Kot: There are up to 60 million feral cats in the United States alone

Evidence: 45 • authority: 80

Evidence: 45 • authority: 92

Evidence: 45 • authority: 72

Evidence: 45 • authority: 72

The cat (Felis catus), also called domestic cat and house cat, is a small domesticated carnivorous mammal. It is a member of Felidae, the family of mammals in the order Carnivora also colloquially referred to as cats. An obligate carnivore requiring a predominantly meat-based diet, it has retractable claws adapted to killing small prey species such as mice and rats. It has a strong, flexible body, quick reflexes, and sharp teeth, and its night vision and sense of smell are well developed. It is a social species, but a solitary hunter and a crepuscular predator. Cat communication includes meowing, purring, trilling, hissing, growling, grunting, body language, and scent marking. It can hear s…

Evidence: 35 • authority: 92

Spatially explicit power analysis reveals challenges for a long-term threatened species monitoring program in Australia.. Long-term monitoring programs are crucial to assess trends in biodiversity and so make informed decisions for conservation and resource management. However, disregarding the statistical power of a monitoring program can lead to incorrect conclusions about species population trends, potentially resulting in ineffective management and misdirected resource allocation. In Australia, predation by introduced red foxes (Vulpes vulpes) and feral cats (Felis catus) remains a major cause of native faunal decline and extinction. Australia spends more than $16 million yearly in cont…

Evidence: 35 • authority: 80

Evidence: 35 • authority: 72

Cat predation on wildlife is the result of the natural instincts and behavior of feral and owned house cats to hunt small prey, including wildlife. Some people view this as a desirable trait, such as in the case of barn cats and other cats kept for the intended purpose of pest control in rural settings; but scientific evidence does not support the popular use of cats to control urban rat populations, and ecologists oppose their use for this purpose because of the disproportionate harm they do to native wildlife. Recognized as both invasive species and predators, cats have been shown to cause significant ecological harm across various ecosystems. Due to cats' natural hunting instinct, their…

Evidence: 35 • authority: 72

A feral cat or stray cat is an unowned domestic cat (Felis catus) that lives freely outdoors and avoids human contact; it does not allow itself to be handled or touched, and usually remains hidden from humans. Feral cats may breed over dozens of generations and become a mesopredator or even a local apex predator in urban, savannah and bushland environments, especially on islands where native animals did not evolve alongside natural predators. Some feral cats may become more comfortable with people who regularly feed them, but even with long-term attempts at socialization, they usually remain aloof and are most active after dusk. Of the 700 million cats in the world, an estimated 480 million…

Evidence: — • authority: 38