Saturday, November 04, 2006

33) Open season on Cats

I received this from a friend:

My neighbor is trapping cats . I don't know what he does with them .His wife says he takes them to the humane society,I don't believe her. Can he do that. I know of about 10 that have disappeared now one of my pets seems to be missing.

And I responded with:


Unfortunately for cat lovers.....there are no laws that prevent trapping, hunting, killing cats, unless it could come under the "cruelty to animals" laws. Highly unlikely, difficult to prove, almost impossible to prosecute.

Only people with a lot of animals get prosecuted for "cruelty" to animals. That makes a big splash in the news, gets all kinds of people fired up, generates bunches of donations to humane societies to prevent such cruelty. (ha!)

I seriously doubt he is taking them to the humane society. They charge a fee of some kind to accept an animal.

The best deterrant for such activities is for people in the neighborhood to let it be known to that person that they know who is doing it. These sneaky, conniving, cowardly bastards generally can't take the heat of knowing that other people know just exactly what sneaky, conniving, cowardly bastards they really are.

One way to do that (diplomatically) is to take pictures of your cats and give the photos to the guy, tell him if he catches one of your cats you would appreciate it if you could recover it before he "takes it to the humane society" (funny how that sounds so much like takes it out in the bushes and shoots it).

On the other hand....we used to be a dairy farm a little over a mile down the road from the humane society. We called it the humane society annex. People would take animals and find them not open or the fee too much and then they would drive by and dump them here. Cows been gone a few years now and a couple rounds of cat respiratory infection and the cat population has thinned down a lot. Those cats carried all manner of parasites...........

Don't know where you live, but there are a couple "Chinese houses" in Owosso that have greatly reduced the pet population in their neighborhoods. (They eat them.)

Then my friend requested that I post this information on my blog and on the SRCC Open Forum. So, here it is with a little addition:

I will add this sort of thing is a good argument for licensing cats. It is against the law to shoot a dog wearing a license, could be the same for cats.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

from SRCC Open Forum

Posted By: Fritz
Date: Saturday, 4 November 2006, at 6:15 p.m.

In Response To: 33) Open season on Cats (kaylor)

Ground nesting birds have all but disappeared in this county as well as other areas of the midwest. A University of Wisconsin study years ago placed the blame on Feral (untamed) cats.
Cats have been allowed free range as long as I can remember. Dogs are supposed to (by law) be on leash or under voice command at all times. Cats can roam at will. I have a Feral cat living in a window well at this moment. My inclination is to trap the animal and drown or gas it. I'll probably end up in jail if I do. Whether an animal lives or dies is up to the owner and their responsibility alone!!!! If you allow your animals to roam freely in the neighborhood, you have no one to blame but yourself if the animal comes to harm.

bob said...

I have 8 cats now only 6 because my neighbor is shooting them. The other day he shoot and killed one coming home in my front yard. Do we shoot deer in the front yard or any other animal running free. What give the right to any person to kill an animal free or pet if they do no harm. He says it was in his garbage, we all live in the woods and once I had a possum in my garbage I learned not to put it out. We all have to live on this earth the cats have no chance if we let people like him just shoot at will.

admin said...

Thank you for your post and I sympathize with you.

I don't believe your neighbor has the right to shoot your cat in your yard. There may be legal charges you could bring against him. It is highly unlikely the police would do anything. I don't know your neighborhood, but what are the shooting laws there?

There might be something about destruction of property, illegal shooting, reckless endangerment (shooting in your yard).

The law doesn't give a rip about the cat. That is one reason why I advocate licensing cats. Same as dogs. It is illegal to shoot a dog wearing a license. That could be the same for cats. At the moment it is, indeed, "Open season on cats" and I'm sure that is very difficult for many people who love their cats and you are quite right, they do no harm.

Anonymous said...

Alright i live in the country and we have barns and what have you . see the cats do cause harm as in they have killed small chickens and ducks on my property. and i see that as a harmful thing so ther for they needed to be taken care of yes household taged cats should and are off limits but a stray cat walks on to my property ill be sure that it dont make it vary far. . see dogs are off limits do to the fact they are worth some thing like my lab that is used for hunting is has a reason to be kept around cats no reason they just cause problems and make messes so keep them in your house and or on your property

admin said...

You are quite legal in what you are doing. I'm sorry, 'legal' isn't always right, moral or even ethical. I'm sorry you have lost some farm animals, but a chick or two hardly seems worth breaking a child's heart because you shot their cat. There is no legal protection for the cat, but the hard feelings created sometimes put a cost on you that far exceeds the cost of whatever you already lost. You become known as the neighborhood pet killer, everyone hates you. It takes a toll.