Cats & Dogs
CCS supports responsible ownership of companion animals.
CCS is currently lobbying Council to adopt mandatory de-sexing of cats. To appreciate the reason for this request here are some facts.
- Some 34,000 unwanted felines are euthanised in Victorian animal shelters each year.
- The Animal Protection Society at Keysborough takes in approx 3,500 cats and kittens, each year , 75% of these have to be killed, as there are no homes offered to them.
- Pet shops are not yet required to provide prepaid neutering vouchers with kittens for sale.
- Pretty kittens make cute “gifts” and then may be abandoned.
- Unwanted cats may turn feral, these cats exercise to catch food and may grow fierce and large
“Caught food” consists of
- native small marsupials
- lizards
- tiny bats
- frogs
- yabbies
- bird nestlings
- birds – many tiny ones that nest in shrubbery
- small possums – even if rescued, almost always die from infection from the cat bite
Image from Alice Springs NT govt. Kay Kessing artist.
Dogs – responsible ownership means keeping control of the animal at all times.
Ensuring it cannot escape to cause nuisance in the neighbourhood.
- creating a traffic hazard, wandering along roads
- Running loose in a park to fight with other animals or intimidate and or injure children or adults
- Ensuring dog poo is collected and disposed of appropriately – if left on roads it washes down drains into streams and into Port Phillip Bay, where we are then given an E-coli reading from the bay in summer, so you can decide whether to swim or not !
- Round worms from dog droppings can infect humans, the larvae can migrate to the human eye and affect the retina, causing blindness.
