Post by Ginger-lyn SummerPost by ShezI think most of us Ginger would prefer a better solution, but their
isn't one, Feral cats are a problem in many countries, In countries
where they should never have been introduced they have decimated the
local wildlife, affecting an ecological balance that has taken millions
of years to bring about... I don't want to shoot any animal, but if the
choice is between a whole ecology and feral cats then you have to be
sensible. You have to see the whole picture, not just the bits you want
to see, I suggest you do some web searches on feral cats in Australia
and the damage they are doing to the wild life, Don't forget Australia
has a very unique ecology Marsupials are nowhere else in the world in
such abundance... they can not be replaced from another gene pool, or
bred from captive animals from other countries, Once they are gone they
are gone.
I love cats, I have had cats for most of my life, But I can not and will
not put feral cats before the ecology of a whole country. Some things
are more important than our love for a particular type of animal.
I love dogs, I cant understand anyone hurting a dog or a cat for that
matter. But if dogs were running wild killing sheep for instance, as a
good Yorkshire lass I would take a rifle out myself and kill the dog...
I would be heartbroken having to do it, but if you had ever seen sheep
torn up by a dog, or lambs ripped to pieces you would feel differently I
assure you, It doesn't stop me loving dogs, or cats it simply is an
understanding that we all have our place on this earth, and once
something becomes out of place, like Feral cats in Australia, or dogs
killing sheep, you have to stop it happening.
Cats are born hunters, and they often play with their food, leaving it
half dead or maimed... some of the smaller marsupials, bush babies for
instance can be decimated by a cat... Would you feel sorry for the cat
if you came across a tiny bush baby torn to shreds and still alive...
You have to face mother nature eventually, and its tooth and claws as
well as beauty and spirituality.. Their is nothing in this world worse
than refusing to face facts... If as a human race we keep over
populating this planet then we like the dinosaur and like many other
species before us will condemn ourselves. We are part of nature to. And
we need to behave responsibly. Not foolishly.
--
Shez's Garden at http://www.oldcity.f2s.com/shez/
After talking to Yowie on Monday, I have a better understanding of the
background of the problem. That being said, I still cannot agree.
Yes, we need to behave responsibly. It is humans behaving
irresponsibly who have created the problem, and it is up to humans to
fix the problem without making it worse. We have similar things here,
for instance, with deer populations getting out of control. I don't
appreciate setting loose hunters on deer just because we humans have
sprawled into *their* territory anymore than I appreciate shooting
cats. Punishing animals by taking away their lives because *we* have
made a mistake strikes me as terribly wrong.
I think that you have the wrong end of the stick their, I don't think
any of us are thinking of punishing cats for being cats, that is their
nature, they are natural hunters and they do what their nature tells
them to do, Feral cats are not a problem in Britain because its a small
island and cats and dogs have to kept in check otherwise we would find
ourselves in competition for food... instead of in partnership in life,
which is a far better answer. If Australia insists that all cats are
kept responsibly, neutered, and cat populations are kept low and in
human habitations then its not a big problem, its when humans don't take
their responsibility to their animals seriously, and let unnutured dogs,
cats and other animals go wild that the problem starts.
I keep in mind always that nature is red in tooth and claw, and our
lives are now so out of joint with nature that people don't know or
really understand where our food comes from, We have become insulated
from nature and the land, If anything ever happens then how many people
could survive, could kill animals for food, would know how to make
cheese butter from scratch could care for farm animals, milk cows, and
sow and reap without all the machinery and power we have today... very
few I think. We are also hunters and killers, we can afford to forget
that in the modern world in the west at least but the rest of the world
doesn't have that sort of choice...
I can kill animals, I can grow food, I can milk cows and goats, make
butter and cheese, bottle food for winter, and dry it, salt it or smoke
it, if I cant bottle it because those skills were still in use when I
was young. I know what it is to harvest vegetables by hand, to stack
corn, or wheat. To spend backbreaking hours picking fruit, or potatoes,
and I do get very irritated with those who will not face up to the very
obvious fact of where our food comes from, and how hard it can be in the
rest of the world to get that food. That those in dire poverty cant
afford to be vegetarian, that cats and dogs are eaten as meat animals in
some countries. That its only in the west you can afford to be a dreamer
and impractical when it comes to the very practical needs of humanity
and of ecology... I doubt if a cat would feel sorry for the mouse its
killing, or a dog would let a rabbit go because the rabbit was cute...
I am a very practical person, I don't have many illusions left. I never
had any illusions about food, it was in short supply when I was young.
Fluffy bunny attitudes about animals do not help the animals in the long
run, they simply make doing a job that must be done all the harder. Deer
need to be kept under control and that means culling, the old and the
weak usually, if they are left to breed without natural predators they
can ruin whole forests and you would end up with wasteland, as they
stripped bark from trees, and killed them.
Unless of course your willing to bring back the big cats and the wolves
to act as natural predators, then if not humans have to do that job.
Post by Ginger-lyn SummerI took Zoology; I understand something about ecosystems. But
ecosystems *do* change, inevitably. The feral cats may simply be part
of a change of ecosystem, a part of evolution, and may yet have value
to that ecosystem of which we are not yet aware. Sometimes by trying
to solve a problem (particularly taking the easy way out), we humans
make more of a mess of things.
We cant afford to have a huge continent like Australia loosing its
topsoil, which it will do if its grazed to death by sheep, and its
marsupials are killed the animals and the land are one. They are part of
the whole ecosystem, introduce something outside of the system and like
Coypu in the Norfolk broads the whole ecology can start to collapse,
beyond saving. Its not just a few miles or a few animals, at risk, its
millions. Cats and other imported species, like dogs, fox's, sheep ect
must be controlled. Its that simple.
Post by Ginger-lyn SummerI don't want to see species decimated anywhere, whether it be in the
US or Australia. But I do think there *must* be a better solution to
this.
What solutions. If you can catch a feral cat, your doing better than
most of us, If you find volunteers to go out with very expensive stun
guns and injections to take out hundreds of thousands, even millions of
feral cats then your doing better than I expected...
the size of the problem is vast, its not just a few feral cats... who is
going to find the time or the money to catch them. And then the money to
have them neutered, and if they are released again they will carry on
killing an already hugely decimated local animal population..
What happens when they kill everything, they cats will die anyway,
because their will not be anything left to eat. Better a quick shot and
death than a slow death of starvation. And I would choose that for
myself as well as any animals I care about.
Post by Ginger-lyn SummerHere in the US, we have groups of caring people who do TNR
(trap, neuter and release), feed and manage feral colonies so they
have no need to feed on local wildlife. I understand, from what Yowie
told me, that this is difficult in Australia since most of the ferals
are in the Outback. It doesn't mean it is impossible.
Hmm Outback is a whole continent, I don't think you understand the scale
of the problem or of how big a continent Australia is, people on the
whole only live in a very small part of the continent mostly on the
coastlines... Its a hard country, it needed hard people to tame it, and
hard decisions made... a huge amount of Australia is semi arid, desert.
America by comparison was walk in the park...
Post by Ginger-lyn SummerIf, instead of
saying "That's just the way it is; accept it" (an argument I always
find fault with, as if we all took that view, we would still be
lynching African-Americans in the American South and women would still
be unable to make decisions affecting their own bodies and lives),
people said "Let's fix this problem in a way that does no harm to the
animals", then we would be doing something positive, both about the
situation and for the ferals.
How about fixing the problem so that a whole ecology can be saved, their
is no way to hunt down and deal nicely with the amount of feral cats
that roam Australia, The land kills, their are miles upon miles of
nothing but sand and shrub, heat and sun, you need to be a tough animal
to survive out their, and cats are tough. Feral cats are not sweet
fluffy, little companions, they are spitting clawing, and dangerous
animals... obviously you never spent to much time on a farm with a good
few feral cats that haunted the barn and kept the mouse and rat
population in check. Go to stoke one of those and you would be lucky to
come out with your eyes, and your hand stripped of skin.
Post by Ginger-lyn SummerI will continue to pray to Bast for the protection of ferals
everywhere. They are, after all, Her children, too.
Cats of all animals are the ultimate survivors, more so than dogs, I
think Bast doesn't need to take a great deal of care of her children she
gave them every advantage in the killing and hunting department.
--
Shez ***@oldcity.f2s.com
Shez's Garden at http://www.oldcity.f2s.com/shez/