There are a lot of cats in Washington , D.C. They go in ballpark , backyards , side streets , and people ’s homes . Exactly how many there are is the motion a new conservation project wants to do . DC Cat Count , a collaboration between Humane Rescue Alliance , the Humane Society , PetSmart Charities , and the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute , aims to tally every cat in the metropolis — even house deary , The New York Timesreports .
Cities be given to support thriving feral cat populations , and that ’s a problem for animal conservationists . If a felid is endure and grow up withouthuman contact , it will never be a suitable house cat . The only options beast control officials have are to euthanize strays or trap and sterilize them , and release them back where they were found . If neither action is taken , it ’s the smaller animals that belong in the wild who suffer . Caterpillar are invasive predators , and each yr they killbillions of birdsin the U.S. alone .
Before beast eudaemonia expert and wildlife scientists can tackle this problem , they need to realize how big it is . Over the next three years , DC Cat Count will use various methods to track D.C. ’s guy and build a feline database for the city . Sixty out-of-door camera traps will capture images of passing cats , rely on infrared applied science to smell out them most of the time .
citizen are being asked to aid as well . An app is currently being developed that will allow user to snatch up photos of any cats they see , including their own darling . The team also plans to study the unlike ways these cat interact with their environments , like how much time pets spend indoors versus outdoors , for example . The initiative has a $ 1.5 million budget to spend on garner data .
By the end of the project , the squad hopes to have the tools both conservationists and animal social welfare radical need to better control the local quat universe .
Lisa LaFontaine , president and CEO of the Humane Rescue Alliance , said in a statement , “ The realness is that those in the fields of welfare , ecology , preservation , and sheltering have a common long - terminus goal of few free - cast cats on the landscape painting . This joint endeavor will provide scientific management political platform to facilitate accomplish that goal , topically and nationally . "
[ h / tThe New York Times ]
