Noticeable, brightly coloured, cat collar protects birds from cat predation
Birdsbesafe® collars are effective
There is a product on the market called Birdsbesafe®. They are fluffy cat collars in very bright colours. They are deliberately bright because songbirds see bright colours especially well. You can immediately understand the idea. The cat stalks a bird. The movement of his collar is picked up by the bird. The bird flies away. It is effective but not effective on animals who do not have the sort of eyesight that picks up bright colours, which includes mice and rats.
This audio file from goodnewsnetwork.org describes the invention of this product:
A scientific study was carried out on this product. Captures of prey with good color vision by cats wearing a collar were reduced by 54%. This is an overall figure. The rainbow and red collars were more effective than the yellow when the prey was birds. We can presume therefore the birds see these sort of colours better than the other colours used in this product.
Bird be safe in action
There was no significant reduction in the capture of mammals by cats who wore the collar.
Other animals with good color vision are reptiles and amphibians so again the collar proved partially successful in protecting these prey items.
The question as to whether the cats in the study accepted the collar, is yes they did, in general. 79% of cat owners said that their cat had no problems with the collar, while 17% said that their cats adjusted to it within 2 days.
14% of cat owners said that their cat spent more time at home and ate more when they were wearing the collar. I presume this is because they decided it was a waste of time preying on animals.
64% of the cat owners who used the red collar said it worked. As to the rainbow and yellow collar the figures are 48% and 46% respectively.
77% of owners wish to continue using the multicoloured collars. If you’re the sort of cat owner who worries about what your cat is preying on or if you are a bird lover then this product may be the thing you’re looking for.
The Birdsbesafe® collar is the only current product on the market which protects reptiles and amphibians from cat predation.
Because the colours are rather peculiar, being very obvious and somewhat like an Elizabethan collar but not of the medical kind, some observers may raise some questions about what is going on because it does look rather odd, it has to be said.
There is then the counterargument that some people will put forward which is that it is unfair to interfere with a cat’s natural behaviour in this way making it far more difficult to express natural desires to hunt and achieve success when doing so. Will a cat become frustrated and stressed?
The study took place in Australia over a period of 2 years. It was conducted by the School of Veterinary And Life Sciences, Murdoch University, Murdoch, Western Australia 6150, Australia. It was accepted for publication on January 19, 2015 and published on January 25.
I presume the collars have a safety clasp or have been tested to be safe. Cat collars can kill cats as they can get caught up on branches and other objects strangling the cat as he struggles. I believe it is a collar cover so the question should be whether the original collar is safe.
Note: This article was first published on Feb 24th 2015. An audio file has been added and adverts have been added too.