Forget Libya: Birds are Being Decimated by Cats!
In other words, our innocent love of cats is fucking up the environment more than some of our man-made machines. “[Kitties] are like gypsy moths and kudzu – they cause major ecological disruption,” said Dr. Peter Marra of the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute.
By Dan Hoffman
Cats, famous throughout history because of the Egyptians and the website LOLCats.com, are coming under fire. A new study published in The Journal of Ornithology found that in the Washington D.C area, the number one cause of bird mortality was kitty predation. In fact, it has gotten so drastic that certain species of birds are having trouble replacing their numbers. Those kitties are misbehavin’.
Wind turbines, a more eco-friendly source of power, are commonly pointed to as problematic for bird life. But these devices, although they might slice birds in half, account for only 440,000 bird deaths each year, according to the US Fish and Wildlife Service, whereas kitties account for 500 millions bird deaths each year, according to the American Bird Conservatory (ABC).
In other words, our innocent love of cats is fucking up the environment more than some of our man-made machines. “[Kitties] are like gypsy moths and kudzu – they cause major ecological disruption,” said Dr. Peter Marra of the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute.
“I hope we can now stop minimizing and trivializing the impacts that outdoor cats have on the environment, and start addressing the serious problem of cat predation,” said Darin Schroeder of ABC.