Ponder.cat
  • Communities
  • heart
  • search
    • Login
    • Sign Up
    • Communities

    • heart
      Support Lemmy
    • search
      Search

    • Login
    • Sign Up
    fossilesque@mander.xyzM to Science Memes@mander.xyzEnglish · 4 months ago

    Meow

    mander.xyz

    message-square
    165
    fedilink
    1.22K

    Meow

    mander.xyz

    fossilesque@mander.xyzM to Science Memes@mander.xyzEnglish · 4 months ago
    message-square
    165
    fedilink
    • WeirdGoesPro@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      41
      ·
      4 months ago

      It does. Travel to a 3rd world country and look at the difference. Dogs and cats everywhere due to no cultural expectation to keep them indoors or neuter them.

      Here is an article better clarifying the effect of our cute little killing machines:

      https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/cats-kill-a-staggering-number-of-species-across-the-world/

      • 1rre@discuss.tchncs.de
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        13
        arrow-down
        6
        ·
        4 months ago

        That article seems very new-world-centric

        Europe, Mainland Asia & Africa all have native small cats and so the birds and small mammals have evolved to deal with them, the issue is that in Australia & the Americas they haven’t and so that’s where all the risk of species actually being wiped out is - in the old world the cats largely just replace the larger predators that humans have killed off in the ecosystem

        • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          7
          arrow-down
          2
          ·
          edit-2
          4 months ago

          Even in the Americas we have wild cats though. Bobcats are slightly larger but not completely dissimilar. We even used to have ocelots across much of the US, and neotropical migrants will still encounter those for part of the year. So I find the claim that mainland birds are not able to handle cat predation to be a bit questionable. However I am not fully educated on this topic.

      • Maiq@lemy.lol
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        4
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        4 months ago

        Maiq has heard its dangerous to be your friend.

        • Klear@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          4 months ago

          No lies detected.

      • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        4
        arrow-down
        7
        ·
        4 months ago

        I’ve seen a lot of stats about cats and it seems very likely they have important conservation implications in island ecosystems where birds did not evolve with similar predators.

        But I’ve not seen evidence of conservation impacts on the mainland where we do and did have similar predators in the past. Just stating that cats eat a lot of birds doesn’t mean they’re a threat to overall populations.

        • WeirdGoesPro@lemmy.dbzer0.com
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          10
          ·
          4 months ago

          True, but that article says that over 350 of their prey species are at risk species, and that several of those are suspected to already be extinct.

          I love cats—I think most people should have them—just be responsible with your furry murderers.

          • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            4
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            4 months ago

            Again it would depend on where those are—threatened species are disproportionately located on those islands I mentioned. Furthermore it doesn’t assign any causation to cat predation.

            Maybe cats are a serious conservation threat on continental areas but I’m just saying I haven’t seen evidence of this.

            • WeirdGoesPro@lemmy.dbzer0.com
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              3
              ·
              4 months ago

              Here’s a study from Oklahoma State University specifically talking about the effects of mainland cats in contrast to island cats:

              “Our review shows overwhelming evidence that, beyond causing island extinctions, where there were no native predators, and massive numbers of mainland wildlife deaths, cats can exert multiple types of harmful impacts on mainland wildlife species that are reflected at the population level,”

              https://news.okstate.edu/articles/agriculture/2017/me-ouch-the-impact-of-cats-on-native-wildlife-species.html

              • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                2
                ·
                edit-2
                4 months ago

                Thanks, this seems more in line with what I was wondering. But I’ll need to see if I can get access to the full paper. The example given in Australia actually fits my hypothesis since they historically lacked felid predators. So I’d like to see the full list to see the location and severity of the effects they’re reporting.

                • WeirdGoesPro@lemmy.dbzer0.com
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  ·
                  4 months ago

                  Here you go:

                  https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/fee.1633

                  • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net
                    link
                    fedilink
                    English
                    arrow-up
                    1
                    ·
                    4 months ago

                    Oh I’ve got the link, but it’s paywalled. I’ll find the full paper later.

                    • WeirdGoesPro@lemmy.dbzer0.com
                      link
                      fedilink
                      English
                      arrow-up
                      2
                      ·
                      4 months ago

                      Here’s a non-paywalled PDF:

                      https://abcbirds.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Loss-and-Marra-2017-Population-impacts-of-free-ranging-domestic-cats-on-mainland-vertebrates.pdf

    Science Memes@mander.xyz

    science_memes@mander.xyz

    Subscribe from Remote Instance

    Create a post
    You are not logged in. However you can subscribe from another Fediverse account, for example Lemmy or Mastodon. To do this, paste the following into the search field of your instance: !science_memes@mander.xyz

    Welcome to c/science_memes @ Mander.xyz!

    A place for majestic STEMLORD peacocking, as well as memes about the realities of working in a lab.



    Rules

    1. Don’t throw mud. Behave like an intellectual and remember the human.
    2. Keep it rooted (on topic).
    3. No spam.
    4. Infographics welcome, get schooled.

    This is a science community. We use the Dawkins definition of meme.



    Research Committee

    • !spiders@lemmy.world

    Other Mander Communities

    Science and Research

    • !academia@mander.xyz
    • !science@mander.xyz
    • !scicomm@mander.xyz

    Biology and Life Sciences

    • !abiogenesis@mander.xyz
    • !animal-behavior@mander.xyz
    • !anthropology@mander.xyz
    • !arachnology@mander.xyz
    • !balconygardening@slrpnk.net
    • !biodiversity@mander.xyz
    • !biology@mander.xyz
    • !biophysics@mander.xyz
    • !botany@mander.xyz
    • !ecology@mander.xyz
    • !entomology@mander.xyz
    • !fermentation@mander.xyz
    • !herpetology@mander.xyz
    • !houseplants@mander.xyz
    • !medicine@mander.xyz
    • !microscopy@mander.xyz
    • !mycology@mander.xyz
    • !nudibranchs@mander.xyz
    • !nutrition@mander.xyz
    • !palaeoecology@mander.xyz
    • !palaeontology@mander.xyz
    • !photosynthesis@mander.xyz
    • !plantid@mander.xyz
    • !plants@mander.xyz
    • !reptiles and amphibians@mander.xyz

    Physical Sciences

    • !astronomy@mander.xyz
    • !chemistry@mander.xyz
    • !earthscience@mander.xyz
    • !geography@mander.xyz
    • !geospatial@mander.xyz
    • !nuclear@mander.xyz
    • !physics@mander.xyz
    • !quantum-computing@mander.xyz
    • !spectroscopy@mander.xyz

    Humanities and Social Sciences

    • !archaeology@mander.xyz
    • !folklore@mander.xyz
    • !history@mander.xyz
    • !old_maps@mander.xyz

    Practical and Applied Sciences

    • !exercise-and sports-science@mander.xyz
    • !gardening@mander.xyz
    • !self sufficiency@mander.xyz
    • !soilscience@slrpnk.net
    • !terrariums@mander.xyz
    • !timelapse@mander.xyz

    Memes

    • !bushrat_confidential@slrpnk.net
    • !science_memes@mander.xyz

    Miscellaneous

    • !answered@mander.xyz
    • !mander@mander.xyz
    Visibility: Public
    globe

    This community can be federated to other instances and be posted/commented in by their users.

    • 2.43K users / day
    • 6.82K users / week
    • 11.5K users / month
    • 22.7K users / 6 months
    • 1 local subscriber
    • 15.6K subscribers
    • 3.08K Posts
    • 31.7K Comments
    • Modlog
    • mods:
    • Salamander@mander.xyz
    • fossilesque@mander.xyz
    • SciBot@mander.xyz
    • fossilesque@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    • UI: unknown version
    • BE: 0.19.8
    • Modlog
    • Instances
    • Docs
    • Code
    • join-lemmy.org