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"cat welfare is the key issue in a pre This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_0506_01D156E8.8FF7D400 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="Windows-1252" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Really ?? A fox or Chicken Hawk to keep mice and rats out of the barn = (or chicken coop) ?=20 Sounds like a government program dreamed up by lets improve the land = registry by making it expensive, sluggish, misleading, destructive and = inconvenient, lets build a better Bluenose, lets torpedo the Film = industry and pay good money to learn how to increase tourism bunch. =20 DW ----- Original Message -----=20 From: Patrick Kelly=20 To: <naturens@chebucto.ns.ca>=20 Sent: Sunday, January 24, 2016 4:39 PM Subject: Re: [NatureNS] Vancouver has new "bird strategy" As Helene point out in her presentation to the Blomidon naturalist = Society, barn cats can easily be replaced by raptors (given a few places = to perch) , fox,, and other native predators=85=20 On Jan 24, 2016, at 4:26 PM, rita.paul@ns.sympatico.ca wrote: Nick - that's what barn cats are for - keeping populations=20 of rodents and flying rodents under control. Pigeons, starlings=20 sparrows - the English kind are all rodents.=20 The cats help keep a barn clean and do their best=20 work at night when its dark!=20 Imagion telling a farmer to lock up his cats at night - near as bad=20 as the fellow who wanted the farmer to delay cutting his hay for = some reason!=20 Enjoy the winter=20 Paul=20 =20 On January 24, 2016 at 1:37 PM Nicholas Hill = <fernhillns@gmail.com> wrote:=20 yes Darrell, they have an impact. My point is that this factor is = overblown and is not put in context of the many other factors that are = truly reducing bird populations in the temperate region:=20 =20 climate change=20 land use (e.g. short rotation forestry)=20 pesticides=20 oil?=20 =20 Cats, cars, windturbines, reflective glass would be minor in = comparison and I'd suggest we first focus on the major causes of decline = and then look at tempering the minor threats which we are not going to = fully eliminate as they are part of our life style:=20 =20 1. Cat--keep cat in at night, fix feral cats and get them places=20 2. Car--slow down..I killed a swallow last year when in what I = thought was a hurry=20 3. Windturbines--research placement of windmills out of flight = pathways=20 4, Glass--hard to know how to reduce bird impacts on existing = windows, this national geographic article discusses some ways=20 = http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/11/141113-bird-safe-glass-wi= ndow-collision-animals-science/=20 =20 We won't get anywhere legislating that cats be not allowed out but = increasing attention on barn populations and making people responsible = (or finding funding for) for fixing barn cats on their property, then = suggesting that owners keep their cats in at dusk and night, will have = impacts. Currently, this negative focus on cats creates the impression = that a biodiversity crisis is the fault of cats not their humans who may = also drive cars profligately and eat crops grown using neonicotinoids.=20 =20 Nick=20 =20 =20 =20 =20 On Sun, Jan 24, 2016 at 11:43 AM, <darrell@abolitphotos.ca> wrote: = I disagree Nick, any animal can become a pest and cats and their = irresponsible owners are exactly that. Myself, living in the countryside = where cats are brought to barns and dropped off and many owners letting = them roam free, I have seen many birds killed. Seen one cat jump up on a = cloths line to kill a saw-whet owl. An impressive predator but way too = many (all) at loose in the daytime and night. Dog owners are not allowed = to let their animals/predators roam free and neither should cat owners. = No pet should be allowed to roam free to kill at will, period. = =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D= =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D On Sun, 24 Jan 2016 11:24:43 -0400, Don MacNeill < = donmacneill@bellaliant.net> wrote:=20 I agree Nick. Don Don MacNeill donmacneill@bellaliant.net=20 On 24/01/2016 10:37 AM, Nicholas Hill wrote:=20 Grayson and Calver (2004, Regulation of cat ownership to = protect urban wildlife: a justification based on the precautionary = approach. Royal Zoological Society NSW 169-178) found previously that = Cat Density was not a predictor of passerine numbers but that distance = to bushland and the density of urban housing were (both negative = factors). In the study cited above (regulation of cat ownership etc), = they conclude that "cat welfare is the key issue in a precautionary = approach for protection which respects interests of cat owners". Cat = welfare means keeping the beasts in at night and desexing them so that = we do not have a feral cat problem. In the country here, people let cats = breed in outbuildings and this leads to a desperate situation for these = cats and for wildlife. =20 Other authors warned that conclusions drawn in Britain over = the impact of cats (million birds and small mammals killed) were drawn = from data on one single village study in Felmersham. This author (BM = Fitzgerald, 1990. is cat control needed to protect wildlife? = Environmental Conservation 17: 168-169) questioned the extrapolation = which we should in a rural area like NS where birdlife is spread widely = over woodland and clearings=20 =20 We have 3 desexed rescue cats that are in at night and well = fed. There is a local impact on mouse, vole and shrew (no birds seen = taken yet) but the population of these animal