The cats have been there for some time now (I assume there were lots of feral cats even before the pandemic) and the local ecosystem has somehow adapted to/with them. Getting rid of them is probably going to have unwanted consequences.
Who's to say cats can't live independently among humans (and rats and other animals) in cities? Someone is probably going to bring up the argument that the cats are not taken care of and have diseases, parasites, injuries, etc., but so do all animals living in the wild. The only difference is that you don't see the parasite infested malnourished stoats in the woods every day like you see your neighbourhood cat colony.
> Who's to say cats can't live independently among humans (and rats and other animals) in cities?
I knew about this nonprofit via a cat colony caretaker, @poetssquarecats (I follow her on Tiktok and she's amazing) that talks about the struggles of feral cats and uncontrolled cat colonies. Yes, of course animals in the wild also suffer from diseases, parasites, and injuries. But these animals aren't in the wild. They're far more constrained than in the wild, with a lot more access to food, and with a lot more dangers. One of the problems is that, in those conditions, the number of cats can and does explode (female cats can become pregnant at 4-6 months old already, and they have on average 16 kittens a year in multiple litters).
And yes, of course getting rid of them is going to have unwanted consequences, but having them has other unwanted consequences. For example, as the article mentions, birdlife is severely affected, which can also have other unwanted consequences. I think that in that case it's better to have the cause under control: either way it's going to have unwanted consequences, but at least when you control it you know that it's happening.
> female cats can become pregnant at 4-6 months old already, and they have on average 16 kittens a year in multiple litters).
This totally was not true in my living memory of fifty years.
Edit : like this is totally news to me which frightens me knowing that could really mean that we've passed a irreparable inflection point in a number of the most stabilized metabolic endocrine and hormonal management systems that have taken the entirety of history to develop into sustainable life.
Is systemic oestrogen poisoning to blame?
Or has there been effective speciation as a consequence already, which might demand humane euthanasia?
"Estrogens occurring in the environment can negatively affect the organisms, such as animals, through phenomena such as feminization, dysregulation of natural processes related to reproduction[...]
Edit :
IF what you are saying is true then de facto there's been speciation because there's no way for prior variants of this animal to co exist socially or biologically in any compatible lifespan and neither could the cats I thought existed exist in any shared habitat for reasons of disease and competition. The only possible conclusion is that the very design for life on the planet earth is already proven to be being erased before our very eyes.
Another, more reasonable hypothesis, is that you were wrong about your preconceptions of cat reproduction. The time to reach sexual maturity seems to be pretty well established, and the number of kittens of course will vary depending on conditions but it's not rare to be in those cases of female cats having multiple litters in a single year. Cat pregnancies last two months approximately, so it's not unreasonable at all.
The cats have been there for some time now (I assume there were lots of feral cats even before the pandemic) and the local ecosystem has somehow adapted to/with them. Getting rid of them is probably going to have unwanted consequences.
Who's to say cats can't live independently among humans (and rats and other animals) in cities? Someone is probably going to bring up the argument that the cats are not taken care of and have diseases, parasites, injuries, etc., but so do all animals living in the wild. The only difference is that you don't see the parasite infested malnourished stoats in the woods every day like you see your neighbourhood cat colony.