Shooting Feral Cats

First off I have cats-4 of them all indoors ranging in age from 16 yrs to 11 yrs. I am now petrified they will get out and will be murdered by the crazy doc at the end of the street. I live in a quiet southern town. I was out with my dogs and heard a gunshot. Turns out the retired doc just killed a cat. I was horrified. You cannot use a gun in the city limits unless you are defending yourself. I find it hard to believe he needed to defend himself from a CAT!

I never thought I'd replace Google as my homepage.

Why should I have to worry about my child playing outside in our own yard being infected with the diseases these feral cats carry? They leave piles of feces all over our yard where my child should be able to play worry free. These feral cats are a nuisance and lead miserable lives of suffering. Funny how you wacky libs love to endorse the killing of "nuisance" sickly, eldery humans or human embryos but then turn around and go to war to save a worthless health hazard (aka feral cats). I have no desire to kill these animals personally, but there should be a massive effort to kill as many of these feral cats as possible. TNR does nothing to solve the disease threat that comes from these cat communities.

People who advocate or act out violence to any living being are cruel and vindictive. It appears that we are creating a nation in U.S. of unusually cruel people who like to kill for any reason. If they had any sense they would realize that a feral cat is the result of human neglect. A feral cats is also not a wild creature up for slaughter but a domesticated animal abandoned and left to defend for themselves. Ignorant violent people, especially the person who feels it correct to add cruelty on top of cruelty does not show much strength or integrity. I would not like to be abandoned or shipwrecked on an island with these sorts of people. To me they act more feral than the cats. Abandoned, neglected and fighting for their own ego survival. I would feel much safer on an abandoned island with the feral cat than the guy with the big mouth, restless fingers and big gun. How about you?

People who advocate or act out violence to any living being are cruel and vindictive. It appears that we are creating a nation in U.S. of unusually cruel people who like to kill for any reason. If they had any sense they would realize that a feral cat is the result of human neglect. A feral cats is also not a wild creature up for slaughter but a domesticated animal abandoned and left to defend for themselves. Ignorant violent people, especially the person who feels it correct to add cruelty on top of cruelty does not show much strength or integrity. I would not like to be abandoned or shipwrecked on an island with these sorts of people. To me they act more feral than the cats. Abandoned, neglected and fighting for their own ego survival. I would feel much safer on an abandoned island with the feral cat than the guy with the big mouth, restless fingers and big gun. How about you?

You shoot my cat, I shoot you. why? because I love my cat more than you. In fact i dont care about you. I'll shoot you anyway. redneck.

But what about kids who go out and hunt birds and rabbits and quail? should they be shot on sight too? I'm pretty sure little kids aren't a part of the natural enviroment. Not only that but what about animals that may have gotten out of the house through no fault of the owner? What about outdoor cats WHO HAD COLLARS that got pulled off? (cat collars have safeties in case they get caught on a branch they don't strangle themselves.) You may have purposely TORTURED AND KILLED a animal who someone cared deeply about. also feral cats have been used for a very long time as effective non-chemical pest control.

Feral and also domestic family cats DO kill birds, as well as ground animals, I have seen this many times. People who deny this are either lying or have never witnessed it themselves. Cats should be kept only by responsible people who keep them enclosed in a house or cat run, and not left to wander the neighbourhood killing. If they are trapped in a neighbours land, then the neighbour should be able to dispose of them.

Shooting feral cats, or any wild animal is cruel. In this day and age, we do not need to kill animals for food. Killing animals for fun is cruel. There are lots of nonliving targets that you can shoot. Cats and other animals feel pain, just like you do. I know that you think people that love animals are sissies, or whatever, but that is far from true. A real man, one who walks with his Creator, knows that all animals are God's creatures and in the end, when Judgement Day comes, you will be punished for all the pain that you have caused defenseless animals. You may not believe in God, but you may find that you are punished by Karma or in some other way. I have seen over and over again that cruelty comes back to you. I hope these words will touch your soul and make you think twice about your cruelty. If not, atleast I know that I tried to help both you and the cats.

so we have a fellow here named bob that says its so bad to shoot wild cats, but he advocates using his guns on human beings? something not right with this man's logic

I have lived on a farm growing up and we never shot feral cat. How stupid these people sound that the cats are ruining the bird population. I have a Maine Coon cat currently and she is probably a bigger threat to people then any of these feral cats She has her own way of doing things. My daughter and I are the only ones who can handle her. So just because these other cats are feral who made them this way? We did by not having our cats fixed and letting them run around outside. The ones who really tick me off are the ones who feel it is ok to let the males cats run around because they feel they have nothing to do with the problems of feral cats. How do you think the females are having kittens????? There need to be stiff fines for people how let their male cats run around and make a larger problem it their communities. Don't even get me started on the idiots who feel it is some kind of a great feat to shot a cat. My family have always had the saying that if you kill it you eat it. The ones who are trapping and then neutering the feral cats are doing a great thing. I do not feel we have the right to just kill for the sake of killing.

Greetings cat lovers. I love the native wild animals like birds,reptiles, amphibians, and mammals, that are being killed by feral and free roaming cats.
I feel that it is my responsibility to protect these animals. Therefore,I shoot cats (with my .22) whenever I see them.
If you love your cat keep it on your property!

i think feral cats hurt the population of wild rabbits squirrels and song birds in my subdivision we have a wooded creek and along that creek i have counted numourous birds that cats have killed and just left UNEATEN and left also i have seen the cats stalk up and kill a rabbit and seen sign of them killing other animals to i think that if it dont have a collar its fair game and that people who have a pet cat need to control it just like the would a dog!!!!!!!

It seems that most people posted here are fanatic cat fans. They can't stand ANY cat being shot.

I own cats too, but feral cats are another story, they constantly cause troubles and hissing at me all the time, not tamable.

I shoot when I saw one. end of story.

i raise rabbits(pets not for meat)i invested hundreds of dollars in 6 foot tall stockade fence only to have my neighbors cats (all outdoor cats)jump it like it wasnt there and mutilate my rabbits.It seems that all my complaining,arguing with him etc does no good,so i have started photographing the damage they have done(39 dead rabbits so far)just in case the police come so i have evidence including the cats inside the pen.he has 19 cats he feeds altho not any you can pet.YES i shoot them any chance i get a clear shot at one--IF YOU LOVE YOUR CATS KEEP THEM INDOORS-cats are not native to the environment here and play hell on the eco system=they dont just eat rats and mice they eat squirrels,rabbits,grouse,quail and any animals young. But you cant tell cat owners anything-CATS ARE UNNATURAL PREDATORS!KEEP THEM INDOORS.

i raise rabbits(pets not for meat)i invested hundreds of dollars in 6 foot tall stockade fence only to have my neighbors cats (all outdoor cats)jump it like it wasnt there and mutilate my rabbits.It seems that all my complaining,arguing with him etc does no good,so i have started photographing the damage they have done(39 dead rabbits so far)just in case the police come so i have evidence including the cats inside the pen.he has 19 cats he feeds altho not any you can pet.YES i shoot them any chance i get a clear shot at one--IF YOU LOVE YOUR CATS KEEP THEM INDOORS-cats are not native to the environment here and play hell on the eco system=they dont just eat rats and mice they eat squirrels,rabbits,grouse,quail and any animals young. But you cant tell cat owners anything-CATS ARE UNNATURAL PREDATORS!KEEP THEM INDOORS.

I was born and raised up in China, and back there I had somewhat 20 pet cats throughout my childhood.

Also, we do have feral cats problem, somewhat 30 reside in the rubble within my yard, and they constantly fought with our pet cats, and not to mention the huge noise they've put up. Our whole family members were trying to kill them, but sadly we don't have guns in China, thus we resorted to big giant stick in case catching one.

Yes, I did kill several feral cats as kids, but heck, don't label me as an animal abuser which I was far from it. When I was little, I always rescue small kittens from dumpsters and stop kids who abuses house cats.

It's the feral cats themselves making them badasses, they would constantly hiss, bite anyone dares move close enough with them and not to mention the huge flea problem they've created.

Whenever you had the gut to label someone *barbaric* or *cruel*, dig a little bit deeper see why they do such a thing. They may have a completely different circumstance than you have. Period.

Ya ur kinda right but some cats are wild and don't belong to the naterially to the food chain and they kill food for other wild predators I think anyone who kills a feral cat isn't a bad person every faral cat that dies a lot of native species live small birds turkeys geese ducks squarrils snakes rabbits I sat kill all faral cats not out of hate but if we don't all the other animals we love will be gone

You have no idea some of the cruel things cats in the USA go through. I myself cannot watch the Animal Planet TV station because I cannot stand the cruel things people here do not just to cats but to other animals as well. How can you own a dog, keep it chained to a tree and then think that it can survive without shelter, food, or water. Yes there are such people in this country. This is one of the things that has caused me to loose faith in my fellow humans. I have wrote many times on here how I feel about humans and how they treat our fellow creatures. This fellow is worried about his Quail birds but yet has no regard to other creatures, only because he sees his birds as food. Articles like this truly cause me to loose sleep. Every animal has a spot on the chain of life. Humans have overlooked theirs and given themselves the title of God on earth as some of them try to take control over everything on this planet.

Another thought worth mentioning is that with the mentality of someone like this who craves attention enough to post about killing cats, you cannot always take everything they say seriously. They often bend the truth to make themselves sound more interesting. Take his "200 yard head shot" for instance. That's a damn tough shot for a trained shooter with a GOOD rifle. He says he uses a .22 caliber? That small caliber rifle is not capable of an accurate 200 yard shot at such a small target. It just doesn't have the muzzle velocity to go that far and still place the shot where you want it to go. So it seems to me that while his subject matter is disturbing enough, he's pretty full of it. Bending the truth and exaggerating to try to impress others... THAT is typical of an American youth.

The first thing that I feel I need to mention is that not every American is like this idiot. True, we don't have the anti-declaw legislation that the UK does, but that is due to our POLITICIANS, not our people. Our government is not "of the people, by the people, and for the people" anymore. It is for the lobbyists who put up the most money to the politicians. So no matter how many of us WANT legislation, it depends on where the money comes from. So one cannot assume that this entire country is like this fool because of the way our "leaders" are. We are not all like that. It would be like assuming that everyone in Europe was a superstitious cat killer because of the mass murdering of cats during the plague. Even the "gun people" are not all like that. I own guns. I like to go target shooting. And I damn sure don't want my government trying to take away my freedom to own a gun. But I don't use them on ANIMALS. I would have no problem using them on a moron like the one in this article, though. It is important to realize that this guy does NOT typify us. Not even our rural farmers, where they have less chance of being caught shooting a small animal. Most of them realize that those feral cats are saving them from a hefty exterminator bill by keeping the rodents in check. Some of the people I work with are from rural areas. Almost ALL of them have stories about the "barn cats" that they knew as kids. And when they were young, most of their parents or grandparents told them to leave those cats alone. They served a purpose. We were having a conversation about how soft kids are now, and how the animal is often blamed for attacks. One friend of mine told how he was attacked, scratched, and bit by a barn cat on his grandfather's farm when he was young. He got no sympathy, he was told that he should have just left the cat alone and, "next time you'll know better". He said after that, he stayed away from them. He doesn't blame the cat, he admits that it was "my own stupidity that got me bitten".

I am not trying to say there are not people like this in America, because there are. There are people like this guy, and trust me, they would shoot a domestic cat wearing a collar in an outdoor enclosure just as easily as a stray or feral. A friend of mine got into a dispute with his neighbor once and the next day found his cat dead, placed on the hood of his car. This happened in the suburbs, not a rural area. There ARE people like that out there. They are NOT, however, limited to this country. The desire to kill defenseless animals is not hereditary, it is not based on nationality or country of origin, it is a sign of a personality disorder. They want to hurt and kill things, but they don't have the nerve (yet) to do it to a human. Some eventually get the nerve, that's why most serial killers start with animals and eventually start killing people. This person is not a typical American, he is a typical disturbed person.

I don't mention the bad things done to cats here because I don't want to give anyone more ideas. I wish all the cat haters would just go somewhere they couldn't hurt any more. Like PRISON.

I concealed the face to avoid the slim possibility of arguments, defamation and copyright claims. I hate this twit. Although he published his own photo he did not give me permission to publish it. In order to respect his copyright rights I blanked the face.

Actually, I think it looks better blanked out anyway. He is a young man. I don't really think it matters who he is. He does typify the young American with a gun and keeping guns in America, as we know, is not unusual. In the UK it is extremely rare.

Just feel that I had to comment on your artical about shooting of cats,feral or otherwise.
In your picture you have conceled his face. Why? I cannot even begin to understand why anyone would want to shoot a defenceless animal. What pleasure can they get from it?
Maybe if children were educated from an early age to respect all life, then maybe they would not want to go out and kill,when they grow up.
I know what I would do to these morons, and it would be done in public.

Just feel that I had to comment on your artical about shooting of cats,feral or otherwise.
In your picture you have conceled his face. Why? I cannot even begin to understand why anyone would want to shoot a defenceless animal. What pleasure can they get from it?
Maybe if children were educated from an early age to respect all life, then maybe they would not want to go out and kill,when they grow up.
I know what I would do to these morons, and it would be done in public.

Joyce you seem to be saying that shooting feral cats in the USA is not the worse thing that happens to feral cats. Well if that is the case it is even worse than I thought.

Shooting feral cats is wrong, plain and simple. Why am I so certain? Because we created the feral cat through our irresponsibility and the shooters in this article understand that.

If we are the wrong doers and the root cause of the problem, it is us who need to be addressed not the victim of our wrong doing.

It is much harder to address the problem through us as it is more complicated and expensive but it is the only way to achieve long term solutions. Also many people are not open minded enough to see that they are wrong.

These people shoot feral cats for the pleasure of it and justify preservation of birds for their actions.

I find it very hard (no, impossible) to accept the mass slaughter of feral cats every year in the many millions while at the same time the cat world just plods on as if it is normal. Actually it is normal. It has become normalised just like the declawing of cats.

I said a bored cat is an unhappy cat, which is absolutely not the same thing. And I said a cat enclosure is the best compromise. I did not say that cats should experience the great outdoors willy nilly.

Also I am writing about feral cats in this article not domestic cats.

And I am criticising people for wantonly shooting feral cats, which is a crime in the UK but apparently just good fun for a good number of people in the USA.

This is not "knock the USA" but an observation on the gun lobby type mentality and certain people.

In the UK we sometimes get kids shooting air rifles at domestic cats but I don't see anywhere near the same level of cat shooting.

Sorry Joyce but you are a mile from the argument.

How can you say in one article that an indoor only is an unhappy cat and that cats all need to experience the great outdoors and we're all selfish for keeping our cat inside. Then you do an article on what happens if a cat IS outside. These shooters don't stop and ask the cat "Are you a feral?" THEY SEE A CAT AND THEY SHOOT. You think shooting is bad. I've heard men brag about burying a cat to its neck and running over its head with a lawnmower. There's an awful world ot there regardless of where you live. About 3 years ago I had 2 puppies who hung out with a very loving older dog. They went down into the woods and I heard 2 gunshots. Only 1 pup came home. We never saw the older dog or one of the pups again.

No one has ever said to me that I'm not giving Furby and Lola a good life. They keep each other entertained. I don't know which would be worse. Letting them out and never seeing them again or bring what's left of their little bodies back home on a shovel and digging a grave. Thats a scenario I hope never to have to deal with.