We have four half-domesticated cats living outdoors. One cat in particular has a predilection for songbirds and the species I find killed more than not is the Gray Catbird. So I can personally attest to this article. This cat has also climbed kolkwitzia bushes in an attempt to raid nests. I happen to be outside a lot and have prevented a few of these attacks. Let’s just say that when this cat sees me it takes off real quick!
I’ve also encountered Blue Jays raiding a Catbird nest which I foiled as well.

Upon researching preventative measures for saving songbirds from cat predation, I did find two possibilities which I have yet to try: the CatBib and the Bird Alert Cat Collar.

We had many many thousands of birds in THIS area and it wasnt that many years ago. The one important change was the arrival of predator birds. And they arrived in many pairs and it took maybe 10 years to lose everything.

Wintering birds were crushed,. They did not survive, squirrels and chipmunks were obliterated becoming food for more and more predator birds. Orioles were nesting here and we had scores of them, But as a daily visitor in this woodland almost 30 years I saw what happened to them. Bright and flashy and consipicuous just as the woodpecker, I saw hawks just swallow them in the trees where they nest. I saw one tiny woodpecker a month ago, just for an instant, you could have missed it, and in a flash that tiny bird was taken out by a hawk.

With just a few squirrels remaining, I saw only ONE in this woodland, wwe had many many hundreds 15 years ago! and my small dog actually found it, a baby maybe a couple months old, and it was dead with an organ bloodied, and I looked up and there in a tree was a juvenile redtail, and that creature didnt even eat that baby, it just played with it.

Making matters infinitely worse for ALL our beautiful things, was the death of the crow.
This was a disaster of major proportions………Millions of them, gone.

They were the only life preservers for lesser birds………….but the reason for THEIR DEMISE the west nile came from where? maybe some flamingoes brought in from some prominent zoo?? improperly quarantined???

What has happened here, with redtails and perigrines killing to produce more killer birds WILL hit areas surrounding, it takes a few years…. Ten for this area.

Wintertime next year should see really dramatic reductions in every bird north of NYC (aside from english sparrow, starlings, and the canada goose) Bird feeders attract redtails. red shouldered, and the whole family of exterminators, imagine how many chicadees are swallowed at feeders!!! And I have first hand experience with this.

My granddaughter, not 8 years old and I OUTSIDE at her peachtree feeder saw a swooping large bird pass a small grouping of chicadees flying to her feeder! THIS HAPPENED 7 YEARS AGO…Within an instant those chicadees were swallowed! Now my granddaughter refused to compromise what she loved, but how many birds are killed at feeders? How many people use FEEDERS???

Just as uncaring people from various bird societies placed predator birds in cities around the USA decades ago, what they encouraged will spread to areas not yet severely impacted. They can never admit what their intervention set in place, the devastion of all lesser species. From the patio rail to the window in my home the past year the most enormous redtail whose shadow and shrieks have finally come to an end but this is due to the extinctions of every bird sound here, this dreadful desolate spring, the perigrines, the redshouldered have moved north. And I have seen not even one squirrel.

These past years 10-15 brought back predators nationwide through human intervention in a big way and they have returned dramatically with consequences far reaching from the desolation in the parklands (only in this area?) to the losses of species in grasslands and shore.

We lost everything WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

Isn’t allowing cats to roam free or re-releasing trapped cats back into the environment human caused?

I guess I have to agree with you then. I’ll choose to protect and create habitat, minimize collisions with my windows AND control cats in my yard and neighborhood in order to minimize the negative effects us humans cause to bird life.

The article was published in the Journal of Ornithology. REAL scientists, if they disagree, publish a rebuttal, which is also peer removed. Pseudo-scientists fill up a web-page which anyone can do. Which are you again?

In your hypothetical scenario, birds would have evolved with the cats and would have developed the mechanisms necessary to deal with predation. If they had become extirpated before the arrival of man I would not support bringing them back. If they had held on in small pockets, they would be an endangered species (ocelots for example) and I would all for their recovery. It is not predation on birds that’s the problem. It’s the fact that they are NON-NATIVE!!! Yes, humans are also, but that is a WHOLLY different situation and and comparison is specious at best.

Cait,
1. From a pro-TNR website:
“PETA is the last major animal advocacy group in the U.S. that overtly opposes TNR feral cat control and no-kill sheltering.”
From PETA’s website:
http://www.peta.org/issues/companion-animals/outdoor-cats.aspx
and:
“Nevertheless, PETA’s position has never been that all feral cats should be euthanized. We believe that trap, vaccinate, spay/neuter, and release programs are acceptable when the cats are isolated from roads, people, and other animals who could harm them; regularly attended to by people who not only feed them but care for their medical needs; and situated in an area where they do not have access to wildlife and where the weather is temperate”
2. We do capture and euthanize stray dogs. No one has yet advocated TNR for dogs. Why? Because society doesn’t accept it. Dogs can kill humans. My goal is to show that cats, when allowed outdoors and free-roaming are detrimental to both humans and wildlife.

I support TNR where the colonies are in large outdoor enclosures on private property and the cats do not stray off said property.

Maria,

Native wildlife is just that. WILD life. Natural prey-predator relationships are at work. Feral cats are supplementally fed 365 / year and as such normal predator-prey interaction just doesn’t take place. They (cats) exist in densities that can be locally disastrous to wildlife populations.
(TNR has NOT been proven to reduce POPULATIONS of cats. It can only work on the colony level and works mainly by the removal of kittens and adoptable adults. NOTE: REMOVAL!! Even then it can not, and has not reduced populations to zero so it is NOT a solution for municipalities. What is ORCAT up to now? $60,000 – $100,000 / year and still can’t get below 300 cats? Doesn’t sound like a solution to a problem to me.

An additional reference–along with statewide BBS data–is included in my follow-up post (http://www.voxfelina.com/2011/03/catbirds-cats-and-scapegoats/).

By the way, I’m not buying the non-native/non-natural argument. Let’s say scientists make an amazing discovery–that domestic cats had been in North America for many THOUSANDS of years. Does that change your view of things? Does predation by cats suddenly belong in another column of your accounting ledger? I rather doubt it.

You really should familiarize yourself with PETA before you go claiming to speak on their behalf. PETA does not support mere TNR by itself–they support TNR with colony maintenance. Their point is that it is not good enough to merely TNR feral cats; they also need to be managed so they get adequate access to food, shelter, and health care.

PETA is an animal rights group; their point about TNR is its relation to the cats THEMSELVES, not how feral cats affect BIRDS. Your comment is not directly related to this argument.

To add to this discussion, your point that “humane euthanasia is preferable to a life on the street” is speciesist and inaccurate. Obviously Alley Cat Allies does NOT support letting cats run wild and live unsafely. Like PETA, they support TNR in addition to maintaining cat colonies for their safety and health. If you think that it’s better to euthanize cats than let them live on the street, then why not do the same to dogs? Birds? How about humans? It is considered unethical to “euthanize” a human, but we let them live on the street, and many homeless people have mental and physical health problems. We advocate putting them in shelters or giving them help, not euthanasia. Are cats so different? In your mind, they must be, but many people do not agree.

PETA has definitely jumped the shark. What kind of animal protection agency advocates mass killings??? UNBELIEVABLE.

http://www.alleycat.org/NetCommunity/Page.aspx?pid=897

{Quote}Do I need to post pictures of cats killed by cars, cats ripped about by dogs and coyotes? Humane euthanasia is preferable to a life on the street and 100% more humane for the wildlife these street cats will kill or maul REGARDLESS of the numbers.{/quote}

According to your logic, we should then “humanely” kill all outdoor animals. Foxes, squirrels, deer, racoons and, yes, even birds, all get hit by cars, mauled by other animals, sick from pesticides, driven from their homes by builders, etc. Should we just kill all of them now so that they won’t be exposed to a horrible death later on?

People get hit by cars, shot, stabbed, etc. Should we just kill them all now so that they can avoid the possibility of a horrible death later on?

None of these animals deserve any more or any less of a right to life. Killing one animal because it might kill another animal is still killing an animal.

I personally would prefer that pet cats are kept indoors. However, feral cats are not pets…their home IS outdoors.

I am always bothered by people who seem to suggest that the protection of one animal must come at the expense of another animal. There are much more humane, tried, and tested options to killing. TNR being one of them.