Domestic cats are not native anywhere. Their ancestor, the African Wild Cat is native to parts of Africa and Asia, but it is not a domestic cat and is classed as an entirely different species. There are felines native to many parts of the world, such as the lynxes, ocelots, and others of the Americas, but they are not closely related to domestic cats. Claiming that these cats are the same as the introduced domestic cat is flatly wrong. Even with other wildcats, they are species that evolved within their native environment and serve their own important evolutionary niche, which domestic cats disastrously interrupt.
Next, if you read the link, you’d see it actually sites as many nineteen other studies for one parameter, which is more than “a very small amount of studies”. Plus, even forgoing the article, there are well-documented cases of entire species being killed off by cats. I even linked one in the same post.
You’re right in that endangered species are threatened because of humans. Introducing nonnative species is one way that happens. Cats are the example here, but there are loads of others. Feral and outdoor cats are an anthropogenic cause of ecological harm.
So, are domestic cats harmful to the environment? Absolutely. They are introduced species. They are not native. They kill loads of prey animals which in turn can also harms producers (because their numbers may now go unchecked) and predators (because they now have fewer prey animals to eat). Thus interrupting the entire ecosystem.
I’m mostly responding to this because I’m confused by the aggressive tone. I didn’t call for extermination programs in my original post. I didn’t even advocate for T&R. All I asked was that people who let their cats out stop doing that. I even pointed out that doing so is potentially dangerous to the cat. Your tags say I’m putting the blame on the cats, but I never demanded anything of cats in the post - that would be pointless - I asked humans to stop letting them out.
Also, it’s pretty clear you haven’t read much of our blog because we point out constantly that humans are harming the environment in other ways. So your tag call-out to “try accusing more humans of hurting the environment” is pretty pointless.
You seem to be under the impression that we hate cats. I can’t speak personally for admin1, but I actually adore cats. I’d probably own one if my partner’s allergies didn’t prevent it. But part of loving an animal, any animal, is recognizing the parts of its existence you don’t like. In this case, that piece to recognize is that cats, when afforded the opportunity by humans, can be extremely destructive to other species and the ecosystem as a whole.
So, again I implore everyone reading this to keep their cats inside.
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