Yesterday a nasty thing happened. I only heard the effects of it, but Em saw what had resulted in it. Around about mid-day yesterday we heard what sounded like a bird, screaming. I thought the inevitable must have happened and the bird had been caught by one of the Hitler cats that hang around our patch (they are called Hitler cats because they are black and white and have varying designs of “Hitler” moustaches on their faces). Sure enough, as Em went outside to investigate, she saw one said Hitler cat with a bird by its wing in the cats mouth. Em tried to get close to the cat to make it drop the bird, but the cat ran off, still with the bird in its mouth.
I knew that this was on the cards because the previous day I had witnessed the same cat very nearly catch another bird, despite the bird being in the relative safety of a bird table. The table is around 170cm tall at the tables base…and around the pole leading up to the table is a piece of non-stick plastic piping to prevent cats, squirrels, etc. from being able to climb the pole. It stands away from anything else that could be used to “prop up” any other animals entry into the house. Well, that didn’t stop Hitler cat. It just, from a sitting position, took a leap and managed to reach the base of the bird table and very nearly swipe a bird. The only thing that saved the bird was that the cat was air born and it had to reach for the side of the bird table to stop plummeting back down to Earth.
I dearly love both cats and birds, but if nothing else shows the force of nature over nurture in this world, surely the concept that Felis Silvestris Catus STILL, after thousands of years of domesticity, STILL wants to hunt birds is not clear evidence that nature wins, then I don’t know what does!
It’s tragic because while I was in Oz, I spent time watching my mums neighbours’ cat who showed almost no interest at all in birds, despite them coming within inches of it. It just did not care.