Cat lock-in plan for Causeway, Kingston Foreshore, Casey

Alexandra Craig said :

Garfield said :

I know a cat owner whose cat goes stir crazy if its not allowed outside. As a responsible cat owner they desexed and micro-chipped the cat, feed it every day, only allow it outside when they’re home and never allow it out at night, which is when studies show that kill rates sky rocket. It doesn’t go more than a few metres beyond the boundary of their property. This is not a problem cat, but once containment reaches their suburb, they will have to spend many thousands of dollars cat proofing their yard or inflict mental torture on the cat by keeping it inside.

Rather than punishing responsible cat owners and their cats by blanket laws, how about targeting problem cats and their owners? Require all cats to be desexed and registered and have the rangers set traps in threatened wildlife areas. Cats captured can be checked to ensure they are registered and desexed and owners fined if they have failed to comply with regulations. Unclaimed cats can go to the RSPCA to be rehomed and cats caught in threatened areas more than once can be subjected to containment orders where there’s a big fine if they’re caught again.

To the person who said TAMS can walk and chew gum at the same time, they can’t. Many dog owners are irresponsible and inconsiderate of their neighbours, allowing their dogs to roam free to scare and injure people while others completely fail to train, exercise and play with their dogs, leaving them bored and barking at all hours of the day and night. TAMS won’t even send rangers out to look for roaming dogs unless the complainant can identify the house they come from.

If their suburb becomes cat containment it won’t be instant. They’ll have plenty of warning and time to slowly adjust their cat to an indoor lifestyle. It can be done with patience. It’s all about just keeping the kitty inside a tiny bit longer each day.

Desexing is already compulsory in the ACT, but not enforced sadly. I do some cat welfare stuff as a bit of a hobby and people not desexing their cats is the absolute bane of my existence. It’s highly frustrating that it’s not enforced.

Cat containment is on its way for all suburbs in the long run, so rather than avoiding the issue, how about answering the question as to why all cats and owners are getting hit with punitive blanket laws rather than only targeting problem animals and owners? According to the Canberra Times its a $1500 fine for not containing your cat, but if you let your dog roam and it gets picked up by rangers and you collect it from the pound it costs $89. If cats were people these laws would be getting challenged on the grounds of racial vilification.

Garfield said :

I know a cat owner whose cat goes stir crazy if its not allowed outside. As a responsible cat owner they desexed and micro-chipped the cat, feed it every day, only allow it outside when they’re home and never allow it out at night, which is when studies show that kill rates sky rocket. It doesn’t go more than a few metres beyond the boundary of their property. This is not a problem cat, but once containment reaches their suburb, they will have to spend many thousands of dollars cat proofing their yard or inflict mental torture on the cat by keeping it inside.

Rather than punishing responsible cat owners and their cats by blanket laws, how about targeting problem cats and their owners? Require all cats to be desexed and registered and have the rangers set traps in threatened wildlife areas. Cats captured can be checked to ensure they are registered and desexed and owners fined if they have failed to comply with regulations. Unclaimed cats can go to the RSPCA to be rehomed and cats caught in threatened areas more than once can be subjected to containment orders where there’s a big fine if they’re caught again.

To the person who said TAMS can walk and chew gum at the same time, they can’t. Many dog owners are irresponsible and inconsiderate of their neighbours, allowing their dogs to roam free to scare and injure people while others completely fail to train, exercise and play with their dogs, leaving them bored and barking at all hours of the day and night. TAMS won’t even send rangers out to look for roaming dogs unless the complainant can identify the house they come from.

If their suburb becomes cat containment it won’t be instant. They’ll have plenty of warning and time to slowly adjust their cat to an indoor lifestyle. It can be done with patience. It’s all about just keeping the kitty inside a tiny bit longer each day.

Desexing is already compulsory in the ACT, but not enforced sadly. I do some cat welfare stuff as a bit of a hobby and people not desexing their cats is the absolute bane of my existence. It’s highly frustrating that it’s not enforced.

It’s a shame that all cats will be punished, even those that don’t hunt. I have seen studies that suggest that not all (domestic) cats hunt, and from memory it’s one in three cats that hunt; which means two in three don’t. Most killing is done by feral cats. Even this following cat hater gives indicates that two out of three cats don’t hunt. http://theoatmeal.com/comics/cats_actually_kill

When looking for indications whether your cat might be a hunter, one suggestion I read was, does your cat play with toys and carry them as if they are prey? Having in the past owned several cats (not all at once) this was perhaps not a bad indicator. My last cat was not a hunter. (I’m not naive here; I have known other cats, one I am particularly thinking of, that were hunters, but my last cat was not. He would lie in the back garden and allow birds to hop near him and never attempt to grab them.) This cat never showed great interest in toys; even as a kitten. He showed interest in play fighting with other kittens though. He grew up a non-hunter, but a fighter. A big cat (6.7kls and not fat), he kept other cats out of the garden.
I have also read that where the kitten comes from could be an indicator of how much it will be a hunter. The biggest hunter I knew (a cat we had when I was a child), came from a dairy farm where the cats had to fend for themselves. So that kitten had witnessed other cats hunting.

FrankReynolds said :

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

I’m with you that dangerous dogs should be managed, there’s been a couple of horrendous stories recently, but this is a false equivalency. They are separate issues and should be managed as such.
It’s similar to something that was brought up a while back when cat containment was last discussed. The argument that cats should be ignored until other sources of impact are addressed is obstructive and would result in nothing ever changing.

See my change of position on cat conatinment above. However, there is a prioritisation issue – and while the gummint seems all clued up on cat management, the dangerous dog issue is suffering neglect:

http://www.canberratimes.com.au/act-news/new-act-dog-attack-laws-worthless-family-of-toddler-scarred-by-attack-20150812-gixig4.html

Nilrem said :

Nilrem said :

HenryBG said :

Maya123 said :

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

Dogs also attack other animals.

Cats attack vastly more other animals than dogs do.

Except dogs do far more damage to humans. You can also mitigate cat damage. Our cat wears a bell, is kept in each night and is kept well fed at home. His external diet supplement appears to be just about completely rats, mice and rabbits. Haven’t seen him eat a bird for months. Looks like a community service to me.

I’m going to do something unprecedented. I’m going to change my mind. I support cat containment around the Wetlands. But I still think the dog control laws are too weakly enforced,

I agree – cat containment is warranted in certain areas, and where the majority of owners are unlikely to comply with responsible pet ownership. I also agree that dog control laws are VERY weakly enforced. The majority of dogs I see out for a walk in my suburb and surrounds are sans lead, frequently sans manners, and quite often sans owner. When owners are present, they just smile (except for the guy whose leashed dog lunged at me – even after I spotted trouble and gave them a wide berth) and seem completely oblivious to the absence of a lead. Dog owners in nature reserves (such as Cooleman Ridge, where dogs are not allowed at all) will usually hastily put a lead on their dog when I come into view. When two parties with unleashed dogs encountered each other unexpectedly on the western side of the ridge, I decided it was safest to keep going.

As for cats and dogs, all cats have a strong desire to hunt, whereas dogs are more variable – some have a strong prey drive, some have none.

Garfield said :

To the person who said TAMS can walk and chew gum at the same time, they can’t. Many dog owners are irresponsible and inconsiderate of their neighbours, allowing their dogs to roam free to scare and injure people while others completely fail to train, exercise and play with their dogs, leaving them bored and barking at all hours of the day and night. TAMS won’t even send rangers out to look for roaming dogs unless the complainant can identify the house they come from.

I agree. The last time I spoke to DAS they told me they only have 4 rangers for the whole of Canberra, and can’t take any action unless the address of the dog is known, which is rather problematic when the dogs are roaming. They would do their best to send an extra patrol around our suburb.

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

I’m with you that dangerous dogs should be managed, there’s been a couple of horrendous stories recently, but this is a false equivalency. They are separate issues and should be managed as such.
It’s similar to something that was brought up a while back when cat containment was last discussed. The argument that cats should be ignored until other sources of impact are addressed is obstructive and would result in nothing ever changing.

I live in Casey and own two cats and, honestly, think this is a great idea. Our cats have always been indoor only, both due to the killing of wildlife issue and due to the fact that it results in much less chance of injury and vet bills for the animals. I believe that cat containment should be rolled out across the whole of the ACT over a period of time.

I know a cat owner whose cat goes stir crazy if its not allowed outside. As a responsible cat owner they desexed and micro-chipped the cat, feed it every day, only allow it outside when they’re home and never allow it out at night, which is when studies show that kill rates sky rocket. It doesn’t go more than a few metres beyond the boundary of their property. This is not a problem cat, but once containment reaches their suburb, they will have to spend many thousands of dollars cat proofing their yard or inflict mental torture on the cat by keeping it inside.

Rather than punishing responsible cat owners and their cats by blanket laws, how about targeting problem cats and their owners? Require all cats to be desexed and registered and have the rangers set traps in threatened wildlife areas. Cats captured can be checked to ensure they are registered and desexed and owners fined if they have failed to comply with regulations. Unclaimed cats can go to the RSPCA to be rehomed and cats caught in threatened areas more than once can be subjected to containment orders where there’s a big fine if they’re caught again.

To the person who said TAMS can walk and chew gum at the same time, they can’t. Many dog owners are irresponsible and inconsiderate of their neighbours, allowing their dogs to roam free to scare and injure people while others completely fail to train, exercise and play with their dogs, leaving them bored and barking at all hours of the day and night. TAMS won’t even send rangers out to look for roaming dogs unless the complainant can identify the house they come from.

Nilrem said :

HenryBG said :

Maya123 said :

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

Dogs also attack other animals.

Cats attack vastly more other animals than dogs do.

Except dogs do far more damage to humans. You can also mitigate cat damage. Our cat wears a bell, is kept in each night and is kept well fed at home. His external diet supplement appears to be just about completely rats, mice and rabbits. Haven’t seen him eat a bird for months. Looks like a community service to me.

I’m going to do something unprecedented. I’m going to change my mind. I support cat containment around the Wetlands. But I still think the dog control laws are too weakly enforced,

I reckon this is great. I am for ACT-wide cat containment. Cats can live a very happy life indoors. As I’ve said before on various RiotACT threads, you can leash train a cat if you want to give him/her some outside time as well as investing in a cat enclosure or cat run if you have the funds/home to allow it.

HenryBG said :

Maya123 said :

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

Dogs also attack other animals.

Cats attack vastly more other animals than dogs do.

Except dogs do far more damage to humans. You can also mitigate cat damage. Our cat wears a bell, is kept in each night and is kept well fed at home. His external diet supplement appears to be just about completely rats, mice and rabbits. Haven’t seen him eat a bird for months. Looks like a community service to me.

Sounds like a sensible idea, with decent notice. No real reason cats need to roam uncontained, day or night.

Maya123 said :

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

Dogs also attack other animals.

Cats attack vastly more other animals than dogs do.

justin heywood said :

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

There is strong evidence that cats do enormous damage to local wildlife and I fully support Rattenbury on this, but I do wonder why dogs aren’t included in the program as well.

Will we end up with a situation where rangers will be picking up stray cats but ignoring dogs?

Dog people tend to keep their dogs contained.
Cat people tend to allow their cats to roam free, killing wildlife.

It’s the squeaky wheel that gets the grease.

justin heywood said :

There is strong evidence that cats do enormous damage to local wildlife and I fully support Rattenbury on this, but I do wonder why dogs aren’t included in the program as well.

That would be because it is already illegal to allow your dog/horse/cow/ferret/penguin etc to wander off your property.

I’m always stunned by the arrogance of those cat owners who believe that they should not be subject to the same restrictions as other responsible pet owners.

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

Strikes me as common sense rather than madness, given how close the wetlands are to those inner south suburbs. Barring designated exercise areas, dogs are expected to be on a leash in public areas. Dog owners can be held accountable for the actions of their pet, or even having them off-leash in public areas.
The same can’t be said of cat owners. Are there any valid reasons why Mr. Fluffykins shouldn’t be prevented from dining out in a native bird reserve? Keep in mind that shutting down the reasonable options may pave the way for other solutions; maybe cats should be allowed to roam, but the sanctuaries will be littered with Curiosity baits? 1080 is used in several Canberra reserves.

In regards to priorities, I’d say TAMS is fully capable of walking and chewing gum at the same time when it comes to controlling domestic animals.

Yes I thought that too. How many people end up in Emergency because of cats? And they keep the rodent numbers (and their germs) down.

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

Dogs also attack other animals.

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

There is strong evidence that cats do enormous damage to local wildlife and I fully support Rattenbury on this, but I do wonder why dogs aren’t included in the program as well.

Will we end up with a situation where rangers will be picking up stray cats but ignoring dogs?

We must just realise that not all of our fellow citizens are as responsible as we are.

I don’t particularly like cats. I haven’t had a dog for many, many years.

Some parents get a “kitten” or a “puppy” because the kids “want one”. Usually, the deal is … they need to feed and clean up after this “cute” little pet. However, that doesn’t happen.

A pet is for LIFE and I am getting too old to have one. However, I do disagree with The Government telling us what we should do about pets.

Awaiting comment from cat lover JH.

Nilrem said :

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?

Madness is that cat owners think they can shirk responsibility and let their cats roam freely on other peoples’ property, killing wildlife, damaging gardens, and urinating anywhere they please.

My mistake, that’s not madness. It’s obnoxiousness and arrogance.

How’s cat containment going for the new suburbs? Any increases in native bird populations?

Madness. Inadequate controls on dangerous dogs and their feral owners, as evidenced by a steady stream of Canberra Times horror stories, and the Gummint is gunning for cats. Cats killing wildlife is a problem, but surely dogs attacking kids is a higher priority one?