Animals and Pets

So depending on the cat breed… virtually no difference at all. The larger of the 2 cats that we feed (shed cat, remember “feral”)… is 20-22 pounds (the smaller brother is 16-17 lbs). He is just as heavy as an average bobcat. Though admittedly less “stocky”. But my point is that they’re similar, “virtually the same” or “barely different”. I never claimed 1:1. But if they’re 99% the same… then it’s the same. Marginally larger is not sufficient argument that they’re different. Bob cats are not like mountain lions. They’re not “huge”.

Just because some domestic cats can get as big as some bobcats does not make that the norm. Also, size is not the only differentiator, which is why I brought up breeding, food source, and habitat.

Check the graph of your own source…https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms2380/figures/2 It shows that normal owned domestic cats are not the issue, which is exactly what the comic is pointing “fun” at. The “owner” that feeds the cat and lets them outside from time to time are nowhere near the problem. You’re context switching between “Feral” and owned and claiming that everything is bad when it’s only one category or the other. This is literal bad faith argument.

Domestic cats and feral cats are the same species, so I apologize for not making that distinction in the one sentence. It is an easy mistake to make, and you did the same thing in your next paragraph:

Further… No, domestic cats don’t “tend” to live in colonies. They only do so only due to food issues and will arguably NEVER create social group unless it’s required.

And went on to describe feral cats. That being said, I literally said feral cats were the problem. From my previous comment:

The comic itself is about pets, not feral cats, so it makes sense that OP would be focusing on that. Feral cats are the biggest problem in the discussion about killing native wildlife (birds in particular).

Talking about bad faith, the part you left out in the description of feral cats is:

This does not inevitably happen, and some will live singly, **but it is not uncommon for small groups of co-operating females and kittens (matrilinear colonies) to develop. **

That [...] did a lot of heavy lifting in your version...

actually means 1.2 as an average… 1.2 and 1.4 isn’t that far apart.

That is a 15% difference, which in breeding numbers is huge. And this is talking about number of litters, so doesn't even get down to total number of kittens born (although litter size is pretty similar). Also of note, bobcats don't generally start breeding until their second year. Domestic cats start at 6 months of age, which is why we fix cats as soon as possible.

Then this comic doesn’t apply to a very large subset of owners who do the right thing and virtually all cats that make it to any human system at all. Now you can fuck off with pushing it onto everyone which is what OP is doing in half of their posts in this thread.

Who said it was about responsible cat owners? Show me where I said all cat owners do this? Or OP for that matter? He has been responding to folks that literally say they let their pet cats outside.

That makes the comic fucking stupid. It makes the OP a jackass for targeting a group of people who aren’t the problem.

The comic is about the health of the cats. Feral cats came up as a natural progression of that discussion. I don't actually like the comic, but it isn't about the health of wildlife in any way that I can see, but about the health of house cats. It is pretty well documented that outdoor cats do not live as long as indoor only cats.

And makes you an accomplice for shilling it as well by conflating the two groups of problem as if they’re the same.

Again, when did I say they are the same group? This particular thread was because someone unrelated said domestic cats would be outside if humans weren't involved.