Despite
being very well and often overfed, it is all too familiar for owners of
cats that spend time outside to find "presents" of dead birds and
rodents just outside the back door and in the garden (and for a handful
of unlucky people these gifts even make it inside). It is a common
question by many as to why this happens when kitties are so well fed
that they have no need to hunt and kill.
So why does this happen, does
it mean our beloved pets are simply cold-blooded killers? Before
establishing whether this is really the case or not, it is important for
all cat owners to understand a few little details about what is causing
this behaviour to occur. Cats are natural-born hunters with our
domesticated moggies having evolved from feral cat species on the
African continent and these instincts are fully engrained into their
nature.
Many people who own cats understand this key fact but find
it difficult to contemplate the reason as to why small animals are
hunted and killed and then not eaten. In fact, it is thought that cats
kill billions of small creatures every year in the USA alone. The
crucial reason behind this undesirable behaviour is that in the wild,
mothers teach their young how to eat their food by bringing them dead or
sometimes injured prey.
One of the biggest culprits are thought
to be spayed female cats who still possess this instinct but have no
young to pass their knowledge onto, resulting in the owner being the
lucky recipient of their hard work. Oddly enough, they may simply be
trying to pass on their skills to you...seeing as we would find it much
harder to catch a bird in a tree, your loving cat is trying to help!
Despite
the fact that this kind of behaviour is not favoured by almost all cat
owners, we have to understand that they are simply following their
incredibly strong natural instincts. As someone that has four cats at
home that all go outdoors regularly, we try to help the problem by
ensuring we are not attracting birds to the garden using bird feeders
which is sad but would ultimately be quite a cruel thing to do.
