• naught@sh.itjust.works
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      2 days ago

      Outdoor cats have a far shorter life expectancy and damage the local ecosystem. Why don’t you care?

      • Tiefkuehlkost@feddit.org
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        2 days ago

        Not every place in the world is America, there are many places where cats are native, and dont get driven over as much because all is full of cars, i got mine to specifically damage the sorounding mice ecosystem because having the pest control there every six months is expensive.

        • Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca
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          1 day ago

          “Many Places” umm no, not domesticated house cats.

          And if you live in a place with native and wild small felines it’s even more important to keep domesticated cats inside since they will compete for food or mix genetics by trying to interbreed and put the native wild population of cats in danger of diseases.

        • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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          1 day ago

          Cats originated in Egypt and spread across the world basically by humans. So unless you’re in Egypt, cats aren’t native to your ecosystem.

          • Tiefkuehlkost@feddit.org
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            1 day ago

            Your right humans spread them as semi wild pets to protect they food stock from rodents but for Europe that where the romans over 2000 year ago, so i would not say that they are a new emerging existencial thread for the eco system here, if that was the case it would have long colapsed lol.

              • Iceblade@lemmy.world
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                6 hours ago

                Long enough for ecosystems to change, adapt and form as well as for animals to evolve based on their new environment. Considering that there are already rats & cockroaches adapting to pesticides, both birds & pests are most certainly adapting to cats to some degree after the passage of thousands of years.

                Obviously there may be a point in restricting cats in more insular habitats such as small islands, but for anybody on a major continent it is rather pointless. Furthermore, cats serve an important purpose in hunting pests that spread alongside humans, primarily rats and mice, both of which can have an even more disastrous effect on local ecosystems.

                https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aam8327

              • Tiefkuehlkost@feddit.org
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                15 hours ago

                This isnt an extinction event caused by a slow climatic change or something, in some places on earth its an invasive species and if you look up how fast/slow they cause damage than its in the range of tens to hundreds, not thousands of years.

        • Jolteon@lemmy.zip
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          2 days ago

          There’s plenty parts of America that are like that as well. A lot of areas, having an outdoor cat is almost necessary you want an outdoor garden, since otherwise the local rodents will just eat it all.