Conservation groups want you to leash your cat

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VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – BC conservation groups are worried about your cats killing tendencies.

They claim cats left to roam around neighbourhoods are responsible for killing billions of birds every year.

One proposal they offered was to license and leash your cat!

Geoff Urton with the SPCA says owners need to be a lot more responsible. “The most important thing is to not let your cat out at night and certainly not at dawn or dusk. That’s when their predatory drive is the strongest. Keep your cat inside as much as possible.”

But if kitty really wants to be let out, “Do it during the day and try to monitor it as much as possible. Let it into an enclosure in the backyard, so they are not roaming around causing trouble.”

It comes down to our ecosystem, cats are predators and they attack birds and other wildlife — In fact a US study claims cats kill up to 3.7 billion birds a year.

Other Canadian cities have cat license programs, Urton says it is needed here.

“It would really help us at the SPCA too, we are taking in over 20,000 a year into our animal shelters.”

The research was compiled by a team at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute in Washington D.C.

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