The Felixer is a fiendish device devised by Dr. John Read, the founder of Thylation. The Felixer is a green box which jets out a poison called 1080 in the form of a gel at 50 metres per second.
The idea is that when a feral cat walks past this green box it detects the cat and jets the poison onto the feral cat. The cat licks off the poison, ingests it and dies.
The device is programmed, as I understand it, to minimise harm to animals other than feral cats.
But what caught my eye this morning is that Dr. Read is misleading the public. He claims that his Felixer and the poison that it jets over feral cats is humane. He says that it is not cruel to kill feral cat this way.
Here’s a quote from him:
“Most people who are involved in conservation are passionate about it because they care about animals: that is my motivation. If the Felixer or 1080 use on cats was cruel, we wouldn’t be doing it. We want to have the best outcomes for the wildlife whilst minimising any adverse impacts.”
Dr Read
It doesn’t take long to research whether 1080 poison causes animal cruelty or whether it is a humane way to kill animals. For example, The World League for Protection of Animals states that “1080 (sodium monofluroacetate) is a cruel and indiscriminate poison to remove unwanted populations of animals.”
The website goes on to state that:
“1080 poison is a slow killer. When ingested (usually through baited food) the animal suffers a prolonged and horrific death. Herbivores take the longest to die and up to 44 hours, while carnivores can take up to 21 hours before finally succumbing to the final effects of the poison. The speed of death is dependent on the rate of the animal’s metabolism.”
The World League for Protection of Animals
The website goes on to provide a witness account in their own words of the deaths of herbivore animals. Here is a description about wallabies poisoned by 1080:
“Affected wallabies were sometimes observed sitting hunched up, with heads held shakily just above the ground. Generally they appeared non-alert and ‘sick’, with shivering or shaking forelimbs and unsteady balance. Most individuals then experience convulsions, falling to the ground and lying on their backs and sides, kicking and making running motions with their hind legs before dying. Many individuals also ejaculated shortly before death, and, with others, exuded a white froth from their nostrils and mouth.”
The World League for Protection of Animals
Does that describe a humane death? Dr. Read is rather callously (I would suggest) trying to mislead the public and animal advocates including international animal advocates into believing that 1080 poison when ingested leads to a peaceful passing. It does not. It is entirely cruel and the Felixer is a cruel device which not only causes great distress and pain to the victim but it can also jet this toxic gel onto non-targeted animals despite the technology employed, as I understand it.
It is also ironic and frankly amusing for Dr. Read to suggest that his device is humane and doesn’t cause pain. This is because the background story is that feral cats in Australia are killed in any way possible. There is no concern about the methods being humane or painless. Australian authorities kill feral cats by shooting and by dropping poison bait from helicopters. They just don’t care about the humane or inhumane aspect of this process. It beats me, therefore, why Dr. Read alludes to the fact that his device ensures that the killing of the feral cat is humane. It is a cruel device. For animal advocates it is an evil device.
RELATED: Proactivity is the way to deal with feral cats in Australia
