Messin with spiders

[Valka D'Ur]

Hysterical rant

You might want to direct this rage at the RL locals who irresponsibly allow their cats to roam the neighborhood.

At least my cats ate their bird kills, and my dad's cat ate his mouse kills. My own cats were content to just kill the mice and let me dispose of the bodies once they were done playing with them. My dad discovered that his cat had created a "mouse crypt" in the cellar where he left the bones after he'd eaten what he wanted of them.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

Of course it's a counter argument. Yes, some cats kill birds. No, all cats do not kill birds. Of all the cats I've had over the last almost-40 years (it'll be 40 years next October), only TWO of them ever killed birds. The biodiversity of our back yard was just fine, thank you.

Now that I'm in an apartment, I don't allow my cats outside, even on the balcony. The neighbor's cat would hang out on my balcony, though, and hop up on the railing and watch the birds. It scared me to see her perched there, leaning over, because if she ever fell, I don't think she would have survived (it's a myth that cats always land on their feet and walk away from a fall).

I don't see how you could possibly know how many birds your cats killed, seeing as how they mainly hunt at night and more often that not don't bring their victims back for you to check

It is however very nice to hear that your cats now are mainly in your apartment. Anyway, I was not trying to scold you for having your cats outside, since my family does, too, I just wanted to clarify that having one's cats outside is not a "non-issue", because that was the impression I got from you.

Nor does it change the fact that if you let your cats outdoors, you are a horrible, selfish, irresponsible person.

Kinda depends on many factors, no? If I live in an urban area with no parks or forests nearby then cats will have close to no effect at all, considering how they tend to hunt only in a certain radius. Additionally, if you have your cat outside, but contain it to your own garden, it will do much less damage than if you allow it to roam completely free. It's never as black & white as you claim it to be

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I don't see how you could possibly know how many birds your cats killed, seeing as how they mainly hunt at night and more often that not don't bring their victims back for you to check

Where did I say I knew how many birds they killed? I said I knew how many of my cats were bird-hunters.

It is however very nice to hear that your cats now are mainly in your apartment. Anyway, I was not trying to scold you for having your cats outside, since my family does, too, I just wanted to clarify that having one's cats outside is not a "non-issue", because that was the impression I got from you.

Owen was the one who was scolding and ranting about it.

When I lived in a house, we had a nice, large back yard with a nice, healthy ecosystem. Yes, a couple of my cats hunted birds - one because she was obeying her instincts as a predator, the robins didn't fly away fast enough, and I know she ate her kills because I saw her doing it. My other cat hunted birds to stay alive, as this was before she was actually my cat. She was a stray who had kittens under our back porch, and it took several months to tame her to the point where she decided to move into the house. In the meantime, she had to eat (for herself and because she was nursing her kittens), and the robins were there. Yes, we did give her cat food, but she was used to hunting.

My other cats? Well, they preferred to hunt mice, insects, and french fries. My two current cats really don't care about the birds flying around outside, other than when they fly too close to the windows. That, however, doesn't inspire an "I want to kill you and eat you" reaction. It inspires a "GTFO of here, you woke me up from my nap!" reaction.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

In a "back yard ecosystem" it is pretty likely that cats are not the only invasive species. Probably not even close. That doesn't make them any less of a problem though.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

In a "back yard ecosystem" it is pretty likely that cats are not the only invasive species. Probably not even close. That doesn't make them any less of a problem though.

Yeah, it's not like I live in Calgary, where they have coyotes in some areas.

 

[Arwon]

It's actually against the law to let cats outside in parts of the Australian Capital Territory. This is a very good idea and should be extended to the whole territory... they're the worst ecological threat in Australia, they butcher reptiles, rodents, birds, marsupials, the lot. The way our cat reacts to birds when he's out on our balcony, I've got zero doubt he used to be a little murderbeast before we got him off a family who let him live outside.

Keeping them inside keeps the little buggers safe too.

 

[Kyriakos]

Cats seem to be among very few animals that do hunt for sport/being a jerk as well

We have a lot of strays in the area i currently live in, and it is becoming a problem. By a lot i mean... at least 30?.. And going by how they act around humans, they are entirely subsidized by some. Issue is that their population will increase, and then a drastic solution (eg moving them) will have to happen, but at least i will be in a different location by then anyway.

 

[Bootstoots]

I just remembered something about Alberta: pet rats are banned and the whole province prides itself on being as rat-free as possible. So I was being unfair. I couldn't possibly expect an Albertan to understand why rats are adorable, smart, friendly little pals.

They can cause damage of their own, though. They like to chew on fabric, paper, and wiring and have to be watched pretty closely when allowing them to run around to make sure they're doing that. Typically my bedsheets would still end up with little holes in them when I let them run around on the bed, and I would rarely let them run around in entire rooms for fear they'd start chewing on wires. Sometimes they'll try to take stuff they've shredded back to their cage to add to their little nests. Usually I'd just give them toilet paper tubes and other waste cardboard along with their food, which they really appreciated.

One time, during my senior year of college, I was woken up to the sound of paper tearing. My rats had both escaped their cage by climbing up to the cage ceiling and squeezing through an opening that looked impossibly narrow, then jumped from the cage to the bookshelf (about a 1.5-foot jump) and found a study book on quantum physics. They were tearing out pieces from it, jumping back to the cage with the paper, squeezing back through the opening, and dropping them off, then climbing back out for more. I've never seen rats so happy. RIP, Schaum's Outline of Quantum Mechanics.

I had to start putting books or other objects on the top of the cage to keep them from escaping. Of course I had to make sure the books were expendable. At one point I forgot and ended up with a bunch of chew marks in volume 2 of the Feynman Lectures on Physics.

 

[Kyriakos]

Rats and mice look far more peaceful than cats anyway:

 

[Bootstoots]

Yeah, they are pretty trainable, about as trainable as a dog. The trick I'm most surprised by in that video is diving for peas - while they're good swimmers, they usually hate the water, so much so that it can be exploited for psychological tests. My sister and I used to try to bathe our first rat when we were kids, and the main thing we learned is just how high rats are capable of jumping. As the video shows, they're good at that.

Bathing rats is totally unnecessary anyway: they spend even more of their time grooming themselves (and each other) than cats do. They don't stink unless they live in a sewer, or someone doesn't bother to change their bedding for three weeks.

 

[Akka]

I have to admit, they are very cute ^^

 

[Kyriakos]

Lol that's just a Huntsman they're harmless

Well, why would anyone try to catch that spider with a container that has roughly the periphery of the spider itself!

 

[Kyriakos]

Anyway:

 

[CavLancer]

Spiders are sexist. The female always eats the male.

 

[CavLancer]

Here's a crazy Aussie with a tank full of red back spiders. Creepy.

 

[Kyriakos]

Australian cheap entertainment...

 

[Berzerker]

Your myopic anecdote doesn't in any way change the fact that cats kill 1.4-4 BILLION BIRDS EVERY GODDAMN YEAR. And that in particular in continents like North America, they do so because they are an invasive species and as such native species (birds, rodents, and small reptiles) are not at all equipped to deal with them. They are responsible for extinguishing dozens of species of birds. Maybe your cat didn't kill birds. It probably did, but let's pretend it didn't for a second. That doesn't change the reality that cats are horribly destructive to the environment. Nor does it change the fact that if you let your cats outdoors, you are a horrible, selfish, irresponsible person.

ouch

I dont have much choice, 3 cats (momma, son and daughter) all showed up at my door around Christmas as a severe winter storm was approaching. They come and go thru our dog door now, I even got a possum coming in. We did get 'em fixed, but they do kill rodents and birds. I've rescued a few but I'm usually cleaning up their remains.