Thread: Disposing of feral cats

The Stephens Island Wren went into extinction from predation by ferral cats. The myth was that it was from a single cat Tibbles, however other evidence suggests that a pregnant female escaped during the construction of a lighthouse on the island and this cat and it's progeny probably caused the extinction. The event in an enclosed habitat of an island prevented any adaption by the wren before the extinction event.

The cats should never have been there.

Well said Dullbird, X2

Originally Posted by Tombie

The trauma for a cat in a mould is "I can't get out" ...

The mould is cold before you teem into it, is it?

Originally Posted by JDNSW

A couple of comments.

Anyone who has lived through a mouse plague will respect this, although in plague conditions a cat, or even several, will not cope in plague conditions.

John

So if there are so many cats roaming the bush how does a mouse plague start and gather without the feral cats feeding on the mice before they reach such huge numbers? I have been in mice plagues at both Grenfell and Louth/Tilpa area and it was amazing.

Bob

Originally Posted by Ferret

The mould is cold before you teem into it, is it?

No they weren't. But then we don't cast ingots or blooms anymore and haven't for 12+ years.

The others described are instant. The rolling mills is through misadventure (they walk onto the roll line and get clobbered!)

They're aggressive buggers and big.
Not uncommon to approach and attack if threatened.

Personally I don't care what they're thinking as long as its not a long, drawn out torture. A quick despatch is always preferred.

We trap and drown foxes when we can't get the gas chamber.

When I was working west of Alice Springs forty years ago, it was with a geophysics crew and they were using hammer drop trucks for seismic works.
These massive weights were held up on the back of the truck and when it was time to drop them, they were released by remote radio control.

Needless to say the shade that they offered wasn't worth the risk, unlike a couple of cool cat Arabs that decided to have their lunch in the shade.
The signal was duly sent, and the flat cat Arabs were retrieved at a later date.
Something to do about planting a palm tree on a dead cat.
.

Mate of dads used to be a crane operator, apparently they used to amuse themselves in the afternoons by dropping loads on the cats in the empty boxes.
Personally I find getting amusement out of it a tad sick. I don't particularly like killing anything, but hey. **** happens.
Still, better an instant squish or melt than drowning, THAT'S ****ed...

Ok, my options have all but dried up. It has been suggested to me perhaps gas, as in LP. Bag the trap, insert gas, tie off and leave for 15 minutes.

Would this work?
I'm not concerned about it volatility as it will be early morning, about 0-4deg.
I also don't care to hear the cat going off it's nut for 10 minutes. But then again it will doing that from the moments it's caught, so another 10 minutes doesn't matter really.

other wise it looks like game over

feral cats 1 jason 0