Is it moral to shoot stray cats?

[iamrefreshed]

And if you go out to any target range on the weekend for causal practice you can easily shoot 500 rounds of ammunition in a couple of hours.

500 rounds of ammunition to a shooter is like a dozen golf balls to a golfer!

Two hours on the golf course…A dozen golf balls…Sounds just about right for a golfer like me!

 

[melensdad]

http://www.americandigest.org/mt-archives/cat burglar-thumb.jpg

Well back on a serious note, but those pictures are funny

I found this website: aaanimalcontrol.com/professional-trapper/howtogetridofstraycats.htm

This was an interesting quotation from the website:

Their behavior is completely different from domesticated cats. They are truly wild animals!
. . .
Of all of the wild animals I have dealt with, trapped feral cats can be the most ferocious! They claw, bite, hiss, emit a nasty musk scent, and do anything to escape. I’ve seen ferals scale a ten foot wall. They’re not to be trifled with.​

The ultimate answer on the webpage to feral cats was to trap them and take them to a shelter where they are killed. This is from a service that charges money for each trapping so they have a vested interest in trapping the animals. They said they take them to local shelters that offer them for adoption but stated that most are simply killed by the shelter.

 

[Kitty_Chan]

And suggested that shooting was nothing more than a band-aid solution, just like traps would be only a band-aid.

I don’t know that anyone specifically agreed/disagreed with the overall message, but I think that both shooting and trapping are final solutions. The problem is not caused by cats that city folk keep dumping out here, the problem was caused by one family that left all their cats to become wild, then they moved away. So there is a finite number of cats here, at least as the situation has developed.

Sorry but it is a band aid. It only works on a finite number of cats. If more come then you have to deal with it again. If no more come then shoot em all, if its good with you. Dont ask us. You asked for those who didnt agree to provide solutions. I did.

Problem is Im talking about a actual working final solution. Because it will happen again if people dont change, its a cycle, it doesnt end. If theres 20 cats shoot away, you have mentioned more about the bullets. What you are trying to do now is justify your reasonings, dont. Do it. If you have to justify then dont.

Trapping I said doesnt work, I cited a bylaw in a city where it doesnt work, the population stays the same

BECAUSE people dont spay and neuter their animals. And moreover they dont take care of them properly and allow them to run free and dump them in places like yours. What if the next neighbours are as careless as the last? then youre shooting again thats why I said its a bandaid.

BTW trapping isnt for capture and release, its to take to the shelter to adopt or put down. I thought Id made it clear I didnt think it was a solution for you and as a solution its pretty bad, it doesnt correct the actual problem and like you said the cat gets more upset.

I mentioned the Humane Society or Wildlife Fish and Game officers and enlisting help from them that was the point of my post, but if your not interested then it doesnt concern me, I was only trying to supply the help you requested.

Once again if you have to justify it Id say on the moral theology side of things means dont.

if you dont have to justify, then go ahead, the moral dilema doesnt exist.

hope thats clearer.

 

[Bennie_P]

It really isn’t problem of morality but a matter of legality.
For me I have decided that my family will not own cats period, in order to help not create any similar problem in which are challenged with. IMO, I think we need a law passed outlawing domestic cats, for I am a bird lover and domestic cats have no pratical use. You can’t take them hunting, they don’t scare away burglers, you can’t train them to guide the visual impaired, nor can they help you herd your sheep. What good are they but to use as target practice? Of course if my wife saw this post she would use me for taret practice.

On the serious side, like Kitty Chan said people need to be more responsible with their pets and no matter what you do in another year or two you may have the same problem. Have a chat with your local animal control officer before you pull the trigger. there is no since going to jail over a cat besides they may provide traps and pick them up for you.

I agree the pictures are funny.

 

[brianwalden]

I think people here are confusing the moral question of whether or not shooting feral cats is sinful with the political question of whether or not it’s prudent to do so.

Morally, I don’t see anything wrong with the OP’s stated reasons for shooting them. Politically, I don’t know anything about feral cats or their management so I have no opinion on whether or not shooting them is the best solution.

 

[Kitty_Chan]

Awww Bennie

cats catch mice and other varmits too, simply being there can keep them out, make sure you get up and remind you to go to bed. Keep the dog in line, they teach you humility by reminding you whos in control. They also dont like the nasty feral cats with their tattoos and all. They and other animals teach you kindness, patience, caring and lower your blood pressure and keep you company.

And on a night when they snuggle up and purr you to sleep, they remind you, youre loved. Or at least warm enough to snuggle.



Oh and btw you may want to check history on the hunting part. Any self respecting Eygptian family owned a cat, who would go hunting with the master.

 

[Bennie_P]

Awww Bennie

cats catch mice and other varmits too, simply being there can keep them out, make sure you get up and remind you to go to bed. Keep the dog in line, they teach you humility by reminding you whos in control. They also dont like the nasty feral cats with their tattoos and all. They and other animals teach you kindness, patience, caring and lower your blood pressure and keep you company.

And on a night when they snuggle up and purr you to sleep, they remind you, youre loved. Or at least warm enough to snuggle.

.

And don’t forget the fleas
cats.lovetoknow.com/images/Cats/thumb/a/a0/Cat_with_fleas.JPG/300px-Cat_with_fleas.JPG

South Dakota and Minnesota both allow wild cats to be shot. Some estimates indicate 2 million wild cats roam Wisconsin. The state says studies show feral cats kill between 47 million and 139 million songbirds a year.

 

[Rebelecka]

ONLY IF YOU’RE GOING TO EAT IT!

 

[melensdad]

I think it would be better to trap the cat before assuming it’s a stray or feral and just shooting it. What if it was someone’s pet? (Some owners don’t put collars on their cats)

Well I just thought I would give the city/suburban dwellers a little visual update on where I live. The picture below is an image of my car’s GPS “navigation” screen. It is a digital map of the paved and major roads surrounding my property.

Roads show up as YELLOW lines on the map. What? You don’t see any YELLOW lines on the map! Yup, that is because we have a narrow private lane that we live on, it is not included on most maps.

The light blue marks are creeks and ponds around us. The circle with the arrow in the middle of the map is where I live. My property goes back to the creek you see running across the screen. On the other side of the creek there are zero houses in that entire area. If you look to the lower right of the screen, you will see a white bar, with some letters above it. That is the scale of the map. That white bar represents 1/2 mile. So the total size of the screen is approximately representing roughly 25 square miles. There are probably 25 houses in that entire area, all of those would be located in the extreme lower portion of the screen.

It is very unlikely that any of these cats in the area are house pets. Its also unlikely that a cat roaming near the river would belong to someone who lives near the bottom of that map as it would have to travel several miles to get back home every day.

The OTHER picture is a photo taken from my bedroom window of an approaching storm. The bean field you see is my back yard. The middle tree line runs along the creek you see in the digital map. If you look close, you can see the neighbor’s farm on the horizon line. The farm in the photo is not on the digital map shown in the other picture, it would appear about 1" above to top of the screen if the screen was larger.

As we have few roads, we don’t have a problem with people dropping off more unwanted cats. The cat problem we have was all caused by one family who left the area and also left a couple dozen cats.

 

[He_Man]

I totally agree with you. I also feel that the shooting of stray cats is wrong.

What about deer? Chickens? Turkeys? Fish?

It seems cats get a pass because I pet one in the evening. That is hardly a pragmatic reason to condemn hunting of certain animals.

 

[Kitty_Chan]

As we have few roads, we don’t have a problem with people dropping off more unwanted cats. The cat problem we have was all caused by one family who left the area and also left a couple dozen cats.

Then you have made your mind up, you dont need our blessings. Its obviously good with you, it makes sense, its good with your soul. May your aim be true.

I will still say that not all in the country have a isolated issue like you and to those they should work with their animal authorities.

 

[Delphinus85]

It can. Plus reintroductions are not always at the place they came from.

The problem is, who has (on average) 100 bucks PER CAT for a spay or neuter?

 

[vern_humphrey]

The problem is, who has (on average) 100 bucks PER CAT for a spay or neuter?

Especially when you can get a box of 550 .22 shells at Wal Mart for around ten bucks.

 

[melensdad]

The problem is, who has (on average) 100 bucks PER CAT for a spay or neuter?

Well beyond THAT problem, I would suggest that there is an inherent immorality in re-releasing the cats back into the wild. The location of where they are re-released is not even relevant. Just the fact that a non-native predator is placed into the wild, intentionally, where it will continue to destroy the native species is morally wrong. **It is simply bad stewardship of the land. **

I would presume that St Francis would argue strongly against setting a fox free in a henhouse, but that is exactly what it is like if cats are set free into the wild. The ground dwelling birds, low nesting birds, and small animals are essentially defenseless against a cat.

Are we not supposed to be good stewards of the land, environment, eco-system? If so, then by setting the cat free we simply sign a death warrant for native species and that is probably a bigger injustice than destroying the cat.

I realize these cats are not at fault. They are just trying to survive, as is their nature. The thoughtless folks who let them run are the ones to blame, but we can cry all day about who and why to blame them and it won’t solve the problem or change the situation. As much as I don’t care to kill an animal, I feel that now I must do this.

When I started the thread I hoped that someone would talk me out of shooting them. It seemed logical to shoot them but also somehow seemed wrong. It certainly no longer seems wrong, and certainly remains logical. Its still distasteful, but that won’t ever change.

Especially when you can get a box of 550 .22 shells at Wal Mart for around ten bucks.

$8.50 on sale

 

[thedavidwilson]

this is why it is always good to find a shelter that has a no kill policy.
unfortunately, your correct. there are feral cats that are not fit for adoption. in cases like this, it is up to the shelter to do what they feel is necessary for the animal.

So if the shelter has a no kill policy and the cat is feral would they just keep it in a cage the rest of its life? How humane is that?

Remember folks cats are animals. They have a soul but not a spirit (i.e. when their body dies their soul dies). We have dominion over the animals. The only reason we should not kill any animal is if we would derive pleasure from causing them harm. It seems the OP has a valid reason and is not getting a sick pleasure from it. So this is OK. If you used a varmit rifle (.17 calibur) or even a 22 the thing would die instantly. So no harm done. Just make sure it is not someone’s pet, because you would be causing the owner harm.

 

[Kitty_Chan]

The problem is, who has (on average) 100 bucks PER CAT for a spay or neuter?

This is what Im speaking about, if 100 bucks is too much then one should not get a cat or dog, period. If you cant afford it then dont do it. THIS is why animals get dumped!!! :banghead:

ALSO why we tried for licensing to offset the costs of spaying neutering to help families. Thats why I keep saying to work with local shelters and animal control about the problems in your own areas.

Because if people made decent decisions in the first place poor Melensdad wouldnt have to make decisions to shoot animals in the second place. Why is it his responsibility to pick up and shoot animals because his neighbors were crummy??

But left witht the situation he has to do what he has to do.

 

[thedavidwilson]

i am speaking a bit tongue in cheek but…

technically you are not a native species to that environment. your home killed many natural species. so should i shoot you? probably not. i understand the concept of invasive species having studied environmental biology, but there is the concept of humanely dealing with the problem. i don’t see shooting them as the most humane way. the other ways definitely take more time, energy, etc. but just because it’s harder doesn’t mean we shouldn’t pursue it. i would say shooting them is not moral simply because there is a more humane way of removing them from the area. plus, we (humans) introduced them as an invasive species so we have a responsibility to help them and the environment, not just what is convenient for us.

Animals do not have rights. Only humans have rights. We are to treat them appropriately so that it will benefit us humans the best. We are not to tourture animals not out of respect of their rights but becasue of what the act of torture would do to the person tourturing the animal. We are to use animals for our benefit. It is disordered to place animals close to a human level. This is the heresy that Budhism and Hinduism is based on.

In todays society we feel more sympathy for a picture of an abused animal than we do for an aborted child or an innocent person starving to death. This is why we should use our reason for these issues rather than sentimentality. This is another classic example the devil taking something right and ordered and turning it upside down.

Now back to the cats: I would like to see a controceptive in bullet form. I belive they have a .22 like bullet in Australian that either steralizes kangaroos or acts as a contraceptive but does not cause permant harm. This allows for hunters to “hunt” and control the population. I wish there was something for cats and dogs. Then the animal control folks could just go around shooting them with this contraceptive. If the animal is a pet then they go back to their owners. If it is feral then they would live out thier life and not reproduce.

But for now if you know the cat is feral, I say take that sucker out!

 

[mesquite_magic]

What we have going on here is a clash of worldviews.

On the one hand, you have the urban dwellers who have seen a lot of Disney movies and think of the animal kingdom as cute, furry and generally splendid. Suffering, cruelty and premature death are things brought about by humans and foreign to animals.

On the other hand, you have the mostly rural dwellers who generally have more actual contact with nature on a day to day basis. They tend to be much more experience observing the reality of nature instead of ‘nature movies’ and have concluded that the lives of wild animals are “nasty, brutish and short.” (Give Hobbes his credit, he wrote that about the lives of man without government. He’d be right if man were merely an animal)

Folks in group #2 see nothing out of the ordinary in killing animals to eliminate unhealthy patterns that have disrupted the food chain or threaten native species. Folks from group #1 can’t stand the thought of animal suffering and are horrified at the idea of violence against them to achieve a goal (even a good one).

Then there is group #3 Urban dwellers who put up with ferel cats in the neighborhood. Yes, that’s right. My lovely neighber keeps feeding the “darn” things. She is of the lofty belief that, “you don’t own a cat, a cat owns you”. At one time a stray dog(whole 'nother story) decided to gift my dh with a ferrel kitten it had killed. My neighbor WENT OFF. I told her that we needed more dogs like that.

I don’t think it’s immoral for you to shoot those cats. What I think IS immoral, are the irresponsable pet owners. They refuse to spay their animals. They let their animals run all over the neighborhood, destroying other people’s property. Then they dump the animal to breed indiscrimately and leave a trail of diseased, ferral kittens running the neighborhood.

It’s not so easy to take these animals to the Humane Society. For one thing, our HS charges $25 for each animal you drop off. It is NOT a free service because of irresponsable pet owners. Once you’ve decided to pay that fee, you have to set about trapping the animals. This is not an easy task. Cats are smart animals. They are cunning enough NOT to be trapped, or to get out of the trap. Believe me, I’ve tried. One of the “cute” little critters bit one of my daycare kids. He almost had to get rabies shots because of it. A county offical and I tried to catch these two “adorable” kittens to no avail. The mother cat ended up moving the kittens and I never saw them again. I could have ended up with a sick kid and a huge lawsuit because some idiot didn’t know how to take care of their animal!

Shoot away.

Kim

 

[strngrnrth]

I feel it is cruel because these cats, some of them, may once have been pets; they may think humans are their own kind and trust them. That is also why I feel that hunting is better than keeping livestock to kill, because the hunted game knows perfectly well that the hunter is a predator.

 

[melensdad]

I feel it is cruel because these cats, some of them, may once have been pets; they may think humans are their own kind and trust them. That is also why I feel that hunting is better than keeping livestock to kill, because the hunted game knows perfectly well that the hunter is a predator.

Please go back and read ANY of the posts that I have written describing this situation. I’ve laid out the situation several times and even posted proof showing the remoteness of the property in my area to show at least some evidence of the fact that these are cats that are not house cats/pets.

After reading some of my posts where I describe the situation then please let me know HOW it is cruel?

Also, what about the responsibility we have to good stewardship of the land? Leaving these cats roam and destroy the native animals is clearly bad stewardship so how do we reconcile that issue? Further, what is more humane than shooting the cats, yet still fulfills our responsibility to good stewardship?

Clearly I’ve struggled with this for quite a while and conveyed the situation, in a way that I thought was clear. What, in your opinion, have I missed that still makes the shooting of these feral cats cruel?