Cats are responsible for killing up to 25 billion animals annually and have directly contributed to the extinction of at least 33 different species.
Growing up our family cat brought us a constant stream of rabbits, birds, and moles. It is actually a problem that nobody talks about, because cats are cute.
To me it seems like everybody talks about it. I've lived in the US, Australia, and now Sweden, and almost everyone seems to have some sort of awareness of and opinion on this issue.
My girlfriend sewed a collar for her cat out of a colourful patterned fabric, and also added a fringe of metallic, very reflective material to it. The collar seems to help a lot — he's no longer able to catch any birds, which are apparently highly attuned to bright and reflective colours (though rats aren't a problem). Highly recommended.
I think this is one of the reasons cats were worshiped/revered in ancient Egypt (for 3,000 years in religious practice). They were the official protectors of the pharaohs chambers against snakes and scorpions.
I disagree. If that were the case many of those smaller species would have gone extinct ages ago due to natural predation from wild foxes and ferrets. Domesticated cats are a new issue because they often hunt with the same voracity of wild animals, but don't experience the natural pressure on their population that wild predators do because they're human pets.
If there were as many human households with domestic foxes as there are with cats, then foxes would absolutely be considered an unnaturally potent problem for wild rodent and bird species too.
Growing up our family cat brought us a constant stream of rabbits, birds, and moles. It is actually a problem that nobody talks about, because cats are cute.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_predation_on_wildlife