I can only hope my reply gets back to Dennis. Thank you for forwarding
it to me.

Friends of Campus Cats has a mission as well as a name -- we seek to raise
public awareness and humanely reduce the population of feral and abandoned
cats on the UW campus. We also deplore the number of homeless cats left
to forage for their existence but do not wage war against them. We
recognize the cats are not to blame for where they are or what they are.
We also realize they will always exist until people become more
responsible about their pets.

Homeless cats are a part of the scewed ecosystem as it is, not as we would
wish it. Killing cats does not solve the problem of "strays" and,
unfortunately, does not "save" the ecosystem for songbirds (not
forgetting, I suppose, the non-native starlings, sparrows, etc., and the
crows that prey on them all).

I can only repeat myself that yes, cats do prey on birds, the unsexy birds
as well as our beloved songbirds. They also prey on the rodents -- the real
disease carriers -- that are so abundant in this manmade ecosystem.

Cats are not the major cause of bird decline. WE are, I'm afraid. What's
more, killing and maligning cats does not wipe out the feral cat
population, on campus or anywhere. It simply creates a "vacancy" for the
next homeless cat to fill, and there will always be homeless cats as long
as there are irresponsible pet owners and a society that tolerates them.

As for research, studies have been done has been done that support what I
am saying -- check with Berkeley, which stewards its feral cat population.
Taking homeless cats out of the breeding cycle and releasing them back to
their colony to live out their brief life (perhaps 2 years) is both humane
and responsible. It is also practical. The released cats defend their
territory against interlopers, which is to say other cats. And they are
not compelled to wander seeking food and shelter -- only birds in their
immediate territory are at risk.

The Burke Museum, by the way, spayed/neutered its population sometime
ago and I hope will call on Friends of Campus Cats to assist if the
population there begins to climb.

I know what I say here will change no pre-formed opinions about cats,
homeless or contained. I will continue to do what I do because I feel it
is both right and responsible. I am part of the solution, not part
of the problem. If everyone spayed and neutered (and tested for feline
AIDS and leukemia) the roving cats in their neighborhood there wouldn't
be a "stray" problem.

I would rather not continue the debate but would welcome hearing from
anyone who would like to discuss or take on stewardship of their own
backyard. That's where it all begins, after all.




On 5 Aug 1994, Isabel Landsberg wrote:

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> Subject: campus cats (fwd)
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> Due to some glitch with the listprocessor this message apparently didn't
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> Dan Victor, Seattle, WA <dvictor at u.washington.edu>
>
> ===============
> Date: Tue, 2 Aug 1994 12:37:35 -0800
> To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
> From: dpaulson at ups.edu (Dennis Paulson)
> Subject: campus cats
>
> It was instructive to hear the comments of Sharon Talbert about Friends of
> Campus Cats. The point Charles was trying to make, and I agree with him
> 100%, is that the practice of not only leaving (i.e., not trapping and
> removing) lots of cats on campus, whether they can reproduce or not, but
> also subsidizing them by feeding them, furnishes the area with a high
> density of healthy predators that in turn wreak havoc on the population of
> small *native* animals (song sparrows are much easier for a cat to capture
> and subdue than are Norway rats). The campus is just a sink for all the
> cats born elsewhere in the neighborhood, where they are not captured and
> neutered. There is no controversy about these conclusions about cat
> effects; they are well-documented. Just from my own observations, as a
> 15-year resident of Burke Museum, I looked out of my window into the
> shrubbery on the north side of the building, and over the years cats
> replaced song sparrows and towhees in my viewshed. I don't understand why
> these cats, just because they don't have diseases and can't reproduce, are
> "OK."
>
> I hope Friends of Campus Cats, as undoubted animal lovers, are willing to
> accept the accompanying label Enemies of Small Native Campus Animals,
> clearly counter to the idea of being an animal lover. I couldn't be more
> serious. To me it is a misguided love of animals that encourages the
> saturation of any environment, urban or wild, with *introduced* (intended
> to be domestic) predators! Cats were intended to be domestic "friends" of
> people; they may have been first domesticated to control infestations of
> mice (also introduced worldwide), as well as to be enjoyable companions
> (they are enjoyable; I've owned cats for years, now only in the house).
> That doesn't mean they now have the "inalienable right" to roam free in our
> cities and countryside by the thousands and decimate wildlife populations.
> There must be a solution to this problem, which pits people who care for
> animals very strongly against one another. As a staunch environmentalist, I
> am strongly on the side of native wildlife and will continue to campaign
> against free-roaming cats, especially in cities, where our native wildlife
> is already limited enough.
>
> Dennis Paulson
> University of Puget Sound
>
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