Your cat is destroying the environment


Anyone who has watched her cat hunker down on its haunches, lock eyes on a moving target — a twitching toe or finger, a laser-pointer dot, a songbird — and pounce, knows that she is cohabitating with a predator. But while we might have felt the consequences of our pets' teeth and claws, cats owners are often in denial about the damage their beloved feline friends are wrecking on the environment:
[Cats] are "cuddly killers" that butcher tens of billions of songbirds, small mammals, reptiles, and lizards each year and push vulnerable species toward extinction. Cats hunt when they are hungry and hunt when they are full. "In the United States," [Peter P. Marra and Chris Santella write in Cat Wars: The Devastating Consequences of a Cuddly Killer], "more birds and mammals die at the mouths of cats than from wind turbines, automobile strikes, pesticides and poisons, collisions with skyscrapers and windows, and other so-called direct anthropogenic causes combined." [The New York Review of Books]
In 2013, Marra and a team of researchers found that in a single year, free-ranging cats killed "up to 4 billion birds, 22 billion small mammals, 822 million reptiles, and 299 million amphibians" in the U.S. alone. A 2011 review of 120 islands found that cats caused "the decline or extinction of 123 species of songbirds, parrots, seabirds, and penguins; 25 species of iguanas, lizards, turtles, and snakes; and 27 species of small mammals, including a lemur and a bat."
Particularly problematic are stray cats, which, while an invasive species, are defended ardently by animal rescue and welfare groups. On the other hand, environmentalists must act to protect fragile species — and that can require the extermination of stray colonies.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
This much is for sure, though: "Pet cats should no more be allowed to roam around at will than should pet dogs, horses, pythons, or pot-bellied pigs. The notion that cats have a particularly deep-seated 'need' for freedom is also a cop-out, an abdication of an owner's responsibility to, hey, play with your cat once in a while, rather than expect the sparrows to do it for you." Read the full report at The New York Review of Books.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.
-
June 3 editorial cartoons
Cartoons Tuesday's political cartoons include RFK Jr. and the CDC, Elon Musk's DOGE exit, and Donald Trump versus academic freedom
-
Gaza Humanitarian Foundation: the group behind Gaza's controversial new aid programme
The Explainer Deadly shootings and chaotic scenes have been reported at aid sites after US group replaced UN humanitarian organisations
-
Is UK's new defence plan transformational or too little, too late?
Today's Big Question Labour's 10-year strategy 'an exercise in tightly bounded ambition' already 'overshadowed by a row over money'
-
Shakespeare not an absent spouse, study proposes
speed read A letter fragment suggests that the Shakespeares lived together all along, says scholar Matthew Steggle
-
New Mexico to investigate death of Gene Hackman, wife
speed read The Oscar-winning actor and his wife Betsy Arakawa were found dead in their home with no signs of foul play
-
Giant schnauzer wins top prize at Westminster show
Speed Read Monty won best in show at the 149th Westminster Kennel Club dog show
-
Beyoncé, Kendrick Lamar take top Grammys
Speed Read Beyoncé took home album of the year for 'Cowboy Carter' and Kendrick Lamar's diss track 'Not Like Us' won five awards
-
The Louvre is giving 'Mona Lisa' her own room
Speed Read The world's most-visited art museum is getting a major renovation
-
Honda and Nissan in merger talks
Speed Read The companies are currently Japan's second and third-biggest automakers, respectively
-
Taylor Swift wraps up record-shattering Eras tour
Speed Read The pop star finally ended her long-running tour in Vancouver, Canada
-
Drake claims illegal boosting, defamation
Speed Read The rapper accused Universal Music of boosting Kendrick Lamar's diss track and said UMG allowed him to be falsely accused of pedophilia