Editor:

In the late 1990s the census for domestic cats in the United States was 80 million. Domestic cats are responsible for the death of more than 1 million songbirds a day in the United States alone. A vast percentage of those songbirds are slowly declining due to other threats such as habitat loss, climate change and competition with non-native species.

House cats also feed on small wild mammals, thus competing with native predators such as bobcats, foxes, coyotes, raccoons and skunks.

Keep your cats indoors and have them spayed and neutered. Shelters such as the Humane Society are overrun by cats, so we don’t need any more kittens being born. If you like to see quails, finches, black-capped chickadees, towees and hummingbirds in your bird feeders, keep your cats indoors.

Manny L. Antonacci,
Alumnus/U Employee
Biology/Radiological Health Dept.