CAT COLONY CARE WITH NATHAN WINOGRAD
Interviewer: Claudette Vaughan

Nathan Winograd is the expert on cat colonies and homeless animals. He is author of Redemption: The Myth of Pet Population and The No-Kill Revolution in America.

What advice do you provide if somebody wants to assist a free-roaming cat colony?

Anti-TNR groups have long held that the feral cat is merely an unsocialized domestic animal. Domestic animals, they argue, need to live in a home in order to avoid suffering. But this belief is inaccurate; in fact, the distinctions between feral and friendly pet cats, or domestic versus wild cats, are meaningless. Even what appears to be a simple truth—one is friendly, the other is not—is not so clear cut. And since feral cats are as hardy a survivor as any wild animal, the notion that they are better off dead than living in their habitats flies in the face of the evidence.

The problem arises from the commonly held, but false, belief that a biological difference exists between a wild and domesticated animal. This misinformation has resulted in much feral cat suffering and killing. We know, for example, that all cats—feral or pet—are genetically identical to the African wildcat, a wild animal by everyone’s definition. Since the feral cat is biologically the same as a wild animal, it follows that the untamed feral cat born on a remote corner of a farm who never becomes accustomed to people, is a wild animal in every sense of the word.

The concepts of wild and domestic are behavioral traits. Whereas domesticated animals are animals “adapted to life in intimate association with humans,” feral cats are not. They fit the dictionary definition of a wild animal: “living in a state of nature.”

Ignoring biology, sociology, genealogy, common experience, and good sense, shelters mired in traditional philosophies argue that all cats need the same things regardless of their domesticity or wildness/ferality. To these groups, all cats are domestic animals who belong in homes, and in their view the feral cat without a human home is better off dead than living in the cat’s natural habitat. They claim that an outdoor cat’s life is a series of brutal experiences and shelters need to “protect” the cat from current and future suffering.

The reality, however, is that all animals living in the wild face hardship, and feral cats are no exception. The studies of feral cats by British naturalist Roger Tabor and others confirm that feral cats survive at similar rates and exhibit behavior attributed to wild animals. Feral cats are “suffering” no more than raccoons. As humane advocates would never recommend the killing of wild animals, nor argue that to do so would be in the animals’ best interest, they should also not recommend such for feral cats. In fact, the animal welfare movement has a long, noble tradition of trying to eliminate such practices, as evidenced by its opposition to hunting.

Since no animal groups support the trapping and killing of other wild animals—raccoons, mice, fox—why is this fate reserved for feral cats? If feral cats are genetically identical to wild animals, survive in the wild like wild animals, are unsocial to humans like wild animals, share the same hardships as wild animals, and live and even thrive in the wild like wild animals, shouldn’t animal welfare groups advocate on their behalf, push for their right to live, and protect their habitats as they do for other wild animals? More importantly, why should all feral cats be condemned to death today because some of them might suffer at some undetermined time in the future? This is especially true in light of the fact that, when the evidence is gathered and examined, feral cats are not suffering as some have historically claimed.

Opponents of TNR programs are quick to say that indoor-only cats live much longer than outdoor cats. They claim that while indoor cats typically live fifteen years, outdoor cats live only a precious few. Intuitively, it makes sense and many cat lovers keep their cats inside for what they believe is the cat’s own good. While that still might be a good idea in appropriate cases, is the claim true? In reality, it is not. Shelter employees who claim feral cats are better off dead need only look through their own “feral wards” where the wild cats awaiting execution are housed. Every day, shelters take in feral cats who have lived their entire lives outside. The vast majority of these cats are healthy despite the absence of a known caretaker.

In the most comprehensive study of feral cats to date, Dr. Julie Levy, a nationally renowned veterinarian and professor at the University of Florida at Gainesville, found that feral cats had similar baselines for health to pet cats and similar rates of disease in comparison to pet cats. Furthermore, in an eleven-year study of feral cats, Levy found that the vast majority of the cats were in good physical condition, with only four percent killed for health reasons. By the end of the observation period, feral cats in the study had been present an average of 92 percent of the average lifespan reported for house cats, which might actually be low, since almost half of the feral cats were first observed as adults of unknown age. In other words, the lifespan of feral cats is about the same as those of house cats. Other studies share Levy’s findings. One study found that ten- to fifteen-year-old feral cats were common in TNR colonies, while another found that feral cats had an “A+” rating for coat, muscle, teeth, and weight gain post-neutering.

It appears that not even a cataclysmic hurricane can change this calculus. Following the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina in the greater New Orleans area in 2005, officials for St. Bernard Parish Animal Control reported that “feral cats did surprisingly well after the hurricane. They were not thin or sick.”

There is no question that cats living outside face risks. But life is about risks. The contention of TNR opponents that we stop the cat from possibly suffering by killing the cat ourselves is an irreconcilable contradiction. Life, by its very definition and common experience, is a mix of easy and hard, good and bad, happy and sad. We experience it as humans. Deer experience it, too. So do birds, fox, mice, and rabbits, which do not lead to the conclusion that these creatures should face mass slaughter. In a call for mass extermination, the feral cat stands alone. But the contradiction goes deeper, because while traditional shelters argue that all cats are the same and have the same needs, they themselves treat them very differently.

In the shelter, the feral cat meets a deadly double-standard: once there, a friendly cat is capable of adoption; a feral cat, by contrast, is killed outright. The distinction between the two is real and obvious, and is made daily by the very shelter professionals who, on the one hand, make the claim that all cats are the same and require the same things in order to lead happy, healthy lives and, on the other, condemn feral cats to death because their temperament is that of a wild animal, which makes them unsuitable for placement as pets.

In the final analysis, however, feral cats are not being wiped out because of disease. They are not starving. It is not predation by coyotes or wild dogs that is killing the cats. (These are all arguments HSUS and others have in the past, or currently make, against TNR.) The number one killer of healthy cats in the United States is the local animal shelter. If people are truly concerned about the safety of feral cats, the focus should be on keeping them out of shelters through TNR.

What special needs and considerations are necessary to manage a free roaming cat colony?

I think passion and compassion are the only two. There’s a woman named Jamie who moved to San Francisco a number of years ago. She bought a home near an alley and when she came home from work, she noticed the reflections of cat eyes in her headlights. Like any compassionate person, she started feeding the cats. She decided she was going to capture them and take them to her veterinarian to have them spayed. But Jamie had never heard of “feral cat” and did not know of humane traps, nor was she aware that there were networks of people out there doing this day in and day out. So she devised her own unique method of trapping. She took a regular cat carrier or pet taxi, the kind you would use to transport a cat to a veterinarian, and she put food in the back. She then put the carrier on her stomach and laid down in the alley not moving (pretending she was inanimate or dead) until the cats mustered the courage to climb on top of her and into the carrier and then she closed the latch.

To say that this is a very inefficient method of trapping is an understatement. But she did it. In most communities, people would dismiss Jamie as a crackpot. In others, animal control would write her a citation for breaking the law by feeding the cats, or “letting them” outside, or violating the pet limit law, even though all she was done was compassionately caring for cats someone else abandoned, or the offspring of abandoned cats. But imagine if her compassion was harnessed by the local shelter, rather than punished. What would be the result?

In Jamie’s case, she went on to trap and alter over 120 feral cats in one year—just with a humane trap and free spay/neuter. Combine that with the thousands of cat lovers in any community and the possibilities are endless. In the case of San Francisco, Jamie was one of five people who approached the local SPCA for help in starting a feral cat assistance program. And what started as a program with five people ended up as one doing 9,000 surgeries per year, five days per week, no appointment necessary, with 1,100 feral cat caretakers using the program and caring for the city’s feral cats. This culminated in a decline in the number of feral cats being killed by 73%.

The tools to make that happen are food, traps, and no cost spay/neuter. But most of all, it means believing in the community and trusting in the power of compassion.

Why does Trap and Kill not work?

If killing worked, we would be a No Kill nation (here or in Australia); because killing is the one thing shelters have done in abundance. On a more macro scale, no matter how many feral cats are killed, the goal of total eradication will never be reached. As far as feral cats are concerned, they will always exist. To advocate for their eradication would be to propose a massacre with no hope of success and no conceivable end. Nonetheless, as TNR inevitably reduces the number of cats by eliminating their reproductive capacity, even anti-cat groups should therefore support it.

Why do some people oppose TNR and what is your expert opinion on it?

Some people just do not like cats, do not value animal life, or find it easier to trap and kill than try to avoid the issues that are really at the forefront for them (such as soiling the garden) which can be easily remedied with a little ingenuity and patience. But for shelters and animal welfare groups, the issues surround the false belief that they are serious predators of songbirds (which I talk about below), and issues about the cat’s fitness to live outdoors. These groups claim that even with human care, feral cats still live a life of misery and suffering and should therefore be killed with or without a caretaker.

We also have to stop pretending that self-proclaimed “animal welfare” groups love cats, but think they are doing the cat a favor by killing him because living outdoors is too difficult. This is nothing more than a sick twisted, selfish paternalistic view that puts their own desires and need for control above the life of animals. The “killing is kindness” view obliterates what is truly in the best interests of animals.

We must reject these outright, because as I have shown above and below, these viewpoints are based on false assumptions, are antithetical to animal welfare, violate the feral cat’s right to live, and are increasingly out of step with a nation of cat lovers.

What is the animal rights position on free-roaming cat colonies? What do you think is the animal rights obligation to free roaming cat colonies and does this differ from what obligations you think a local community should take?

The right to life is universally acknowledged as a basic or fundamental right. It is basic or fundamental because the enjoyment of the right to life is a necessary condition of the enjoyment of all other rights. A movement cannot be “rights” oriented and ignore the fundamental right to life. If an animal is dead, the animal’s rights become irrelevant. It, therefore, goes without saying that feral cats have a right to live.

More practically, a No Kill community must include a commitment to TNR. But that is only the first step. Since feral cats are the offspring of abandoned pets and are thriving, and since—as a general rule—feral cats are entering shelters relatively healthy and robust, then it is clear that they are doing well, with or without a caretaker. And while there are counterexamples, as there are with all animals, this is no reason to enact an unreasonable double standard for feral cats since we do not advocate death for all friendly stray cats. Therefore, if TNR in a managed colony is not an option, the compassionate alternative is to spay/neuter and release even when there is no established feeder. If the feral cat is out there and appears healthy, we may intervene to spay/neuter to allow feral cats to be better able to thrive without the biological demands of mating or raising litters. If that too is not an option, they should be released in another safe place, first with a caretaker but without one if need be the way we would if a raccoon or other wild animal could no longer safely remain in a particular location. Finally, if TNR is not an option in any form, the shelter should not accept feral cats, a course of action no different than a shelter’s refusal to accept and kill a raccoon or other wild animal because the relinquisher does not want the animal crossing his yard. It is not ethical to kill healthy feral cats under any circumstances any more so than we would kill healthy raccoons, foxes, deer, horses, pigeons or cows.

In the end, a community’s definition of No Kill has to be one where no healthy dog or cat, no sick or injured but treatable dog or cat, and—without question or compromise— where no healthy or treatable feral cat is killed. Anything short of that, and the No Kill movement would be sweeping feral cats under the rug—and would, in fact, not be No Kill.

By contrast, some groups have cautiously supported TNR in some circumstances and so long as certain conditions have been met—if the landowner agrees, if there is shelter, if there is no wildlife predation, if the climate is temperate, if there is a feeder 365 days a year, if there is licensing, if all the cats are vaccinated regularly. Even some No Kill shelters have adopted some of these preconditions to the support of TNR, but they are utterly irrelevant for purposes of supporting TNR.

From the No Kill position, the rights of feral cats are self-evident. These may not be legal rights, but they are fundamental to the No Kill position. And they include the right to life and the right to live in their habitats. And the right to have the animal welfare/rights community fight to protect both. This position is no different than our views about habitat protection for raccoons and other animals.

And that is why our approach to TNR must include a platform which promotes the right of feral cats to their habitat, wherever that may be, and a right to their very existence, independent of their relationship to humans. They are animals who share our communities and whose needs must be accommodated. After all, it’s their world too.

What to do when cats are threatened and have to be removed from the colony?

There are several groups who have information about relocating colonies, but best to make sure that is truly the last resort. It is important to remember that cats are hardy survivors, and it is always better to relocate them to a safer location, rather than having them killed. And that is true even without a caretaker. It helps if the animals are sterilized, because then they do not have to expend energy with the requisites of mating, birth and raising litters, especially since they are under threat from animal control and people are still under the mistaken belief that a wayward cat requires “saving” by taking to the pound because they have been brainwashed to believe the great outdoors is a constant threat to cats, even though this is a cat’s natural habitat, and historically, they have been living outdoors for millennia.

How can one protect free roaming cats from neighbors who complain to animal control to get them removed?

The first thing to do is to try to minimize potential conflicts before they arise, rather than wait until neighbors begin complaining. Some potential problems and solutions include:

• Wild animals feeding onsite. Feed cats during the day and pick up any leftover food once the cats have eaten so that raccoons and others don’t come at night.
• Kittens. Spay/neuter will prevent kittens from being born. In some cases, feral kittens can be socialized and adopted.
• Spraying, fighting, and howling. Neutering quickly reduces or eliminates these behaviors. Regular and sufficient feeding will also prevent fighting.
• Cats using yard as a litterbox. Caregivers can place covered, sand-filled litter boxes in their yards, put up a barrier such as a “cat fence,” and/or offer to periodically clean the neighbor's yard. One product which works well is called the scarecrow and humanely keeps cats out of a neighbor’s yard. (www.hdw-inc.com/scarecrowdescription.htm). Buy it for your neighbor. If they use it, it works all of the time.

Beyond the basics, I also encourage caretakers to talk to the neighbor and ask questions even if they appear “unreasonable.” In one case, a neighbor demanded-without explanation-that a caregiver stop feeding cats in the neighborhood. After asking several questions, she discovered the neighbor was upset because he didn't like cat footprints on his new car. To keep the peace, the caregiver bought her neighbor a car cover and he never complained again. By asking questions and offering solutions, it becomes possible to focus on the person's specific concerns rather than their generalized objections to feral cats.

It is also important to calmly share your perspective with the goal of amicably resolving the problem. It can be a good idea to prepare a small packet of written materials in support of caring for feral cats. Explain to them that TNR is the most humane and effective way to control feral cat populations and minimize the most common concerns people raise about feral cats. Be sure to explain the ramifications of trapping the cats and taking them to an animal shelter: most will be killed since feral cats are not candidates for adoption. In addition, more cats-probably unneutered-will move back into the area starting the cycle all over again.

Some animal welfare organizations are working to get the name feral cat changed to nuisance cat. How can this be prevented?

First of all, let’s be really forthright. These are not “animal welfare” groups, they are anti-cat kill-oriented agencies hiding under the cloak of animal welfare. Over 150 years ago, Henry Bergh started North America’s first humane society, the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). While early humane efforts primarily focused on protecting animals who had been forced into labor (horses to pull railways, dogs to churn butter, pigs to eat garbage on behalf of the sanitation department), it did not take long for Bergh and his SPCA to set their sights on the abuses of local dog catchers. The other SPCAs, humane societies and animal welfare groups that began to dot the American landscape, though distinct and independent, nevertheless modeled themselves after Bergh’s ASPCA. While local pounds were busy killing animals (treating them poorly in the process), humane groups were fighting to lower death rates and better their plight. In many ways, the battle rages to this day. While animal control is claiming to protect people from the (often incorrectly) perceived threats caused by animals, animal welfare groups are trying to protect animals from people. These have always been two very distinct movements, opposing each other on fundamental issues of life and death.

While we can try to bring these opposing principles closer together, the tension can never be eliminated. In the No Kill philosophy, we try to reconcile them as much as possible, forcing accountability onto animal control so that the only animals killed are those who are irremediably suffering (rigorously defined as a hopelessly ill or injured animal with a poor or grave prognosis for being able to live without severe, unremitting pain), hopelessly ill or injured (a sick or injured animal with a poor or grave prognosis for rehabilitation), or in the case of dogs, truly vicious (with a poor or grave prognosis for rehabilitation). But for 93% or so of the animals who do not fit these definitions, the No Kill philosophy not only demands that shelters save them, but through the No Kill Equation—comprehensively and rigorously implemented so that they replace killing entirely—provides the key to do so.

It is only through the No Kill philosophy that we begin to truly reduce the disparity between “animal control” and “animal welfare” in a way that is fair to the animals, and, for example, protects the public from the truly vicious dog. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t some irreconcilable tensions. There are, as discussed below. But it does mean we have put our cards on the table so that we can make distinctions and decisions in a fair and open manner.

When we simply ignore the distinctions (pretending to ourselves and to the public that no such disparity exists) or when we call ourselves one thing, but profess the opposite, we come dangerously close to the dictionary definition of lying. At the very least, we are misrepresenting ourselves, hiding behind the veneer of “animal welfare” or “animal protection,” when we really promote a philosophy that puts animals last or worse—even allows them to be executed based on unfair, misleading, impermissible, and thoughtless claims.

Among other things, this is the very heart of what is wrong with these pro-killing agencies. They claim to be about saving animals, about promoting the bonds between people and animals, and about leading the cause of animal welfare. But how can this be reconciled with their support for the killing of healthy feral cats or for calling them “nuisance” cats? It simply cannot.

As to the question of why they insist on taking positions that are, at their core, inherently antithetical to animal welfare, we must look to the “actors” who make up the leadership of these organizations. Here, the term “actor” is deliberate. Because while they play the public persona of animal lovers who would leave no stone unturned if it held out the promise of saving lives, the reality is that historically and presently, the leadership of these groups come primarily from the ranks of animal control, from a mindset that animals can and should be killed, that people must be protected from them (without regard for true risk analysis) and even that killing them is an act of kindness. And so they denigrate the animals they are supposed to protect, and veil their reactionary animal control agendas under the cloak of “animal welfare.”

And the public has, until recently, accepted it, because this view has dominated the national discussion of companion animals for so long; and, has essentially been the only voice, until the No Kill movement called it into question. In fact, the lack of challenge to this position has convinced many animal activists—even those who would label themselves as “animal rights”—to accept extreme Orwellian notions that killing is kindness, that cats are better off dead than outdoors, that dogs and cats should be killed, because it comes cloaked in the mantel of large, national animal welfare (and animal rights) groups. As a result, they have essentially been brainwashed to think that animal control based on killing poses no contradiction with an animal welfare mission, even though the latter has an altogether different philosophical underpinning. And as long as groups like this simply ignore the distinction and bring animal control mindsets to animal welfare without a bridging philosophy that is ethical and rigorous, animal control based on killing will continue to ride roughshod over animal welfare—and compassion will fall victim to control. (At its most enlightened, the two will come closest together under the banner of the No Kill philosophy.)

In order to change it, we must expose the truth. We must not be afraid to take the gloves off and call them the cat killers that they are. When they fundraise, they show images of happy animals and give the impression that they are working to protect them. That is why people donate. And it is why they will feel the pressure to change when people discover that the leading cause of death for healthy cats is not disease or cars, it is their local shelter.

In a managed cat colony how can one best help a pregnant mother?

There are three main choices with a mother about to give birth. First, trap the mother and allow her to give birth inside a home so that the kittens can be socialized and adopted out. Second, allow the kittens to be born, grow up feral, and then spay mama and kittens (when they are old enough) and return them to their habitats. Third, if it is a remote and safe location (mainly I mean safe from people), and the cats are healthy, one might consider the possibility that they don’t need anything, that they are wildlife who can live out their lives. We need to get past this notion that life is miserable being feral, that being an indoor pet is necessarily preferable to being an outdoor feral, and that we have to “save” them from a life of ferality.

How much success do you emphasize on lobbying local councils and governments to change their position towards managed cat colonies?

Most people think it is illegal to practice TNR because of local leash laws. But since feral cats are unowned, in the vast majority of cases the leash law doesn’t apply. Animal control might still try to write a citation, but I do not believe this is an argument they should win in court. Simply trapping for the purpose of spay/neuter, all the while presupposing the animal’s re-release, is not enough to establish ownership. Animal control tries to get around this through anti-feeding bans, pet limit laws (arguing that by feeding, you become the animal’s owner), etc., so there are some legal challenges, but I believe that the cat’s come first, and the fact that local pounds are stuck in a 19th century anti-cat model of sheltering based on killing should be openly fought if need be. If you are doing TNR and no one is interfering with you, it might not be a good idea to go public. Why bring on the controversy, especially if it could mean a killing of the cats?

But when approaching city councils, if necessary, it is important to focus broadly on all the issues, and not just lifesaving. There are also public health benefits and financial benefits to a jurisdiction and these should be at the forefront of arguments in favor of TNR.

It is important to state that TNR and colony management are effective in reducing the number of cats, and therefore, the number of chance encounters with humans. By contrast, prevention of TNR or the supported use of lethal methods, on the other hand, actually allows the population to continue multiplying. In fact, a San Francisco survey of feral cat caregivers found that every caregiver who implemented a TNR program saw their colony stabilize or decrease in number. In the United States, only about 0.0002% of cats get rabies every year, and a rabies vaccine as part of TNR eliminates risk. Not only are there no known cases of cats getting rabies if received at least one vaccination, but a cat to human rabies transmission has not occurred in the U.S. since 1975 (30 years!) according to the Center for Disease Control.

TNR increases neighborhood tranquility by reducing complaints: Before implementing TNR, Orange County Animal Services received 175 nuisance complaints a week. After implementing a TNR program, as a result of fewer cats and fewer “nuisance” behaviors associated with the cats that have been resolved by neutering, complaints have dropped dramatically. Since implementing community-wide TNR procedures in 2001 in Cape May, NJ, Animal Control has achieved an 80 percent drop in feral cat complaints. Orange County, FL, also reported savings of $655,949 over a six year period by neutering rather than killing feral cats. The Atlantic City (NJ) Health Department approved a TNR program for the Atlantic City Boardwalk, which accommodates 39 million visitors annually. The Health Department credited TNR with helping to “prevent injuries to humans, protect humans from public health and safety risks, and promote a healthy human population.” And combined statistics from the San Francisco Department of Animal Care & Control and the San Francisco SPCA show a decline in feral cat deaths of 73% and a decline in neonatal kitten deaths of 81% from 1993-2000, as a result of a citywide TNR initiative. Officials also credited the TNR program with a decline in cat field service pick-ups,“ DOAs,” and total cat impounds.

Can fighting free roaming cats be helped? How should the dominant male best be handled?

An unneutered Tom cat’s home range is about 10 miles. A neutered Tom cat’s home range is less than one mile. Male cats are motivated to roam for two main reasons: food and sex. Feed them in one location and neuter them, and you will resolve the vast, vast majority of fighting, spraying, dominant behavior. And because they roam less, you’ll see fewer “conflicts” with neighbors.

I don’t think many people realize this Nathan but a critical mass of mainly women were the first one’s that answered the call to try and help reduce suffering in the animal kingdom. Why is being a colony cat rescuer looked on by so many with disdain?

Public health and animal control authorities are agencies, at least in the U.S., which tend to be filled by dinosaurs who have a long history of reactionary policies, were hired to kill animals as a “solution” to problems, and like many bureaucrats, focus on self-preservation as opposed to innovation. They see caretakers as “creating” colonies and making their jobs easier. Better to write a citation in response to a neighbor complaint, than explain to the neighbor how the caretaker is not “creating” anything, but is actually part of a humane, compassion, long-term solution to reducing the number of free roaming cats and thus human-cat conflicts.

That women dominate this field on the front lines of compassion, but that stuffy, crotchety men who don’t have personal relationships with animals (and probably don’t really love them) lead most of the large national U.S. groups who are squandering that compassion tracks larger social histories. Interestingly enough, if you look at the most successful communities in the U.S. in terms of saving lives, places like Reno, NV, Charlottesville, VA, and others, these are shelters all run by women.

Winning community support: How did you do it?

A national survey in the U.S. found that while some people did not want free roaming cats, well over 95% did not want them killed. In the U.S., we spend $40 billion every year on our animal companions, through taxes and contributions, billions more go to animal agencies, giving to animal related causes is the single fastest growing segment of American philanthropy, catering to people with companion animals is one of the largest growth sectors for the travel and care industry, and No Kill is on the agenda of local governments nationwide. We already have community support.

But it is constantly being thwarted and undermined by groups like the Humane Society of the United States and PETA. I think the first order of business is to expose these groups for what they are, or reclaim the institutions at the local level who are supposed to be the animals’ voice, but currently focus on fundraising, self-preservation, and a “catch and kill” agenda cloaked under the mantel of animal welfare and animal rights.

Are free roaming cats the cause of wildlife and bird decline?

In a joint campaign called “Cats Indoors” established by the American Humane Association, the American Bird Conservancy and the Humane Society of the United States, the organizations claimed that “scientists estimate that cats kill hundreds of millions of birds each year and three times as many small mammals.” The coalition’s resulting Cats Indoors campaign would later go on to say that “[s]scientific studies actually show that each year, cats kill hundreds of millions of migratory songbirds. In 1990, researchers estimated that “outdoor” house cats and feral cats are responsible for killing nearly 78 million small mammals and birds annually in the United Kingdom. University of Wisconsin ornithologist, Dr. Stanley Temple estimates that 20-150 million songbirds are killed each year by rural cats in Wisconsin alone.”

Both of these claims fly in the face of the evidence, and neither of the studies cited stands up to scrutiny. In the British study, a bird advocate asked a small number of people living with cats who allowed the cats outside to record any birds and small mammals their cats brought home. The researcher then took that number, multiplied it by how many cats he guessed lived in England, and came up with the astonishing number of seventy-eight million. The methodology, to put it mildly, is unscientific; the “study” is nothing more than an oversimplified formula of multiplying a guessed number of cats in England by how many birds a small number of cats brought home. Since the world is not that simple, statistical models are not created by merely multiplying two numbers. The study’s formulation is, in the words of one reviewer, “irresponsible and reflects a feeble understanding of basic science.”

Science, by contrast, asks qualitative questions: How did the birds die? Did the cats kill them? Were they road kill or fledglings who would have died anyway? Was there any indication of disease in the prey? Was the catch freshly killed or were the birds dead for days? All of these answers could have been found with very little effort, but the author ignored them. More importantly, the study also ignored the fact that several hundred birds in the village where the study was conducted must die each year to maintain a stable population and that the village’s bird density was nine times higher than the rest of Britain! These latter facts lead to Jeff Elliott’s inescapable conclusion after he analyzed the study: “Taken together, these elements suggest another interpretation: cats are simply weeding out birds from an overcrowded population. Nor are they apparently catching healthy birds at their peak of winged life; wintertime is most stressful on birds that are old or sick, and fledglings tumbling down from nests could account for the high count in early summer. And with only 130 dead sparrows recorded… the cats kill—or find—less than half the numbers that must be annually culled to sustain their population.”

The Wisconsin study cited by these groups is simpler to debunk because it is not a “study” at all. In “Cats and Wildlife, a Conservation Dilemma,” Dr. Stanley Temple states, “recent research suggests that rural free-roaming domestic cats in Wisconsin may be killing between 8 and 217 million birds each year.” That “recent research” turned out to be his own citation, an article called “On the Prowl.” In that article, he states, the estimates of bird predation by cats are his “best guesses” by using the same quantitative (and discredited) formula from the British study. In a subsequent interview with Elliott, Dr. John Coleman (Dr. Temple’s protégé and co-author of the articles) commented that “the media has had a field day with this since we started. Those figures were from our proposal. They aren’t actual data; that was just our projection to show how bad it might be.”

That has not stopped anti-TNR groups, however, from citing it as factual. Belief, supported by bad science, is a hard opponent to defeat. According to Elliott, “we trust science. We put our faith in the writings of scientists. We trust that in the scientific pursuit of discovery, truth will hold sway.” But that is not always the case. Scientists can bring their own biases to the table, throwing a spin on results to make them best reflect preconceived notions. Data that points to a different conclusion can be ignored. Statistics can be manipulated to make results seem alarming.

Science can be pursued honestly, with integrity, at the same time it is in error. When we trust science, and it subsequently fails to live up to the rigors of comparative scrutiny, we take refuge in the process, the unfolding of what we call “the learning curve.” Private agendas pursued under the cloak of science pose a different problem altogether: they are, quite simply, an affront to the intellectually honest pursuit of knowledge. This is unforgivable, particularly when it comes at the expense—indeed calls for the end—of a vital humanitarian endeavor. A hidden agenda masquerading as science is especially appalling in light of the fact that it could potentially result in millions of cats slated for eradication.

The divide between the above studies and independent, well-designed, and methodical ones looking at the impact of feral cat predation on birds is glaring. Several more reliable studies found the presence of cats to actually be good for birds. In one study of cat predation in New Zealand, it was found that “cats suppress populations of more dangerous predators such as rats and thus allow denser populations of birds than would exist without them.” Another study looked at the impact of feral cat predation in Australia and came to the same conclusion, like virtually all non-partisan studies, that the “common belief that feral cats are serious predators of birds is apparently without basis.”

While bird species’ decline is evident, the vast majority of studies on the issue point to a different culprit: habitat destruction caused by humans. Pesticides are also recognized as a major culprit in bird decline—particularly the effect of toxic lawn care products, insecticides, fungicides, and rodenticides. A 1994 World Watch Institute study showed that four primary factors are responsible for bird declines: habitat loss, over trapping, drought, and pesticides. A 1993 study by the Center for Conservation Biology at Stanford University found environmental loss was responsible for the decline of the songbird. In 1998, the University of Georgia blamed forest fragmentation across the southern United States. An article in National Geographic in 1993 blamed poisons in the environment, particularly lawn care and farm products. Of course, Rachel Carson’s seminal work, Silent Spring, shared this conclusion. Unless we conclude that predation studies on four continents (fourteen studies in Europe, twelve in North America, nine in Australia, and one in Africa) are all wrong, feral cats should no longer be unfairly implicated in any decimation of bird populations.

Even Dr. Coleman himself admits that birds in Wisconsin who used to live in prairie lands have since lost their habitat to human encroachments and now only find refuge on farms. Farms, of course, are notorious for using significant amounts of pesticides. If they are truly in decline, the answer to why birds are disappearing from Wisconsin is not hard to see, if the question is being asked without a predetermined agenda.

For more information about feral cats, I encourage people to read my book Redemption: The Myth of Pet Overpopulation and the No Kill Revolution in America.

Do you think that animal welfarism is so weak because they caught on early to the fact that older women and men make bequests and leave money in their wills for animal welfare organisations without much research being done on what’s happening behind the scene.

Their goodwill has already assumed if they are told “we are working for the animals” then that means animals won’t be killed yet widespread killing in rich animal welfare organisations is the norm rather than exception. It’s an old con but an unbelievably effective con.

In the United States, we have shelters and animal welfare organizations with assets over 100 million dollars. In fact, the Humane Society of the United States alone has an annual budget in excess of 100 million dollars. In the U.S., giving to animal related causes is the single fastest growing segment of American philanthropy. Instead of using that money to save the greatest number of lives, many of these organizations are little more than fundraising operations. In fact, it is not unusual for the wealthiest shelter in a given community to also be the biggest impediment to saving feral cats or dogs and cats in general. This is certainly true in cities like Baltimore, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Chicago, Minneapolis/St. Paul, and elsewhere. Just to give you one example. After Hurricane Katrina devastated the greater New Orleans area several years ago, over $100 million was donated in the first thirty days. HSUS itself took the lion's share, well over $20 million but only spent $4 million before departing the area. It’s a travesty and a tragedy and one where the old maxim "follow the money" could not be more true.