Alaska Board of Game (of the Alaska Dept. of Fish and Game) vice chairman Nate Turner said:
“We’re certainly not encouraging people to go out and start shooting these cats if they think they’re feral. Try to contact the owner, try to do the right things, take a little bit of time with what you’re trying to do. But then again, if there are feral cats that are clearly feral…that’s a case where I can see where a person can dispatch one of these cats and it shouldn’t be a question of penalty associated with that,” he said. “But don’t go through the neighborhood shooting cats.” (Peninsula Clarion)
His statement is impractical and contradictory. It shows muddled thinking. He is advocating shooting feral cats without sanction provided the shooter is clear that the cat is feral. But the only sure way you can verify a cat is not owned and feral1 is to check for a microchip and/or make quite extensive enquiries. You have to at least check for a microchip which means taking the stray cat to a veterinarian or animal shelter.
A shooter is not going to do that before deciding if he can shoot the cat. Therefore the whole statement is fatally flawed.
He should have said:
“You can’t shoot cats because you might be shooting someone’s pet”.
Alaska Animal Welfare Law
An an aside, the animal welfare laws of Alaska are subtly altered from most of the state animal welfare laws. The lawmakers have introduced the need to inflict ‘prolonged physical pain’ before the act can be deemed criminal. The word ‘prolonged’ opens the door to shooting cats. Most state animal welfare laws do not include this word.
However, the outside cat is protected by practicalities as mentioned above. You cannot shoot cats even in Alaska where they have a slightly backward attitude towards animal welfare because you might well shoot someone’s cat and that has to be both a possible crime under AS 11.46.482. Criminal Mischief in the Third Degree (criminal damage) and a tort in civil law (you’d be sued in the civil courts for compensation). The domestic cat has two laws criminal protecting him/her: animal welfare and criminal damage.
The only weakness in the criminal damage law vis-a-vis cats is that the damage has to be at least $500. Purebred cats are protected but moggies are not. However, you could not be sure about the cat’s pedigree at a distance and the cat’s value is also linked to the emotional connection between cat and owner. This should push it above $500.
1. Also there is a subtle difference between ‘feral’ and ‘stray’. You can’t tell the difference at a distance without careful investigation.
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“AK Fan” nailed you spot on, and you call HIM “laughable”? I’d say wishful thinking on your part, but I’ve never seen evidence of same (“wishful” or otherwise). You’re pathetic, doddering missives strongly suggest you were an utter failure as a “solicitor”, except perhaps in gay bars–and even then I suspect any such “successes” were among the exceedingly desperate. Perhaps that’s why you resort to cats for “intimacy”.
But in 2020 this proud Alaskan and his colleagues from the U.S. Geological survey, (former) AK Dept. of Fish & Wildlife, having succeeded in keeping TNR illegal in Alaska in 2017, will submit another proposal to the Board of Game for reclassifying Felis catus as a deleterious exotic species, thus allowing year-round unlimited take by any legal hunting or trapping method anywhere it’s legal to hunt in Alaska. Governor Bill Walker declared cats to be an invasive species in our state just last March, thus paving the way for our next Board of Game proposal. And one of the Board members is himself an Alaska state wildlife biologist, is well known to us, and agrees with us concerning TNR and other worthless “no-kill” programs.
You should also research Alaska Administrative Code more carefully. I have never bothered to hide shooting feral cats (the TNR practitioners, on the other hand, have to hide their illegal “colonies”, even having to move them from time-to-time), and I have never been arrested or even charged for doing so. In fact in May 2016 I personally admitted my “crimes” before a meeting of the Anchorage Assembly (and pointed out in Anchorage Municipal Ordinance Title 17 where it’s explicitly NOT a crime). Have you fainted dead away yet, girly-man?
What the relevant (state) Administrative Code requires is that I make a “reasonable” effort to notify a problem animal’s owner to restrain it before shooting. And I comply–when I see a cat on my property, I shout loudly, “whoever owns this cat better come and get it, or they’ll never see it again!”
Then I immediately fetch my firearm, and–if it’s still there when I return–shoot it, and incinerate its carcass to at least 160 degrees F to destroy the pathogens and parasites 40%-70% of unconfined cats carry. The ashes are then fed to my roses. That’s why they’re now so tall they’ve grown over my (south-facing) front porch canopy. I get compliments on them every summer.
And don’t bother to resort to “Muslim-bashing” as you have done in the past. As I fully understand that being Muslim (particularly Shi’a) is 100% better than the alternative (particularly with respect to self-hating, neo-pagan cat worshipers), I find such attempts on your part hilariously pathetic.
PS: my son is a barrister in a commonwealth country, where he holds joint citizenship. I share your more ludicrous “arguments” with him when I think he needs a humor-break from his busy schedule both at work and as a parent. Thank you for that.
You’re an Arab living in Alaska. What’s your real name? Have you got the guts to tell me? Can you attach a photograph? Do you have any photos of the cats you have shot? Please upload them. Or are you going to remain anonymous? My arguments on shooting feral cats are accurate. Such as this one:
https://pictures-of-cats.org/is-it-legal-to-shoot-feral-cats-in-wisconsin.html
I have written many others. No doubt you have killed someone’s pet and you’re proud of it. That makes you a cruel arsehole.
“That makes you a cruel arsehole”.
Oh boo-hoo. So what does allowing feline vermin to ejaculate on your arm make you? Please don’t tell us what you do with your other arm while that’s going on.
PS: I’ve already posted my photo on another thread in your blog, about four years ago. Khalas.
Photograph please. Let’s see you and your real name. Come Mr Arab in Alaska who takes pride in shooting and incinerating peoples’ pet cats.
If you want photographs of people, then I suggest you use a real one for your own avatar. One depicting the 70-year-old wrinkled, lonely, and unwanted cat-lady hag that you are.
But he’s very correct, you already have a photo of him on your website.
The avatar photo was taken fairly recently. You’re all cowards and bullshitters. Fur of big words and no action. I am not going to search for his photo. You can upload it in 20 seconds to a comment or email me mjbmeister@gmail.com. But you won’t because you cat haters lack guts. I want names too. That’s impossible for you guys isn’t it. Hiding behind anonymous usernames which are crude and rude.
I have a girlfriend who visits daily. I have friends at the gym. I am not lonely. I am fit and active.
A photo The Hindenburg going down in flames is a fairly recent photo too.
Absolutely hilarious. Does your imaginary “girlfriend” know you let your cat hump your arm? I suppose it could be worse…
As for being “afraid” of you, have you ever heard the American expression “in your dreams?”
Still scared of telling us your real name and showing us who you are? Pathetic.
Further leaving us all wondering, what does its “girlfriend” think of its imaginary cyber-love-fest with Joyce Sammons and their unholy bestial offspring of Furby. Oh wait, that’s right, its just the “Godfather” of a CAT. LOL And why is Joyce putting up with it having a “girlfriend”? LOL
Tune in tomorrow for another furrtilizing episode of “As the Stomach Churns”. We now return you to your regularly scheduled BROADcast.
You say you were a Solicitor? Do you know what we call them in the USA? “Ambulance Chasers”, the lowest scum who can’t get any cases so they chase down any ambulance they hear. LOL Don’t you find it odd that that is exactly what you are still doing but now with this website? Chasing down the sound of wailing cataholic sirens to exploit any injured cats they find so you can use them for click-bait income for yourself. How is what you do today any different than being a low-life ambulance-chaser? It’s not, absolutely no difference at all. Funny how it all worked out like that, isn’t it. You never did stop being a “Solicitor”, you just became an even more lower-life kind. LOL
PPS: delete all you want. I copy everything I post here for the Woodsman so he can laugh at you too. Have a nice day.
I am waiting for your full name and a photo of you. You know my name and my contact details. Who is more courageous?
PPPS: you weren’t paying attention. I incinerate the cats I shoot. Therefore I don’t have photographs of them. One small pile of ashes looks like the next…
You know what I mean. I am referring to photos of you. Let’s see you and your real name. You won’t do it though because you are full of BS.
Simple solution: If you don’t want your cat shot to death for being mistaken for being feral, don’t let it off your property. That’s the way everyone deals with this. If it is off of your property it is considered feral by everyone else. Why don’t you get this?
LOL. You are laughable. You are advocating criminal behavior publicly. I don’t get it because I like to (1) treat cats decently and (2) be law abiding. You are clearly (1) cruel and (2) criminal in your behavior.
If you (1) treat cats decently, this would include keeping them from being legally shot at, run-over by cars, or drinking antifreeze in your neighbors open garage.
If you (2) are law abiding, then you have to respect the laws that allow people to shoot cats, enforce the laws that allow them to protect their own property from damage by other peoples’ animals, and in many areas it is the law that cats must be contained.
You are clearly neither (1) nor (2).
I bet the following phrase has been spoken by every Magistrate that you’ve ever stood before, “Your personal opinion is not law, nor are you allowed to interpret or reinterpret the law for us.”
Does someone have to remind you that 19 western US states (Alaska being one of them) and 3 US territories just added the species Felis catus, known as the house-cat, to their lists of invasive species? Nearly all those states have laws that make it perfectly legal to remove and destroy, by any means necessary, any species on those lists. Of the other 31 eastern states, they already have uncontained house-cats listed as vermin for over a century or listed as invasive species now. Or their invasive species laws include a nice umbrella phrase of “… or any other non-native species …” of which house-cats are fully covered by that wording.
pictures-of-cats.org/the-western-governors-association-declares-the-feral-cat-an-invasive-species.html
Have you had yourself checked for Alzheimer or other forms of dementia lately? You seem to forget even your own words. They found too that toxoplasmosis infection causes severe memory loss in seniors. Could that be your reason and excuse?