• Lodespawn@aussie.zone
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    17 hours ago

    In Australia there is an expectation that people keep their cats inside because those little murder machine are able to decimate a significant amount of our native fauna. I was shocked when I moved to the UK for a few years to find out that a typical requirement for getting a cat there through legitimate sources included committing to letting them roam outside.

    • jaybone@lemmy.zip
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      12 hours ago

      In Australia, I’m surprised the local fauna doesn’t decimate the cats.

      In some densely populated cities, cats help control the rat population.

    • Asetru@feddit.org
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      16 hours ago

      “Humans are destroying the planet and drive a lot of the fauna towards extinction. Let’s blame…” spins wheel… “Cats.”

      • Bademantel@lemmy.world
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        16 hours ago

        Plot twist: They are there because of us! There are many reasons why biodiversity is rapidly declining. That doesn’t mean that cats are not wreaking havoc on the local bird population:

        • VonReposti@feddit.dk
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          15 hours ago

          Why are US numbers way off the chart for cats and windows? Is the US overrun with cats and murderous windows? How do you make sure the windows stay friendly towards humans? Do you export bad windows to Russia?

          There are so many questions…

            • VonReposti@feddit.dk
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              15 hours ago

              Adjusting for population the numbers should only be 10 times higher, 1.96 billion for cats and 250 million for windows. Cats are close to equal but I’m still concerned about your windows.

              • zikzak025@lemmy.world
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                7 hours ago

                US has more regions with warm climates that birds live in year round. A lot of bird species only live in Canada half the year and then migrate south for winter.

                • Soggy@lemmy.world
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                  5 hours ago

                  We really need to emphasize data analysis more in school, that’s obvious surface-level stuff they just didn’t consider.

      • Lodespawn@aussie.zone
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        15 hours ago

        Yeah well cats aren’t native to Australia, humans brought them here so that’s on us, the common house cat is an apex predator here, cat owners need to take some responsibility for their murder machines or we end up with more 20 kg feral cats that can take out a kangaroo

        • Soggy@lemmy.world
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          5 hours ago

          Nitpick, but cats aren’t an “apex” predator in any environment. They are hunted by pretty much every carnivore at least as big as a coyote, including large birds of prey.

          • zikzak025@lemmy.world
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            3 hours ago

            They are in New Zealand, where the problem is worse than in Australia. New Zealand has zero native land predators. There are some birds of prey that can hunt invasive stoats and rats, but cats are effectively uncontested (with the exception of humans performing population control).