I beg to disagree. I’ve seen cats attack nests full of
baby birds. But whatever, any cat that I trap in my yard ,
is history.
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Cats kill millions of songbirds a year. They’re predators at heart and they take an enormous toll on our songibrd population. They are not native to the U.S. so our birds have not evolved defenses- a recipe for disaster, just like all exotic invasives.
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I guess it would depend on where you live regarding the cat issue.
Last season I had 3 stray cats that hung out in my garden and orchard and for the first time i did not have any problems with my fruit or vegetable garden getting demolished by unwanted attacks from squirrels (traps also helped), birds, groundhogs or any other unwanted pests. @rayrose, I wish we lived close because I would take all those unwanted cats.
I certainly respect everyones opinion but what I do know is Ive never seen a cat eat one piece of fruit from my yard. I’ll keep the cats, you can have the birds.
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I take such bombastic statements with a grin of salt. If somebody really counted, how many millions is that — ten? five? one? one half? one tenth? And how much is that relative to the total songbird population? Fifty percent? Ten percent? One percent? You cannot expect 100% survival rate for any wildlife population, otherwise their numbers would rapidly explode and quickly lead to an epizootic. Cats have been on this continent for hundreds of years, if their effect was as devastating as it’s described by some, there wouldn’t be a single songbird remaining. You should also take into account that rats are also very fond of birds’ eggs and babies. If you eliminate cats, the rat population would explode and perhaps result in much worse damage to the birds.
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Very true. Snakes also eat bird eggs and hatchlings. Nature has a way of maintaining balance.
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Anyone with experience with groundhogs? Trapping seems the only way although I’ve read about success using lavender. Any advice is much appreciated.
Hi. Yes, you are exactly right that nature maintains a balance IF the species in a particular ecosystem are native to that ecosystem. The key here is that domestic cats are native to the Middle East and wreak havoc on our native species. A classic case of an invasive species.
You are right. Deterrents are temporary at best and a rubber crutch at worst. You must find a successful way to greatly reduce their population all year. Otherwise, while you think you are deterring them with lavender or other deterrents, their population is continuing to grow. There are lots of good videos on YouTube on trapping these.
@ Applefarmer
[quote=“applefarmer, post:26, topic:19510”]
(“Anyone with experience with groundhogs )”
Yes .
Groundhogs have a small home range.
Usually they are found 100- 300 ft from their den.if you see one and scare it., it will run to its den, so find its den.
Grab a smoke bomb , and some thing to plug the hole with.( plastic and some sod works)
Have your " plug" ready. Put smoke bomb in hole and plug.
Not sure if this is legal ?
But it works.
Their dens have a back door, so plug both.
@ Stan “I take such bombastic statements with a grin of salt.”
I actually underestimated the number by quite a bit. Latest research on the subject by U.S. Dept of Fish and Wildlife and Smithsonian Institution below:
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Back door. ?
That is what I have heard . But has not been my observation.
Often I have found 2 holes close together . Put a large home made smoke bomb in one and plugged it. And NO smoke came out the other hole.
This may not always be the case , but it’s what I have observed…
I have got ride of them around my orchard / garden areas.
Home made smoke bomb recipe:
Equal parts ~
Sawdust
Sulfur
Sugar
Salt Peter
Mix together add water until wet , mix again,
Spread out on news paper to dry.
Soak sheets of news paper in salt Peter / water . Dry…
Salt Peter and paper is like a fire cracker fuse . When dry.
When really dry roll up a BIG fat cigar of the mix in piece of the news paper .put in a old tin can and light.
This has worked well.
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I’ve got a pretty good feel for how many birds die in my yard each yr. Each death leaves behind feathers. It’s a very small number and there are lots of birds and cats around. I tend to think the deaths I see, feathers indicating a dead bird, are birds that die and then get eaten. It’s usually under a tall tree where birds rest at night.
Maybe I’m missing a lot of deaths of young robbed from the nest.
The estimate is 10% mortality by pets each yr. That’s a small number considering that birds have high reproduction rates and don’t live that long at best.
If there are species who’s numbers are threatened by pets then that’s another story. I’m sure there are those species but around here it’s not the common species like dove, starling, sparrows, or finches.
I’m not a cat lover and have never owned a cat in the last 60 yrs. So I’m not biased in favor of cats. I just live with them in my yard. There are several that visit and usually one on my place at any time.
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@fruitnut Two of your common species you mention- starling and sparrows- are themselves exotic invasive species from Asia and Europe, respectively. And yes, you’re absolutely correct that they are exploding in numbers because they’re not native here and our ecosystems are not adapted to deal with them.
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…except by cats 
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I had a groundhog this last summer. I kept filling the holes with big rocks and eventually he stopped re-digging. Maybe I tired him out 
I tried a groundhog trap and never caught anything in it other than some birds.
Good point. Except the cats also wipe out huge numbers of our native songbirds too. And the invasives are so prolific they thrive anyway. The populations of so many of our native songbirds are in free-fall decline. Since I entered the conservation field in 1977 I’ve seen once abundant bird species now become rare, over and over again. Heartbreaking.
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I agree with you Steve… I am all for saving endangered species and restoring ecosystems’ balance…
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Often I find that the predator was a hawk - another bird, often the Cooper hawk
I’ve seen them very diligently pulling off the feathers of their prey before consuming
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To get back on the topic, it looks like 2019 is going to be
a much different year than 2018. Last year I trapped a total
of 30 squirrels. So far in the first 9 days of 2019, I’ve already trapped
12 squirrels.
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