Cats housbound in Oakville

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Cats now housebound in Oakville. From todays Toronto Star.
The crucial question: Should cats, which are natural hunters, be allowed to freely to roam the streets?

As of Jan. 1, the answer in Oakville is no.

“If it’s your pet, you should have it under control,’’ said Johanne Golder, executive director of the Oakville and Milton Humane Society, which is contracted by Oakville to provide animal control services.

Oakville has joined neighbours Milton, Burlington and Hamilton in prohibiting cats from roaming free. The town has already banned dogs from running loose, but added cats to the list when it consolidated all animal bylaws last month.

Owners whose loose cats repeatedly end up at the Oakville shelter can be fined $105, plus a $30 town surcharge, a return fee of $25 and $15 for each day the cat stays at the shelter.

Golder said the mentality that cats are “disposable” pets (unwanted kittens are often abandoned or dumped at shelters) is to blame for the huge feline populations in urban centres.

The more cats, the fewer birds, said McGill University avian expert David Bird.

He said house pets are just as bloodthirsty as untamed ferals — homeless offspring of stray or abandoned cats raised without human contact.

Bird (his surname and passion are coincidental, he chirped) estimated well-fed pets alone destroy upwards of a billion birds annually around the world. The American Bird Conservancy estimates hundreds of millions are killed in the United States by cats each year but says an exact figure is unclear.