peter2014

LV, 30 Oct 2017, 4pm

This is sad that a Yellow-breasted bunting was caught by a domestic cat.

20171030-D5N_9980.JPG (813.6 KB)

1/11/2017 10:06

lexusjohn

HKBWS Vicky

The project team noted this photo on facebook too. We have already put a collar with bell on this cat yesterday. Hopefully could alert birds from the cat. We will continue putting collars to cats which are approachable. However, there are cats that stay away from human and also there are cat lovers who think that collar will kill the cat and will take away the collar. We are still thinking how to solve these problems.

Vicky
HKBWS

sdavid

Why not remove cats totally from LV?

Seems silly to be attracting Globally-threatened birds to a location where there are an abundance of predators?

derekhon2

I saw a lanceolated warbler chased by a little cat in LV.

ajohn

Quote:

Original posted by sdavid at 2/11/2017 10:34
Why not remove cats totally from LV?

Seems silly to be attracting Globally-threatened birds to a location where there are an abundance of predators?

I agree. There are photographs of cats catching Yellow-breasted bunting (globally Endangered) this year, and catching a Rustic Buntingg (globally Vulnerable) last year. The HKBWS/CA Management agreement at Long Valley is doing great work to make sure that farmers are growing rice to attract these buntings, but when they arrive they are at risk of being caught and killed by cats.

Removal of cats from the site seems, to me, to be a much higher conservation priority than colour-ringing the buntings in the hope of finding out about movements if they survive.

CWSO

種禾稻去吸引雀鳥來餵猫, 完全不設防.
餵猫冇問題???? 批評人地餵蟲D人,去晒邊呀?

ivantse

Quote:

Original posted by CWSO at 2/11/2017 14:48
種禾稻去吸引雀鳥來餵猫, 完全不設防.
餵猫冇問題???? 批評人地餵蟲D人,去晒邊呀?

一直都有關注貓既問題
唔知唔好出黎抽水ok?

ivantse

Quote:

Original posted by ajohn at 2/11/2017 11:58


I agree. There are photographs of cats catching Yellow-breasted bunting (globally Endangered) this year, and catching a Rustic Buntingg (globally Vulnerable) last year. The HKBWS/CA Management agree ...

For Nature Conservation, cats are really problems which should be removed. But not all the people agree with that, especially the groups who fight for animal rights.

HKBWS Vicky

Indeed most of the cats are kept by farmers who aimed to control rats. We cannot remove those cats since we are not owning/managing the whole site.
That's why we try to use other method to alert birds by putting collar with bell on cats.

derekhon2

I saw this cat three times in "attacking mode" today from 5:00pm to 6:00pm

tgraham

I saw this recently which shows how bad domestic cats are for the environment.Its estimated they kill 1 million birds everyday in Austrailia
In the US the estimates are much higher


http://mobile.abc.net.au/news/20 ... 9013960?pfmredir=sm

[ Last edited by tgraham at 3/11/2017 07:05 ]

wcaptain

Some habitat management suggestions in relation to the domestic cat problem

(1) ditch creation
Cats do not like water. A ditch (or deep water part) between pond bunds and paddy can be created so that the cat cannot jump from the pond bunds and catch birds. The ditch should be wide enough (3 to 4 m?) so that cats cannot jump across.

(2) Flooded the field when paddies are available
Same as above

(3) Planting of lemon grasses (or other irritated plants)
Cats do not like irritated smells. Plants with such smell can be planted along the edge. Their leaves can be cut to produce such smell during paddy harvesting. Lemon grasses are tough, cheap and easy to grow.

BTW, pest problem is usually associated with various aspects (food source, origin, hiding place etc) and so an integrated approach should be considered when tackling this kind of problem.

Jackvader

Saw this killer cat today patrolling in LV with bells on. Quite threatening still!

JNM_2271.JPG (1.81 MB)

7/11/2017 23:13

裝塵

Below photos is taken by a birder who is from China this week FYR.
6,7 November 2017
LV

[ Last edited by 裝塵 at 9/11/2017 23:47 ]

Jackvader

The last photo shows that the collar bell is ineffective. I am an owner of two cats. Cat loves to hunt and kill, not necessarily for food. If LV is infested by these killer cats, we should consider removing them from the area, at least temporarily at time when rare birds passing or staying in LV.

[ Last edited by Jackvader at 11/11/2017 22:49 ]

evafun2014

I think birders really don't like to see cats killing rare birds. By the way, cats are owned by farmers, not wild cats, they have their functions on rats control. Let's think of some ways to do it in Harmony, hopefully not to finger pointing those cats too much. Just afraid too much finger pointing would result in negative actions by someone like poisoning or so. I would suggest doing it in a win-win way, hope not helping birds but hurting cats.

lalan

會否考慮暫停在朗原的環誌計劃，以減少雀鳥的壓力？

evafun2014

It might be a good suggestion for Hkbws to consider.  At least it will be less stressful for birds busy looking for food during this period.

Jackvader

Cats kill more than 1 million birds in Australia every day, new estimates show

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017- ... y-estimates/9013960

JohnC

Can we convince the farmers to use other methods to control the rats?  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbG6GNwfX2Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsoVcrFyrF8

There are plenty of other ways to get rid of rats.