 St. Paul, Minnesota, April 22, 2009 - By 10 AM 15 feisty felines were delivered in live traps to St. Paul Animal Control. At many shelters or animal control centers, that would usually mean death for the cats. However, for the cats received at SPAC today, the outcome will be much better. They will be surgically spayed or neutered, vaccinated for rabies and marked as managed feral cats.
As winters in Minnesota have grown shorter and warmer, the state has been seeing growing numbers of feral cats, which are free-roaming, untamed offspring of domestic house cats. They are, in effect "kitties gone wild".
Though the negative impacts of feral cats are frequently exaggerated, most people agree that leaving large numbers of intact domestic pets to roam wild is not a good thing.
Traditional approaches to managing feral cat numbers have amounted to killing them. They have been trapped and killed, poisoned and shot.
Not only are these tactics considered inhumane, they are expensive and ineffective, due to the high reproduction capacity of feral felines.
Each female can have at least 3 litters of kittens in a year and the kittens themselves are able to reproduce at just 6 months of age. Cats are like breeding machines. In fact, with each breeding cycle, cats breed "surplus" kittens that usually do not survive due to various environmental factors that limit the population size. Killing adult animals does not change these environmental factors and, therefore, does not change the population at all.
The solution to all of this, according to animal welfare advocates, is called Trap Neuter Return, or TNR.
TNR advocates understand that the key to managing feral cat populations is reducing or eliminating reproduction. Disease concerns can be addressed through vaccination. Additionally, concern about the impact of feral cats on native wildlife populations can be addressed by providing food for cats, so they have less need to kill birds and other animals.
Additionally, they say, TNR can reduce the numbers of animals entering animal shelters and impound centers, thereby decreasing animal control costs and the numbers of animals killed at these facilities.
The average cost to take in and kill a feral cat is between $75 and $100. The cost to sterilize and release it: $35.
The felines that arrived at St. Paul Animal Control today are part of a precedent-setting program to help control the community's feral cat population. They were trapped by St. Paul residents, using traps provided by the City. Sterilization surgeries are being performed in Animal Ark's mobile surgical hospital called the Neuter Commuter. Volunteers and funds are also provided to the program by other animal welfare groups that are part of a coalition called Homes For All Pets, that has the stated goal of reducing unnecessary euthanasia of companion animals in shelters.
Staff at St. Paul Animal Control and Animal Ark with some of the first feral cats of the 2009 Wildcat Wednesdays season
Mary Salter from Animal Ark sedates the first cat of the season
Animal Ark staff on the Neuter Commuter prepare the first cat for surgery | Related Links:
2008 Wildcat Wednesdays Season Bigger than Ever
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