Animals V. Animals: A False Choice
Humans are the overwhelming cause of bird deaths. Those who try to frame the issue as a “cats versus birds” debate contribute, perhaps unwittingly, to the further decline of bird populations. Alley Cat Allies Legal Director Wendy Anderson explores the real reasons birds are at risk — human accountability — and the role lawyers can play in animal protection.
In April 2007, a birder in Texas shot a feral cat, which resulted in a felony cruelty indictment and national media coverage. The defense argued that since certain bird species are endangered, and because cats kill birds, therefore killing cats will save those bird species. This argument brought attention to the “cat versus bird” debate.
However, the argument is not so simplistic. The simple term of “habitat destruction” as a single cause of species loss belittles the logging, crop farming, livestock grazing, mining, industrial, and residential development that humans undertake and that impact the environment and animal species. A 2007 World Conservation Union report indicates that of the nearly 8,000 animal species threatened with extinction, 99% are at risk from human activities; habitat loss and destruction is the most important threat, affecting 83% of the bird species sampled. Consequently, it follows that humans, not cats are responsible for all the major threats to bird and animal life today.
Furthermore, even if cats did pose a real threat to bird species, removing and killing those cats would have no positive effect. Humans created and have maintained an environment that is highly advantageous to cats. Killing a population of any adaptive species, while leaving in place the advantageous habitat in which it thrives, merely leaves an ecological void that is quickly refilled by members of that species.
The fate of endangered species is precarious if society continues to focus on tangential matters; human population and resource consumption are expected to increase dramatically over the coming decades, and ignoring this growth will lead to deaths of millions of animals, including birds.