Letter to the editor: Best Friends Animal Society responds to story
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Recent posts
Thanks for setting the record straight Scott Hudson is a local reporter that let his bias get in the way of good journalism.
I wish there was more detail on HOW releasing sterile cats back into the community reduces the total population. It is counterintuitive considering the fertile cats are still reproducing either way.
The cats will have been spayed or neutered before release.
Exactly. The cat owner still let’s the roam to others property to exactly what they want, mainly peep and poop. I believe in talking to people have spoken to the cat owners. They doesn’t work with these people…..they have no regard for anything but there cats. As far as spraying and neutered….that’s one of the first things they will tell you about their cats if they are. Animal Control has be as good S they can withe the large number if cats in the area. They need help but not from groups and people like this.
Above reply was to Mr. Yarbrough and I agree with him.
Yes, thank you for clarifying the situation. The Augusta commissioners are capable of doing things that don’t work or make sense. I was dismayed to read that they had given Best friends animal society a ‘cold shoulder’. Your program makes such a good solution for everyone. Augusta will have a smaller healthier cat community. I’m happy to hear that you are being welcomed into Augusta.
Excuse my mistakes in my above comment, I am on my phone and hard to proof typos.
If you combine TNVR (trap-neuter-vaccinate-return) with “SSS (shoot-shovel-silence)” the number of feral cats decreases even more. Our neighbors pick up their dogs’ scat when they walk their dogs. Cat owners never come around to pick up the cat scat in your grass, scrub the cat urine off your porch furniture or car tires, or pick up the dead bird carcasses.
Just from a purely logical point of view, any program which can reduce the feral cat population is a good thing, but the catch, neuter and release program cannot be more effective than euthanasia. The average feline lives 12-18 years. If two areas with identical populations were to implement a single program it would take 15 years longer to reduce the feline feral population to the same point in the neuter and release group than the euthanasia group. The key to success with either is the percentage of the population which can be removed each month. Any progress will depend on removing more than the reproduction rate of the remaining population.
Go0d point. An animal population is a function of life span, birth rate, disease, predation, habitat (i.e., food and shelter) loss or gain, human intervention (e.g., feeding feral cats), and environmental conditions. Decreasing the birth rate (spay-neuter) and the life span (euthanasia) work, but these actions must be used together and be ongoing. The population will rebound if the these actions stop.
The average life span for an outdoor feral cat is about 3 years I believe . They have many predators such as hawks , owls , foxes , coyotes and your big bad dogs that run loose . So sterilizing them will decrease the population . And if you hate cats so much go out to the animal shelter and volunteer to kill some . The poor employees assigned this task need some relief