We are sitters from Australia , but have done most of our sits in UK the past few years, to explore and sight see . We looked after mainly dogs to start, but have had several cats recently.
We’ve been a bit shocked about the casual acceptance of owners that their cats slaughter the local wildlife every night, whilst there’s also an understanding that wildlife ( small birds, small mammals etc,) are under threat. This summer we’ve had ducklings, robins, harvest mice, dormice, wrens all paraded through various houses we’ve looked after. We’ve managed to rescue some, but many casualties.
In Australia, domestic cats are largely kept in, viewed as being very damaging to wildlife, they wear collars to warn of their prescence, and usually kept in at night . A roaming cat is often frowned upon. In UK we find owners just accept this, often rare and threatened species killed.
Have any other sitters from overseas noticed this in UK in particular?
Not sure about the UK, but in the US the feelings seem to run the gamut — although it slowly seems to be gravitating more toward protection of local wildlife.
I will also say it feels like I’m seeing more owners keeping cats indoors full time, partially as the coyote situation here is so bad in so many places, even in semi-urban areas. “Catios” are becoming a much more common substitute to free-roaming felines.
I house sat in the UK for 6 months last year and almost all our cat sits were for indoor/outdoor cats with the exception of maybe one or two; and the majority of those houses had a cat door that allowed for them to come and go as they please.
And when walking around in the different areas in which we stayed, I remember remarking to my husband that I had noticed more cats outside than other places–and they often had collars so I know they were not strays.
I do not recall having many conversations about this behavior in particular so I can’t speak to the hosts’ feelings about this.
When I sit in the US, my experience has been opposite–while I have sat for plenty of cats that are allowed outside, the vast majority are indoor only. So it just seems to me that letting cats outdoors is maybe more common there, which could suggest a generally different attitude about their hunting tendencies.
I am in the UK and agree with you. Think all cats should have a bell on their collars to protect wildlife. Have had cats often kill something. Some cats are also out all night hunting.
The last time I researched tgis topic, it was estimates that 1-3 billion birds in US (maybe North America) are killed by domestic and feral cats. Number does bot include snall mammals, snakes… Keeping cats indoors, especially areas where such predators do not occur, is critical to protect native wildlife.
Wildlife in Australia, New Zealand and many other places have been severely impacted by domestic and feral cats. I totally support feral cat culling programs. Of course, capture and domesticate the kittens.
Most U.S. cats I’ve sat have been indoor ones (some with catios). In the U.K., I’ve sat indoor and indoor/outdoor ones. At one of the sits, I found several dead fledglings in the garden or front path and mentioned it to my hosts. They blamed neighbor cats, but I never saw any cats nearby besides theirs, which spent most of the day outdoors. They didn’t have a cat door, so the cat couldn’t leave surprises indoors at least.
In my own U.S. neighborhood, there’s a cat that’s someone’s pet (don’t know whose), who wanders and we see from time to time. I do wonder whether that cat is killing birds, because we have loads of them, since we live by a creek and small lake.
Tangentially, there was a cougar spotted in our area in the past couple of weeks. It was just caught and euthanized, because of a leg injury. There’s another one that officials are looking to capture. Some think maybe we’re seeing them, because wildfires might have driven them away from habitat in our area — we have lots of woods. If they’re hunting in our neighborhood, they’d have good odds with birds, rabbits, deer and other wildlife. We have coyotes, too, but I’m not sure what preys on them.
Interestingly just had a convo with someone about that…it’s not a lot. Bears, alligators & mountain lions — all of which I’m glad I don’t see a lot of in the neighborhood, despite the coyotes being such an invasive problem. We even have a pack of them in our neighborhood, & on my last sit I couldn’t let the little dog out off-leash as a neighbor dog was taken in the yard with the owners present not too long before…!
Yeah I would say in Australia there are efforts being made by various councils to try to keep cats inside and attitudes are changing in relation to wildlife protection. Many years ago our keen hunter bought in twin baby ring tail possums over two nights. That was a bit hard to stomach. Another time in the middle of the day he let a squawking butcher bird free under the dining table. He had a bell on his collar but the hunting instinct in him was very strong. I do personally feel sorry for total indoor cats, even in prison you get outdoor time
I’m an Aussie and have seen changes to local council requirements in relation to cats outdoors. More than a third of local councils in Australia now require cats to be contained overnight or 24 hours a day. Most are in the ACT and Victoria. Parts of Western Australia and Queensland also enforce strict local bans on roaming pets.
When sitting in the UK, and I generally sit in rural locations, I certainly notice the difference where cats can come and go as they please day and night. The “gifts” vary from dead to partly alive!
Yes, my husband carries bear spray and a huge, heavy flashlight when he walks our dog at night, because the coyotes are out more then. He wants to be prepared in case of an attack. But we’ve seen them even in daylight in our neighborhood, once in our backyard.
And we drove to brunch a couple of days ago in Portland and saw one in someone’s front yard a couple of minutes’ drive from the restaurant.
Wild, isn’t it? We’ve had them in broad daylight as well — a singleton roams our neighborhood. A year ago we saw him walking down the street bold as brass, dragging a giant pizza box in his mouth!
I’m from the UK and used to have cats when I lived in a small village and would get ‘gifts’ ranging from a live pigeon to mice, rabbits etc. it didn’t occur to me at all to keep them inside. However, since housesitting in NZ and Aus, where a lot of cats are kept inside I’ve come to the conclusion it’s a good idea to let cats roam during the day and keep them inside I’ve at night, when they’re more successful with their hunting. I think it quite cruel to keep them inside 24/7. Even animal charities say cats should have access to the outdoors. I did a lovely cats sit in Canberra where the home was very cat friendly. The two cats even had their own bedroom and from the top bunk of bunk beds they had a window which connected them to a covered walkway leading them to a large section of the garden that was fenced in. So, during the day they went out through a cat flap as normal but, when they’re came in for dinner I locked the cat flap but they still had access to the outdoors until morning, but were unable to hunt. It was a great idea.
Some of the cat sits I’ve been doing in Aus have outside catios where the cats can enjoy being outside but can’t get our birds and wildlife. I think there’ll be more and more of these as local councils crack down on cats being outside, especially overnight, providing there is enough outside space for them.
It’s just my experience, living there for 45 years, around our neighbourhood, Facebook group topics, local papers, community attitudes, friends, media etc. In Sydney north shore. We did 3 sits there over last summer and none of the cats were allowed out at all, in Sydney and Central Coast.
We’ve not had a sit in UK where the cat has been restricted to go out, they come and go , and wildlife hunting is just part of it.
Oh please no! That’s incredibly stressful for them. Imagine a big bell ringing an inch from your ear every time you moved… It’d be bad enough for a human, but for a cat, which instinctively want to move silently, it’s torment.
“Catify” your home, build a catio, do whatever helps. But not the ********* bell!
