New Zealand has announced plans to eradicate feral cats by 2050, as part of efforts to protect the country’s biodiversity.
Speaking to Radio New Zealand on Thursday, conservation minister Tama Potaka said that feral cats are “stone cold killers” and would be added to the country’s Predator Free 2050 list, which aims to eradicate those animals that have a negative impact on species such as birds, bats, lizards and insects.
Cats had previously been excluded from the list, which includes species such as stoats, ferrets, weasels, rats and possums, but Potaka used the interview to announce a U-turn.
Cats have the exact same right to bring extinction to this world as we do.
I wish “middlebrow dismissal” had become a more common term. It basically means a knee-jerk rejection of an idea without seriously engaging or investigating it. A “cache dump of prejudices” rather than argument.
This thread is absolutely filled with people who think they know better than kiwi conservationists that have studied and discussed this topic in depth.
Most people didn’t read the story, and don’t actually care, they are just feeling emotions and need to vomit it out. Even if they did read the story, most people don’t really understand things like ecology anyway so it’s unlikely to change their emotional reactions.
It’s still weird to dismiss the insane destructive power of the domestic shorthair. Killing is practically their only pastime
I’m sorry, I read this headline like a Dr. Doofenschmirtz plan, ahahahahahaha
Perry the Catypus on his way to throw some paws
Is this gonna be like Australia’s war against the Emus? That they lost.
NZ is quite a bit smaller!
But cats are smaller too which either makes it easier for the Kiwis or more like the Australia/emu situation.
Why just not eat them?
Darkness
We are the extinction event
@[email protected] @[email protected]
Speaking to Radio New Zealand on Thursday, conservation minister Tama Potaka said that feral cats are “stone cold killers” and would be added to the country’s Predator Free 2050 list, which aims to eradicate those animals that have a negative impact on species such as birds, bats, lizards and insects.
Unfortunately the aforementioned list will never contain the most “stone cold killer”, most dangerous predator species of 'em all, because it’s a list kept by that very species themselves.
Unfortunately the aforementioned list will never contain the most “stone cold killer”, most dangerous predator species of 'em all, because it’s a list kept by that very species themselves.
nods knowingly
Wallabies…
Not even ACT are foolish enough to challenge the might of the feral wallaby population
Remember when Europe burned all the cats and that caused the plague to get a lot more out of control? I’m sure it will work out this time though
Very, very different situation, I wouldn’t make the comparison unless:
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You’re ready to get fucking educated on ecology and biology.
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You’re a troll trying to make people react.
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Cats are causing lots of harm to the native wildlife there. You know since they didn’t evolve with things similar to cats.
Has sanitation, pest control, and medicine have advanced since the 13th century?
No … we still need cats to do all the heavy lifting.
You know, I can think of one species that’s a lot more harmful to the environment. Maybe the cats of NZ should start hunting non-native members of that species.
Humans are the species that brought cats to the island which are destroying the local ecosystem. So yeah, getting rid of people would help but that ain’t fucking happening so we have to correct our mistakes where we can.
Are… are you talking about humans?
Yes, but I think we need to distinguish between the native population, which has proven capable of co-existing with the local ecosystem, and the settlers, who’ll need to be culled.
Maybe we can be a little animale and let the aborigines adopt the more tame settlers. Find them nice, loving homes, you know? The rest will unfortunately need to be euthanised.
Given Australia and New Zealand’s proximity to one another on the map, it makes sense to assume that the latter was originally settled by explorers from the former; and, indeed, Aboriginal Australian people can be credibly dated back more than 50,000 years, when they were able to walk to the continent from what is now New Guinea.
But no! There’s no real archaeological sign of Aboriginal Australians (or anyone else) settling on the island that would become New Zealand until the Maori arrived from Polynesia, around 800 years ago.
I didn’t leave out a zero; human habitation on New Zealand has a history of less than a thousand years. In fact, the Maori only beat Europeans to New Zealand (which they called “Aotearoa”) by about 300 years, and archaeological records indicate that they brought invasive species with them, too. They also caused the extinction of at least two bird species before European colonization even began.
Maori are great, great people. But I don’t think that they’ve “proven [themselves] capable of co-existing with the local ecosystem” any more than the European descendants have.
(As a side note, the word “aborigines” in that part of the world carries a potentially problematic connotation. Some Aboriginal Australians see it as a holdover from that country’s colonial era.)
So who’s native in New Zealand? How long have they been there. Or the fact that they are not white gives them special privileges.
The Maori brought pigs and had farms. The “noble savage” trope is racist.
Aborigines is Australia, the first people of NZ are the Maori and they’ve only been there since the 1300s
Cats must only be indoor pets. We can easily separate pet mice and rats from their feral counterparts and we need to do the same to cats. And I am a cat person big time.
If you care about cats and/or if you care about the environment, you keep your pet cats indoors. Simple as.
A lot of reactionary, super-sensitive, chronically online children in this post wailing into the void because they’re imagining some kind of housecat Auschwitz.
You can’t claim to care about the environment and be fine with feral cats eliminating some of the most unique biodiversity on the planet. You midwit pussies out there have to make a choice.
+1 for indoor only cats. Those cunts are ruthless - they can’t not murder wild animals and we’ve got a lot of native birds here so keep em indoors.
Same.
Love cats.
Keep them in doors.
Outdoor cats and feral cats are walking, prowling ecological disasters.
I find it kind of amazing that humans will constantly look outwardly as if everything that is happening isn’t a direct result of their own failures as nature’s caretakers. Yes, let’s kill the cats because of all the havoc they’re wreaking on our biodiversity but let’s also ignore all the havoc that we ourselves continue to wreak. Let’s applaud ourselves for caring so much about the environment by slaughtering one of man’s two best friends. Irresponsible cat owners aside, there are ways that (key phrase here) cost money that involve a well-known acronym, TNR to combat feral cat populations. They can be re-homed or put aboard ships to tackle rodent problems at sea and become resident sailor cats. There are better ways than blindly dropping poison fucking sausage and installing automatic poison spray machines around town. As if that won’t result in any accidental deaths of spayed neighborhood outdoor cats with chips, collars, and loving families. This thread has absolutely lost the plot if everyone agrees with the methods put forth in the article. I can assure you, this is some grade A bs.
Have you ever met a truley feral cat they cannot be rehomed.
Yes, let’s kill the cats because of all the havoc they’re wreaking on our biodiversity but let’s also ignore all the havoc that we ourselves continue to wreak.
So because humans do bad things, we should allow bad thing to continue to happen.
I would say you should get directly involved, I am sure there are plenty of groups trying to do exactly what you say which is raise money for alternative solutions, but I kind of have the feeling you’re not going to.
There are not cheaper ways, though. It’s a monumental task and if it is done incompletely, it was pointless to even undertake.
Most feral animals can’t just be “re-homed”. Cats don’t need humans to be happy and to thrive. They don’t need a house. They don’t need a ship. The most we should do for them is give them a cat island (where they would likely turn cannibal and start consuming each other within a generation).
Do cats in new Zealand have a lower than average literacy rate?
Cats are remarkably capable predators, and cat owners are remarkably irresponsible.
Letting your cat be an “outside” cat is bad enough for the environment. Not spaying/neutering said “outside cat” is how we get feral cats everywhere.
That said, I dont love the vague “eradicate feral cats” language. Would greatly prefer a broad spectrum spay/neuter/tag program to naturally reduce their population.
Predator-free NZ was always destined to ruffle some feathers though.
As someone who donates significantly to spay/neuter efforts (in the U.S.), these irresponsible people piss me the fuck off. To the extent that I have cut people out of my social circle over the issue.
My fucking neighbors just keep letting their outdoor only cats reproduce and get mad when they meow for kibble. It’s the worst. My county has a well funded TNR and last litter program, but they don’t give a shit. I’ve done TNR of at least 8 or 9 cats and they just keep coming.
These aren’t even the completely wild and feral cats or anything (since the shitty neighbors feed them from time to time) although I’m sure their offspring has made some feral cats by now. It’s horrible.
I don’t think just spaying is enough. It’d have to be capture or even worst case euthanize. Leaving cats and any nonnative predator is especially harsh on local species each second they are in the wild because new zealand is one of the few places with flightless birds like the kakapo, which are critically endangered (just one step away from being extinct in the wild)
Spaying and neutering and releasing is more effective because then they still compete for the same resources, pushing reproduction down. I wonder if they can use that she other methods to get the population down to zero.
That’s when you are trying to control the population. These are invasive species, worse than that, invasive predators. Eradication and control are two different things.
Neither of those solves the problem entirely, but an eradication aims to keep the population of invasive species much lower than control. Any amount of invasive predators, especially as effective as feral cats, needs to be controlled.
Feral cats and pet cats are just two different things, like feral pigs and wild pigs. Even pet cats need to be tightly controlled, every bird a pet cat kills is multiplied in aggregate, these things we love are absolutely brutal.
Yes that’s why I said “I wonder if they can use that
sheand other methods to get the population down to zero.” Zero means eradication.I’m sorry, that’s totally fair, I don’t mean to sound dickish. They can’t hit zero. Australia is a model for how bad invasive cats can get, and the cat is already out of the bag, so to speak. They either target aggressive goals, which are primarily culling mixed with chemical and some limited physical spay/neutering programs. But when you are talking bang for buck, it’s really easy to look to culling primarily.
Spay nueter programs are much more expensive and usually donor funded. You gotta do a lot to an animal to even modestly safely remove it’s sex organs, especially females. I wouldn’t be surprised if they pop up in NZ, privately funded, in addition to the other programs. Desexing is still is the best way to deal with an active colony with a food source, you are right.
New Zealand has no native predators, and cats are extremely good predators.
These aren’t house cats that got lost, these are cats that are entirely wild and are now an invasive species. TNR would still decimate the local fauna while waiting for nature to take its course.
They also can’t be housed like you might do with a house cat turned stray.
as much as I love house cats, in New Zealand, the feral cats are an ecological apocalypse.
they gotta put thiel on that list
Rats are already on it.
I adopted mine, got her spayed, and she absolutely never goes outside. Not that she would, she’s too much of a chicken shit to bother trying to get out.
look up austrialian cat plague…at a certain point exterminating them is the only realistic option
The dairy industry is significantly more damaging to NZ’s ecology than some feral cats. I’m not saying it shouldn’t be addressed, but there are measures already in place. It’s important to keep perspective and not be distracted by media.
It’s possible to do two things at a time. Cats and dairy are not mutually exclusive.
To the people thinking “oh poor kitties”. In New Zealand, cats are like terminators (or more accurately, Predators from those movies). Pretty much everything evolved to be incredibly easy pray for cats. Sure, it sucks that cats have to die, but they’re an incredibly invasive species that hunts the native species to extinction. They should’ve never been imported in the first place.
New zealand is extremely prone because its home to flightless birds and other similar species that never grew up against land predators of this nature. That’s why cats and even rats are especially dangerous. These flightless birds have no real way of protecting their young and even themselves.
It’s sad for cats because we see them as companions and pets, but new zealand holds a lot of critically endangered species that simply cannot exist anywhere else
All of Oceania is this. There’s a lot of unique land animals that evolved with no threat. European colonisation really fucked that entire region and the ecosystems within.
On average, each roaming, hunting pet cat kills more than three animals every week. The numbers add up. On average, over a year each roaming and hunting pet cat in Australia kills 186 animals. This number includes 110 native animals (40 reptiles, 38 birds and 32 mammals).
That’s for Australia’s 3.7M pet cats that aren’t kept indoors 24/7. So that’s approx 407M native animals killed each year by cat lovers that don’t responsibly take care of their cat—71% of cat owners. Factor in other contamination and habitat destruction, you can expect that to be closer or even over half a billion native animals killed each year.
So, yeah, Oceania countries will hunt and kill cats. And anyone that doesn’t keep their cat inside or at least bell it’s collar, is a real piece of shit. Certainly doesn’t give a fuck about animals and the environment. It’s a totally different part of the world to Eurasia where it’s fine to just have strays all over the countryside because they’re actually a part of the functioning ecosystem.
Source: https://biodiversitycouncil.org.au/resources/the-impact-of-roaming-pet-cats-on-australian-wildlife
That’s pet cats and doesn’t count the damage that feral cats do.
Here claims that Australia’s Cats Kill Two Billion Animals Annually, with feral cats killing 1.4 Billion.
I’ve personally scraped up native birds and possums that were killed by neighbours roaming pet cats. Most not eaten. And some just paralysed and left that I called WIRES wildlife rescue for. It’s heartbreaking. These poor little critters didn’t deserve an ending like that.
Cats like hunting. Please keep your kitty inside.
Time for them to catch up in evolution’s arms race or be left behind with the other failures like the dodo and the dinosaurs
Or the feral cats? Does humanity deciding to cull a species not perfectly fit that model as you imagine it?
Not how evolution works.
Survival of the fittest? No? Am I a slider? Did I land on a world where natural selection isn’t one of the evolutionary pressures on the ecosystem?
One of yes. Along with gene drift and flow, and genetic mutation. But our imperialist, capitalist societies really love to lean into the survival of the fittest as the end all, be all of evolution and life. There’s a whole lot more to the complexities of nature even if our “might equals right” societies don’t see it.
I wouldn’t bother. If they’re this simple and loud about whatever they think they comprehend of evolution and natural selection concepts, you know them and their cat are ironically nature’s food in the first 48 hours detached from society’s teet. Lucky for them, we keep getting better at keeping the weakest around. Mike Judge does a good film about it.
I’m sorry that your love of cute, cuddly animals has allowed you to suspend your belief in basic science. I’d hoped you were made of sterner stuff. Perhaps on your next interaction, you could dispense with the backhanded insults and argue the actual point?
No one in New Zealand actually wants to go around killing cats. Euthanizing them is the tool of last resort, and it’s generally prioritized for areas where urgency is high and other more humane solutions are hard to implement.
You can’t fuck around in an island ecosystem. You have to make hard choices in order to preserve the lives of the native plants and animals.
there’s a lot of really impractical, child-minded fools online, this site collects a LOT of them because Lemmy communities tend to be really shut off ecosystems.
There’s a joke in here about introducing an invasive predatory species to the closed ecosystems of Lemmy but I am too angry at the midwits and giant, fake progressives here to formulate it.
Like humans aren’t?
lol what is this supposed to imply or perscribe?
Sure, but try proposing culling people instead and see how far you get…
