05-03-2024, 11:18 PM
A reliable food source allows feral cat populations to grow quickly. This can lead to more cats than the environment can support, meaning more competition for resources and higher chances of disease spreading. Eliminating the cat food should (in theory) reduce the number of cats congregating and spreading diseases among the population and other animals. People who feed feral cats think they are doing them a favor, and perhaps they are helping some individuals, but they aren't doing any favors to all the other animals, artificially expanding a predator base that kills billions of endemic animals every year and is credited for playing a role in at least 26% of all animal extinctions in the last 500 years.
Several years ago there was a sick orange cat hanging around our farm harassing our chickens etc. It was really snotty and the eyes were so goopy and practically crusted shut that it wasn't having any success killing our chicks. I trapped him and we took him to the humane society. We didn't know the cat had an owner and considering how sick he looked, assumed that he didn't.
Later that day a "neighbor" (In quotes because they were squatters using and selling drugs and creating traffic and drama all hours of the day and night) was walking down the street and calling out a name. My wife went out and asked what she was looking for and she replied, her orange cat. She told her that we had just taken a sick orange cat to the humane society so she should try calling there. Unfortunately, the humane society told her they determined that the cat was so sick that it couldn't be allowed into their facility so they waived their normal hold period and euthanized it as soon as it was dropped off. So then we had a methed-out "neighbor" screaming at the top of her lungs that WE KILLED HER CAT. Our fault for breaking The Farmer's Creed. The screaming went on for a few hours, until she passed out I guess. Was the cat feral? No idea. It's owner certainly acted feral.
Several years ago there was a sick orange cat hanging around our farm harassing our chickens etc. It was really snotty and the eyes were so goopy and practically crusted shut that it wasn't having any success killing our chicks. I trapped him and we took him to the humane society. We didn't know the cat had an owner and considering how sick he looked, assumed that he didn't.
Later that day a "neighbor" (In quotes because they were squatters using and selling drugs and creating traffic and drama all hours of the day and night) was walking down the street and calling out a name. My wife went out and asked what she was looking for and she replied, her orange cat. She told her that we had just taken a sick orange cat to the humane society so she should try calling there. Unfortunately, the humane society told her they determined that the cat was so sick that it couldn't be allowed into their facility so they waived their normal hold period and euthanized it as soon as it was dropped off. So then we had a methed-out "neighbor" screaming at the top of her lungs that WE KILLED HER CAT. Our fault for breaking The Farmer's Creed. The screaming went on for a few hours, until she passed out I guess. Was the cat feral? No idea. It's owner certainly acted feral.