the American Bird Conservancy (ABC), feral and free roaming cats are menaces that kill hundreds of millions of birds each year in the U.S. What ABC fails to mention is the following:

1.  ABC’s population estimate is a guess.

2.  The studies quoted are either unpublished, not peer reviewed, misquoted per the authors, have taken place in another continent with a completely different ecosystem, or are extrapolated from small non-scientific observational studies

3.  Birds face many other threats in their struggle to survive in a hostile world.

Here are some statistics gathered from Business Week, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, ABC and Orange County, Florida's internal publication about the real threat to birds in the U.S.

" Window panes: 97 million to 976 million birds killed each year
" Power lines: 174 million birds killed each year
" Vehicles: 60 to 80 million birds killed each year
" Pesticides: 72 million birds killed each year
" Oil field waste pits: 2 million birds killed each year
" Windmills: 30,000 birds killed each year
" Communication towers: 4 to 50 million birds killed each year
" Fisheries: hundreds of thousands of seabirds killed each year
 
These are the documented figures. Missing from the above statistics are the numbers of birds that are killed by hunters with the support and sanction of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, state game agencies and the U.S. Department of the Interior. Those numbers are easily in the tens of millions.

 Consider also how many birds may have been killed by "natural" predators, how many of those "natural" predators may have been killed by both hunters and game department policies, leaving a vacuum or niche that feral and free roaming cats are filling, or how many birds have died or been killed due to habitat destruction for development, farming or because they are considered pests. And consider that tens of thousands of birds are killed every time there is an oil spill.

It is clear that even the high-end estimates of the number of birds killed by feral and free-roaming cats represent a small percentage of birds killed by all means. This is just another indication of the need for scientific study of the effects of cats on bird populations before any action is taken against feral and free roaming cats. As taxpayers, we need to ask Florida and U.S. Fish and Wildlife what they are doing to combat the real and documented threats to native bird species.

The bottom line is this: traditional trap and kill DOES NOT REDUCE THE FERAL CAT POPULATION.  Trap/Neuter/Return does. And at a much lower cost to the taxpayer.

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