[CAT] "Kitty cameras show Athens cats on the prowl"

[rfmcdonald]

Mike Paluska's CBS Atlanta story about the National Geographic Society/University of Georgia Kitty Cams Project is enlightening. The video's great, although it also reinforces my determination to keep Shakespeare an indoors cat: the outside is dangerous!

National Geographic and the University of Georgia Kitty Cams Project captured the actions of cats wearing cameras on the collars from November 2010 to October 2011.

During that time, 55 cats collected an average of 37 hours of video a piece.

The videos show cats walking around their homes, stalking birds, eating lizards, walking through sewers and in some cases climbing trees and walking on roofs.

The goal of the project was to learn about the predatory practices of cats - specifically, how much wildlife they were killing in their suburban environments.

"Cats aren't as bad as the biologists thought," said Ph.D student Kerrie Anne Loyd.

[. . .]

Common household cats were required to wear the cameras for seven to 10 days when their owners let them out of the house.

During their research, researchers reviewed more than 2,000 hours of footage. They determined that the cats "did not hunt as much as we thought," according to Loyd.

"About 44 percent of cats engaged in predatory behavior. We found in suburban areas, they are catching small lizards and small snakes, so that was surprising. They were also eating worms and catching butterflies, things they would never bring home. So without this camera, we'd have no idea what they were doing," said Loyd.

The younger male cats were more prone to participate in what Loyd called "risky" behavior.

"Some cats do cross the road quite a bit, and are going down the storm drain and drinking run-off from the road," said Loyd.