The Australian government has long condoned killing feral cats but in July, Minister of the Environment Greg Hunt officially declared open season. Since then, the Australian Department of the Environment has been working to kill two million cats by 2020 as part of their misguided “Threatened Species Strategy.”
Alley Cat Allies strongly condemns this cruel and ill-conceived plan, which supports the shooting, poisoning, and lethal trapping of community cats on five islands and multiple mainland “feral-free” areas. The Australian Department of the Environment even went so far as to design an app called FeralCatScan, which allows the user to track outdoor cat sightings so cats can be killed. The Australian government’s goal is to “cull” the cat population, but “cull” is just a euphemism. They are killing cats, and it’s as inhumane as it sounds.
The plan is not only cruel, it’s ineffective, a waste of funds, and won’t save wildlife. Removing cats from an area and killing them only leads to a vacuum effect where cats from neighboring areas move into the empty space. Trap-Neuter-Return (TNR) is the only effective and humane approach to the outdoor cat population, and it doesn’t waste time, money, or lives. It’s been proven: killing does not effectively stabilize and reduce cat populationsnot in a city or state, and definitely not in an entire country. TNR does.
Australia’s war against cats needs to end. Trap-Neuter-Return is the only proven humane, effective approach to community cats.