Cats: Our Friends, Their Foes

Written by: Nicholas B. Canino, PHSS Intern

Cats are one of the most popular pets in the United States, with about 43 million households owning at least one. Their quirky personalities, neverending curiosity, and admirable features make them delightful pets to have. It is also common knowledge that these enthusiastic critters are not nearly as domesticated as dogs and still have a “wild side” to them. Much of their time is spent hunting toys on a string, pouncing on their owner’s hands, and gnawing on whatever they can get their paws on. Unfortunately, this can lead to a major issue for native animals on the receiving end of their wild nature.

Many cat owners think that it is essential to allow their cats to have free access to the outdoors around the neighborhood. This is due to a common misconception that cats require time outdoors in order to live a healthy life, but in reality, it has the opposite effect. But whether owners decide to leave them outside overnight, during the day, at all times, or even for short periods of time, these cats can do severe damage to the native wildlife that also calls that neighborhood home. Instead of having toys to hunt while inside, cats that are outdoors will choose to hunt a variety of native animals including lizards, birds, and small mammals. Many of these animals end up severely wounded or dead as a result of the cat's wild instincts.

Of course, cats are not to blame for simply complying with their natural behavior. In nature, these cats would be able to hunt and the populations of these animals would not decline so significantly. However, because of the increasing population of feral and outdoor cats in the United States, many native populations are not able to keep up. In some regions of the world, cat populations can be directly attributed to the extinction of numerous species. One study in 2013 found that domestic cats in the U.S. kill an average of 1.3 to 4 billion birds and 6.3 to 22.3 billion mammals annually. This unfathomable number of wildlife killed each year solely from domestic cat predation is why many wildlife ecologists believe cats are a greater concern for biodiversity than deforestation or climate change.

For a long time, cat owners have overlooked the impact that their precious pet is having on their local environment. Many owners will refute this argument by stating that they feed their cats a sufficient amount of food to stop them from hunting. But, has a cat ever stopped hunting toys on a string because it was full? Likewise, many owners say they have only seen their cat bring home an animal once or twice. But, for every animal they bring home, a few were left where they were killed and many more were severely injured and left to die. That is where Pelican Harbor Seabird Station comes in.

Over the past few years, Pelican Harbor has better tracked the circumstances of admission for many of our injured and sick animals. Since 2019, we have had nearly 500 animals come in that were attacked by a cat. About 75% of these animals were birds such as Northern Mockingbirds and Mourning Doves. The other 25% includes mammals like baby opossums and squirrels that we frequently get in the summer months. Cat attacks are the second most frequent reason why animals are brought to us for treatment. Unfortunately, the survival rate for these animals is very low with less than 50% of birds surviving to release. This is due to a potent bacteria that cats carry called Pasteurella multocida, which left untreated has a grace mortality  rate. Our treatment for patients attacked by cats includes strong antibiotics to avoid infection, laser treatment for pain, and wound repair and cleaning if necessary.

Because of the high occurance of cat attacks, there is a lot that we can do at Pelican Harbor to improve the situation for our native animals. Educating guests on the consequences of leaving their cats outdoors is one of the most impactful methods we can use to reduce the negative effects of outdoor cats. We always recommend that people leave their cats indoors and only allow outside access if there is an area where wildlife cannot get to, like an enclosed patio. Not only does this ensure that our wildlife is protected, but that our cats are safe as well. While we do our part to treat our wildlife, make sure you are doing your part to protect them too!

References:

Are outdoor cats happier? - Animal Humane Society

The impact of free-ranging domestic cats on wildlife of the United States - Nature

Wonderful Warblers

Written By: Sarah Stinson-Hurwitz, Wildlife Intake Associate

Fall migration is in full swing! Sweet little warblers are migrating all the way down to Central and South America for the winter after summering in the Eastern United States and Southern Canada. Here in South Florida, we are lucky enough to be a stopover migratory site and see a lot of these little fellas in the fall. 

We often get calls at the station when a finder sees a warbler, like the Cape May warbler shown on the left, on the ground not moving. A common first thought is that it needs help — it must be suffering from a broken wing or are unable to fly. If the warbler has a visible injury, your rehabilitation center should be contacted immediately. But oftentimes, the bird is just stunned from a collision with a window or another obstacle and needs a moment to recuperate. The best thing to do when you find a stunned warbler is to stand back and observe for about 20 minutes to see if they recover and fly away on their own. If not, it's time to take a photo and call us (or your nearest rehabilitation center) to determine next steps. 

Window collisions are the second deadliest human-related cause of bird injuries (cat attacks are the first). You can do your part to aid in their prevention by putting decals on your windows where collisions occur. The decals are made using the ultraviolet spectrum which is transparent to us humans but highly visible to birds. Collisions occur because birds are confused by the reflections of vegetation and sky they see in windows, and the decals upend this illusion. We also recommend placing feeders and bird baths either within three feet, or more than 30 feet, away from windows so that when birds take off they will not hit windows at dangerous speeds. If you are interested in acquiring decals, we have some available in our online store.  You can help make the world a safer place for warblers and all birds!

Why Passerines Aren’t Pets

The benefits of re-nesting songbirds 

Written By: Samantha Martinez, Environmental Educator

Humans have the amazing ability to empathize with their surroundings. To put themselves in the shoes of beings other than themselves. This is unequivocally a characteristic that we should nurture and be proud of. However; our own empathy that is meant to be used to help those around us can sometimes harm them when we are not fully aware of the effects of our actions. The most common situation that we experience like this at Pelican Harbor Seabird Station involves baby songbirds or mammals. Today we will dive deeper into the needs of baby passerines, also known as songbirds. And remember, always reach out to your local wildlife center if you find any wildlife that seems to need help

Nestling  Mockingbirds  Calling Out For Their Next Feeding From Mom & Dad 

From February to August Each year, parent songbirds will build a nest, incubate their eggs, and invest all of their energy into raising the next generation of their species. Inevitably they will run into a few roadblocks. For instance, a strong wind may knock all of their hard work completely out of the tree, babies and all. A  few may be stumbled on by humans who are more than willing to help. Now someone's first instinct may be to take the babies home and begin to feed them. This may seem like the most logical course of action but is actually not the best way we can help and has actually been coined “Bird-Napping”. In cases of fallen nests with birds that are too young to learn to fly, re-nesting would be the best option.

But what about older birds? Baby songbirds learn to fly from the ground up and can be found hopping on the ground as they build up their wing muscles until they are able to fly. In the case of baby birds learning to fly, it may look strange to us to see a bird on the ground. However, this is a completely natural process that every songbird must go through so it is important that we respect this process and leave the fledgling birds to complete their flying lessons. While their parents may not be easily visible, they are keeping an eye out for their little ones. 

Depending on their life stage, re-nesting or simply leaving them alone may be the right answer. Information on how to renest a baby bird and identify the life stage of said bird can be found here on the PHSS website. Two videos from our website will also be included at the end of this article.

Juvenile Northern Mockingbird Learning To Fly From the Ground Up

If you are still feeling iffy about the idea of leaving the baby birds, you should also be aware of the dangers you may unintentionally be imposing on these helpless younglings. Firstly, different species of songbirds each take up a specific niche in their environment when it comes to the foods they eat and baby songbirds can be extremely difficult to identify correctly. Feeding a baby bird something other than its natural diet can lead to digestion issues, growth stunting, a weakened immune system, or even death. Secondly, being raised by people can completely take away a bird's ability to behave normally in the wild and have the proper social skills to connect with other conspecifics (members of the same species) and may prevent them from breeding in the future. Though they are absolutely adorable and if raised by people can become quite friendly, wild birds or any wild animal for that matter should never be kept as a pet if it has the potential to have a full life in the wild since wild animals are biologically on every level different from domesticated animals and have much more complicated requirements to stay happy and healthy. 

All in all, good people from all walks of life stumble upon baby birds during nesting season and hear the call for help from these younglings. It is important to keep our empathy intact and do what we can but also be aware and informed of the best ways to help these animals before our good deed goes awry. Whether that be to put them in a strawberry basket with some leaves and re-home them in the closest tree or bush and wait for mom and dad to return or if the best thing is to just leave them be so they can grow into healthy well-adjusted birds. Either way, it is important to not let our first judgment and good intentions take away the right of every wild animal to be free. 

Found a baby bird? Here are some videos to help you identify the best course of action: